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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription, which takes about a 15% cut:

 

4. Donate by check. I get whatever you donate. Make the check payable to Robert Zimmerman and mail it to
 
Behind The Black
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You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


SLS rolled back to launch site for dress rehearsal countdown

NASA engineers today returned the agency’s SLS rocket to its launchpad for its next attempt to complete a full dress rehearsal countdown, completing the journey from the vehicle assembly building in 8 hours.

They will spend the next two weeks preparing the rocket for that dress rehearsal, with the two-day countdown to begin no no earlier than June 17th.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

7 comments

  • Ray Van Dune

    If the SLS passes its wet dress rehearsal, and EPA gives SpaceX the go-ahead in mid-June, we could see the start of an epic race between SLS and Starship to be the first to fly! If SpaceX gets to fly from Boca Chica, it may well win, but if it has to re-position to Cape Canaveral, SLS probably has the advantage. So SLS may hold the title of largest rocket to fly, but the smart money says it won’t be for long!

    Or will SpaceX be presented with a set of compliance requirements that are achievable enough to tempt it to continue efforts at Boca Chica until they can be met? An even more bizarre possibility looms… what if SpaceX is blocked, but the public uproar is so loud that Biden sees the chance to win votes in November by issuing an Executive Order to allow SpaceX to proceed! Just think, it might force Musk to keep a low profile instead of being anti-Biden, and certainly win votes in south Texas, where Dems are in trouble anyway!

    I hope SpaceX gets approval to launch and we have a clean race! If they do, I’ll bet they win!

  • the public uproar is so loud that Biden sees the chance to win votes in November by issuing an Executive Order to allow SpaceX to proceed!

    Ha ha ha, <gasp>, ha ha ha, <gasp>

    You greatly overestimate the number of people who care about SpaceX and greatly underestimate the ability to manufacture votes. “win votes [based on supporting American business]” – how quaintly last century.

  • Ray Van Dune

    Well, I did use the term “bizarre possibility”.

  • Am I paranoid to wonder if the Biden regime might try to take SpaceX from Elon Musk?
    Yes, I am.

  • This rocket is threatening to log more miles on the ground than it will in the air.

  • Gary: See my essay on this IG report, posted two hours ago.

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