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The time has come for my annual short pre-Thanksgiving/Christmas fund drive for Behind The Black. I must do this every year in order to make sure I have earned enough money to pay my bills.

 

For this two-week campaign, I am offering a special deal to encourage donations. Donations of $200 will get a free autographed copy of the new paperback edition of Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, while donations of $250 will get a free autographed copy of the new hardback edition. If you desire a copy, make sure you provide me your address with your donation.

 

As I noted in July, the support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.

 

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Why Google blurs surface images of Israel, and why that blurring could end

Link here. A 1997 U.S. law requires that all satellite imagery of Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank be blurred. The law also sets the resolution standard based on the best images produced by other commercial companies outside the U.S.

NOAA is now reviewing the law, since high resolution European commercial images have been available since 2012. If it decides this is the new standard, high resolution views of this very politically hot region could become publicly available for free.

The article focuses on the wonderfully good things in science and research this change would bring. It completely ignores the use that terrorist organizations, set on killing as many Israelis as possible, could put to such images.

In general, I prefer freedom and the wide distribution of information. In this case I am torn.

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. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. 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

3 comments

  • Noah Peal

    Israel is in a war zone. Nothing wrong with covering one’s windows when at war.

  • Max

    Speaking of covering windows, the OPCW’s Report was just published on the gas attack in Syria. I’ll results and interviews have come back negative.

    https://www.opcw.org/news/article/opcw-issues-fact-finding-mission-reports-on-chemical-weapons-use-allegations-in-douma-syria-in-2018-and-in-al-hamadaniya-and-karm-al-tarrab-in-2016/

    I suppose this vindicates Russia. Another deep dark state fake news operation.
    Israel is still preparing for what’s going on across the border in Syria.

  • pzatchok

    Actually the OPCw report does not vindicate anyone.
    read the whole article. they even state themselves that their job and objective was to not find the offenders but to ONLY find evidence of chemical weapon use in the area.
    they admit to finding traces of Sarin gas, mustard gas and chlorine.
    They also found traces of explosives. Imagine that, explosives in a war zone.
    No data on when those chemicals were used.

    No real facts other than that.

    Here is a fact. They are still finding traces of Mustard gas in France from WWI.
    The chlorine could have come from a truckload of pure chlorine intended for water treatment use. Accidentally blow up the truck in a populated area and guess what you get? People dying from Chlorine poisoning.
    Unless someone intended to blow it up and then blame the other side. An act of a terrorist.

    A simple fact is, a single small chemical weapon attack on civilians is a terrorist act. For it to actually do anything other than scare people they would have to make more attacks and use it to drive people out of an area.
    A single attack is the act of a terrorist. Multiple attacks is a tactical attack.

    A terrorist attack has political ends, a tactical attack has a military end.

    What was gained from this attack? And who gained the most?

    Right after it happened what was called for in the news?

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