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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
c/o Robert Zimmerman
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Cortaro, AZ 85652

 

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.


SpaceX sets February 6 for first Falcon Heavy launch attempt

Capitalism in space: SpaceX has now scheduled February 6 as the date for its first attempt to launch its Falcon Heavy rocket.

I was amused by this tidbit from the article:

While a launch date has been set, the company still faces a regulatory obstacle ahead of the launch. The Federal Aviation Administration’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation has not yet issued a launch license for the Falcon Heavy, a requirement for a commercial launch such as this. Such licenses are often issued days ahead of a launch.

I dare the FAA to deny this launch a license. I just dare them.

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

9 comments

  • Joe From Houston

    We will see the battle for access to space right here, right now. It is long overdue.

  • ken anthony

    The moment the govt. says no, Elon will break ground on a new facility.

  • Michael

    No license no launch – new facility or no

  • wodun

    This will be the first SpaceX launch that I will go out of my way to watch for a long time. There is a lot of drama in the first flights/landings but there is also a lot of schedule slippage that makes trying to watch one a crap shoot. I am prepared for there to be no launch.

  • ken anthony

    Michael, there are plenty of island countries that would love to have their own space program. No licence just takes the FAA out of the picture.

    Govt. has its place. What most don’t realize is that place is not to tell us what we can or can’t do. England learned that lesson in 1776. America is working hard to relearn that lesson today (with more powerful fireworks.)

    CA is working on their 1860 lesson.

  • wayne

    ken–
    ref; “CA is working on their 1860 lesson.”
    >Good stuff!

    Alanis Morissette –
    Ironic
    https://youtu.be/Jne9t8sHpUc

  • Michael

    Ken

    This is true with respect to island countries. That’s where ITAR comes in.

    Don’t get me wrong. I am a strong supporter of SpaceX. I do not trust the government, to include NASA. SpaceX (and some others) is on the verge of making NASA irrelevant with the exception of unmanned science and planetary type missions, and maybe technology development.

    NASA is starting to become aware of this and bureaucracies will do anything to survive.

    I sometimes think that NASA should go back to the NACA model.

    I think we agree in the essentials but I guess I maybe be more paranoid that you.

  • Mike Borgelt

    yes, NASA needs to be NASRO – National Aero Space Research Office for technology development and another organisation called Office of Solar System Exploration – OSSE

  • ken anthony

    Right Mike, but remember, it ain’t really paranoia if they really are out to get ya!

    Watch what entirely predictable happens on mars. First they don’t care. Then when people make it valuable hey’ll claim to own it (for all of mankind’s bureaucrats.)

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