Category: Behind The Black

Falcon 9 Dragon launch to set used booster turnaround record

9:19 am

Capitalism in space: The planned launch on June 29th of Dragon to ISS will set a new turnaround record for a used first stage, just over two months.

This first stage is not a Block 5 first stage, it is the last older Block 4. What this quick turnaround means for the upcoming Block 5 launches however is important.

Although CRS-15 will likely see its venerable Block 4 Falcon 9 booster expended in the ocean without a recovery attempt, the speed of Falcon 9 B1045’s refurbishment is thrilling for another, more abstract reason: if the design functions largely as intended, a Falcon 9 Block 5 booster should be able to handily crush that already impressive record with ease, and one will perhaps do just that within a handful of months of this launch.

Currently scheduled for no earlier than (NET) July 19 and late July to early August, the Telstar 19V and 18V communications satellites will require their own Block 5 launches roughly a month from today, and July 20’s Iridium NEXT-7 mission will further require its own Falcon 9 Block 5 booster for a mission from California. It remains to be seen what boosters will launch those three missions, as well as an additional two SpaceX missions tentatively scheduled for August and September.

In other words, there is a very strong likelihood that SpaceX will be reusing its Block 5 boosters almost immediately this summer.

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Ryugu from 25 miles

8:56 am

Ryugu from 25 miles

The Hayabusa-2 science team has released its first image of Ryugu, posted to the right, from a distance of only 25 miles. From the project manager:

The shape of Ryugu is now revealed. From a distance, Ryugu initially appeared round, then gradually turned into a square before becoming a beautiful shape similar to fluorite [known as the ‘firefly stone’ in Japanese]. Now, craters are visible, rocks are visible and the geographical features are seen to vary from place to place. This form of Ryugu is scientifically surprising and also poses a few engineering challenges.

First of all, the rotation axis of the asteroid is perpendicular to the orbit. This fact increases the degrees of freedom for landing and the rover decent operations. On the other hand, there is a peak in the vicinity of the equator and a number of large craters, which makes the selection of the landing points both interesting and difficult. Globally, the asteroid also has a shape like fluorite (or maybe an abacus bead?). This means we expect the direction of the gravitational force on the wide areas of the asteroid surface to not point directly down. We therefore need a detailed investigation of these properties to formulate our future operation plans.

They are going to have to spend some time in orbit to figure out not only where to land, but how to do it. More information on the mission can be found here.

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U.S. suspends payments to Palestinian Authority

12:08 am

Years late: According to one Israeli news source, the United States has suspended all aid to the Palestinian Authority, beginning in May.

I24 News, which is based in Israel, reported Monday that the U.S. froze funding as part of the Taylor Force Act, which requires Palestinian officials to end payments to terrorist groups and take steps to stop those groups’ behavior.

The news outlet, citing a White House official and a Senate aide, also reported that certain Palestinian programs have been put on hold because the West Bank and Gaza office of USAID have not received a budget for the coming year. USAID provides funding for foreign development projects.

An official with one of those programs told i24 News that the U.S. stopped transferring funds at the end of May.

It appears that the Trump administration did this to underline the Palestinian leadership’s continuing support of terrorism and its unwillingness to accept any peace deal with Israel. It also appears that the Trump administration has successfully garnered the support of many Arab nations in this effort.

Without funds, the corrupt leadership in both the West Bank and Gaza will find itself very vulnerable. We could therefore see some very interesting and I think positive developments in the next year.

One more note: It is a disgrace that neither Bush nor Obama had the courage to do this earlier, even though it has been obvious for years that the Palestinian leadership was using U.S. aid to support terrorist acts. Their lack of action in this area suggests that neither was ever very serious about negotiating a peace deal.

Update: More information here concerning the Trump administration’s cuts to aid to Gaza.

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Trump administration to remove climate change from NOAA’s priorities

2:40 pm

According to one interpretation of a presentation by the Acting head of the Department of Commerce, the Trump administration to going to remove climate change from NOAA’s priorities.

Because of its work on climate science data collection and analysis, [NOAA] has become one of the most important American agencies for making sense of the warming planet. But that focus may shift, according to a slide presentation at a Department of Commerce meeting by Tim Gallaudet, the acting head of the agency.

In the presentation, which included descriptions of the past and present missions for the agency, the past mission listed three items, starting with “to understand and predict changes in climate, weather, oceans and coasts.” In contrast, for the present mission, the word “climate” was gone, and the first line was replaced with “to observe, understand and predict atmospheric and ocean conditions.”

The presentation also included a new emphasis: “To protect lives and property, empower the economy, and support homeland and national security.”

The job of NOAA, if it should have any job at all, should always have been to make observations and collect data. The interpretation and predictions should be left to others. By inserting the issue of climate change into its core priorities the agency’s work was almost guaranteed to become distorted and corrupted by politics. And that is exactly what we have seen.

Expect this change to cause more howls from the left. Expect even more howls when this change forces the Trump administration to start to take a close look at NOAA’s data — something they have not yet done — and discovers the amount of unjustified tampering to it, all aimed at proving the existence of global warming.

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Dragon cargo fees to rise, due to NASA demands

12:12 pm

A government audit has found that the fees that SpaceX charges for its Dragon cargo missions to ISS will rise as much as 50%, and the cause of that price rise is almost entirely due to NASA redesign demands.

[T]he auditors pinned much of the blame on NASA for the increase. They also emphasized that the program still seems like a good deal for lowering launch costs. Auditors cited NASA for missing opportunities to cut redundancies and bargain on pricing, and noted that the agency forced SpaceX to (expensively) redesign its Dragon spaceship from the bottom up.

The report did hint, however, that SpaceX has done some reckoning as the startup has matured. “[SpaceX] also indicated that their CRS-2 pricing reflected a better understanding of the costs involved after several years of experience with cargo resupply missions,” the auditors wrote. (A SpaceX representative declined to comment on the report.)

None of this is a surprise. There are factions in NASA that have been working for the past decade to stymie or defeat the arrival of privately built and owned spacecraft like Dragon, as it makes the NASA-built spacecraft like Orion look bad. By demanding redesigns that raise the cost for Dragon, these factions gain ammunition to attack it. I guarantee we will see op-eds doing exactly that in the next year.

No matter. In the end the private market still does it better and cheaper than the government, as the audit found.

Despite the cost increases, the report ultimately called the CRS contracts with private companies “positive steps” for NASA — especially since the agency could find discounts by launching cargo on used SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket boosters. “NASA’s continued commitment to the commercial space industry also helps spur innovations in the commercial launch vehicle market,” the auditors said.

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Coldest place on Earth is even colder

12:01 pm

The uncertainty of science: Scientists have found that the coldest place on Earth in Antarctica is even colder than previously believed.

Scientists announced in 2013 they had found the lowest temperatures on Earth’s surface: Sensors on several Earth-observing satellites measured temperatures of minus 93 degrees Celsius (minus 135 degrees Fahrenheit) in several spots on the East Antarctic Plateau, a high snowy plateau in central Antarctica that encompasses the South Pole. But the researchers revised that initial study with new data and found the temperatures actually reach minus 98 degrees Celsius (minus 144 degrees Fahrenheit) during the southern polar night, mostly during July and August.

When the researchers first announced they had found the coldest temperatures on Earth five years ago, they determined that persistent clear skies and light winds are required for temperatures to dip this low. But the new study adds a twist to the story: Not only are clear skies necessary, but the air must also be extremely dry, because water vapor traps some heat in the air.

They say this is about as cold as it is possible on the Earth’s surface, as it presently exists.

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Supreme Court again rules in favor of religious freedom

10:47 am

A victory for freedom: The Supreme Court today ruled again that a business owner has the right to refuse service in cases where that service will violate their religious beliefs.

On Monday, the Supreme Court ruled that a Washington state court would have to reconsider its ruling against a florist who served a gay couple for over ten years but would not do their wedding flowers. The Supreme Court’s decision was catalyzed by their ruling in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case in which they ruled for Colorado baker Jack Phillips.

As noted, this decision was strengthened by Court’s earlier ruling in connection with a bakery that refused to bake a cake for a homosexual wedding. The new ruling further confirms that earlier ruling.

Both rulings also clearly imply that a constitutional approval exists should a restaurant owner decide they wish to refuse service to someone because that owner disagrees with the customer’s political beliefs, as happened this past weekend to Trump administration press secretary Sandra Sanders. I agree. Freedom says a business owner should have this freedom.

The public likewise should have the freedom to condemn the business and its refusal of service, whether it be a restaurant, bakery, or florist. If the denial of service results in lost sales, that will also be an expression of freedom. Freedom carries risk. It requires personal responsibility. Business owners must recognize that any time they deny services for political or religious reasons, they might find they have hurt their business. So be it.

In all cases however the government must not be involved, which is what made actions against the Christian bakers and florists and photographers so egregious. It wasn’t the market and freedom making a judgement, it was government officials with their own political agendas. Thank goodness the Supreme Court has acted to shut this down.

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A NASA astronaut’s detailed look at Dragon and Starliner

8:27 am

Link here. Lots of interesting details about both spacecraft from an experienced astronaut’s perspective.

The Commercial Crew program will launch uncrewed ships first. SpaceX is aiming to do that in September and Boeing in October. If successful, crewed launches will follow on December 31 (Boeing) and January 17 (SpaceX).

“We’ve gotten into the cockpit in both spacecraft. We’ve run through parts of the profile, from launch to rendezvous docking, un-docking, and [atmospheric] entry. But everything’s not been tied up, not quite yet,” Williams said. She didn’t say which company’s spaceship is her favorite.

In fact, crewed launch dates may slip to mid-2019. Williams said she expects NASA to announce her official mission selection this summer, and from there about a year of more deliberate mission training will follow.

This is a delay from the previously planned summer launches. This had been expected, but it also looks like both companies are trying hard to get things off the ground this year.

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Buzz Aldrin sues his own family

10:04 am

Buzz Aldrin has sued his own family in response to disagreements about the management of his financial affairs.

This is one of those stories that is hard to interpret or analyze. The facts as presented by either side could justify their actions, and thus it is hard to say what really caused the rift. It will require a full court case to settle it.

Regardless, this does seem to be the kind of craziness that often follows Buzz Aldrin wherever he goes.

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The ship cut in half

6:01 pm

An evening pause: The youtube page explains:

Norwegian cruise ship “Braemar” was literally split in half. Carried out at the shipyard in Hamburg operation was aimed at extending the hull by 30 feet. Between the two separated parts inserted third. The ship was repainted and with a new name – “Balmoral” – went on another tour.

Hat tip Edward Thelen.

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Supreme Court rules warrant required to gather cell phone data

9:17 am

Well duh: The Supreme Court today ruled that the police must get a warrant in order to gather cell phone GPS data from anyone’s phone.

In a 5-4 decision on Friday the justices said that police need warrants to gather phone location data as evidence for trials. That reversed and remanded a decision by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Carpenter v. United States is the first case about phone location data that the Supreme Court has ruled on. That makes it a landmark decision regarding how law enforcement agencies can use technology as they build cases. The court heard arguments in the case on Nov. 29.

The dispute dates back to a 2011 robbery in Detroit, after which police gathered months of phone location data from Timothy Carpenter’s phone provider. They pulled together 12,898 different locations from Carpenter, over 127 days.

The legal and privacy concern was that police gathered the four months’ worth of Carpenter’s digital footprints without a warrant. A Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals judge ruled that cellphone location data is not protected by the Fourth Amendment, which forbids unreasonable search and seizure, and therefore didn’t require a warrant.

In the Supreme Court’s ruling, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that the government’s searches of Carpenter’s phone records were considered a Fourth Amendment search.

That the decision was 5-4 is absurd. The language of the fourth amendment is simple and clear. That there is any doubt about the illegality of the police data gathering here speaks badly on the four justices who dissented.

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SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy wins Air Force launch contract

8:45 am

Capitalism in space: SpaceX has won a $130 million Air Force contract to use its Falcon Heavy rocket to launch a military satellite.

The Falcon Heavy beat out a bid from United Launch Alliance for the mission labeled Air Force Space Command-52, or AFSPC-52, which is targeting liftoff from KSC’s pad 39A in 2020.

United Launch Alliance’s most powerful launcher, the Delta IV Heavy, has a price tag approaching $400 million.

The price comparison bears repeating: ULA: $400 million, SpaceX: $130. It is not surprising that SpaceX got the contract, though it does illustrate the difference between the Air Force’s space effort and NASA’s. The Air Force is making a concrete and real effort to lower its launch costs, using competition as a tool to do so. NASA, which faces the same kind of price comparison when comparing SLS to SpaceX, continues however to ignore that price difference and insist its future interplanetary manned programs must go with SLS, and SLS only.

In this context, I think this graph from Capitalism in Space is worth another look:

SLS vs commercial space

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Hawaii’s Supreme Court to review TMT’s permit, again

8:36 am

Hawaii’s Supreme Court is set to review, for the second time, the construction permit for the Thirty Meter Telescope.

Much of the arguments centered around whether it was a conflict of interest for a hearings officer who made a key recommendation in favor of the project to be a member of a Hawaii astronomy center. The state allowed retired judge Riki May Amano to preside over contested-case hearings for the contentious project despite complaints from telescope opponents who decried her paid membership to the Imiloa Astronomy Center.

The Big Island center is connected to the University of Hawaii, which is the permit applicant.

Opponents appealed to the Supreme Court after Amano recommended granting the permit and the state land board approved it. “She should have never presided over the case,” Richard Wurdeman, an attorney representing telescope opponents, told the justices. He noted the center included exhibits about the project planned for the Big Island’s Mauna Kea, Hawaii’s tallest mountain.

The details don’t really matter. Nor will the decision. The protesters will simply find another petty issue if they lose, and will appeal again. Their goal, apparently supported covertly by Hawaii’s Democratic government, is to delay, delay, and delay, until the consortium building TMT is forced to abandon Hawaii.

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McCain’s office joined Democrats in encouraging IRS to harass conservatives

7:54 pm

Working for the Democratic Party: Newly released documents show that an official working for Senator John McCain’s (R-Arizona) joined the Democrats in encouraging the IRS to harass conservative groups.

Judicial Watch today released newly obtained internal IRS documents, including material revealing that Sen. John McCain’s former staff director and chief counsel on the Senate Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee, Henry Kerner, urged top IRS officials, including then-director of exempt organizations Lois Lerner, to “audit so many that it becomes financially ruinous.” [emphasis mine]

Want to what really stinks about this? The meeting where McCain’s staffer suggested this came only ten days before Lois Lerner “admitted that the IRS had a policy of improperly and deliberately delaying applications for tax-exempt status from conservative non-profit groups.” In other words, McCain was all-in with the idea of weaponizing the IRS for political purposes.

Want to know what stinks even more? Henry Kerner was appointed by President Trump in 2017 to take over the Office of Special Council, a federal office focused on protecting whistleblowers while acting as a watchdog to prevent partisan political action by government agencies, in violation of the Hatch Act.

Boy, that sure is draining the swamp, President Trump. Keep at it!

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Too much hate

12:54 pm

I will admit that my posting right now is somewhat lax, mostly because I am depressed and appalled at the level of hate and vitriol coming from the left, against Trump, against his family and children, against Republicans, against anyone who dares express an opinion or take an action that the left disagrees with.

The stories below are only a very very very small sample of similar stories in the past two weeks.

The last story has one further important detail: One of the thugs who harassed Nielsen in the restaurant also works at the Department of Justice.

Civilized people do not act this way. It is beyond the pale, and if it doesn’t stop some very bad things are going to happen, and happen very soon.

Much of this recent hate is centered on Trump’s tough immigration policy, and is generally based on ignorance and emotion, or downright disinformation. Somehow, all the problems we face are Trump’s fault, even though Trump’s arrest policy for illegal immigrants is merely the same policy followed by the Obama administration, but enforced in a more aggressive manner. (Unlike under Obama, no one is being released under their own recognizance.) It is also a policy that is following laws written and passed back in 2008, and signed by Republican president George Bush.

It is perfectly reasonable to disagree with Trump’s approach on immigration and to try to get it changed. Readers of this website know that I myself disagree strongly with Trump on many issues, and have had decidedly mixed opinions so far about the success or failure of his presidency.

To threaten, harass, shout curses, and menace the children of lawmakers over these issues however is unacceptable. It does not solve anything, and can only lead to worse injustices.

I find this situation even more depressing because I do not see anything changing for the better. Instead, I see it getting worse, day by day. The left will simply not accept the results of the 2016 election, and appears willing to do anything to overturn it. Nor do I see the type of voter groundswell necessary that will tell the leaders on the left that this behavior must stop. Their voters remain firmly on their side, and if anything, quite willing to endorse the hate and invective being spouted by their leaders.

So, forgive me if I am “going Galt” over this. I am an optimist at heart, and like to write about positive human endeavors. Unfortunately, it is harder to spot these positive endeavors when the culture is overwhelmed by a dust storm of hate.

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Obama administration ordered a “stand down” of work to stop Russian election interference

10:02 am

The real Russian collusion: When it was evident that the Russians were trying to use the internet to interfere with the election in August 2016, the Obama administration instead ordered a “stand down” of any work that might have stopped that interference.

Former President Barack Obama’s cybersecurity czar confirmed Wednesday that former national security adviser Susan Rice told him to “stand down” in response to Russian cyber attacks during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Michael Daniel, whose official title was “cybersecurity coordinator,” confirmed the stand-down order during a Senate Select Committee on Intelligence hearing held to review the Obama and President Donald Trump’s administrations’ policy response to Russian election interference.

…“Don’t get ahead of us,” [Rice] told Daniel in a meeting in August 2016, according to the book.

Daniel informed his staff of the order, much to their frustration. “I was incredulous and in disbelief,” Daniel Prieto, who worked under Daniel, is quoted saying in “Russian Roulette.”

“Why the hell are we standing down? Michael, can you help us understand?” Prieto asked.

It appears that the Obama administration wanted the Russians to interfere with the election, and this desire was part of their effort at the FBI to frame the Russian collusion story on Trump. They needed the interference to justify the FBI Russian investigation, which had just been instigated in late July 2016. Stopping the Russians (and defending the American electoral process) was therefore not in their interest.

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UAE signs deal with Russia for UAE astronaut flight

9:50 am

The new colonial movement: The United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Russia signed an agreement this week to fly an UAE astronaut on a Russian Soyuz capsule to ISS in April 2019.

The mission will be a standard 10-day tourist mission, though of course they are not describing it like that. The announcement also does not state if the UAE paid Russia for this flight, but I expect so, just like any tourist flight. The price however was likely a lot less than Russia has been squeezing from the U.S. for its astronaut flights. UAE had also been discussing this with China, and the competition probably forced Russia to lower its price.

I had been hoping that one of the U.S.’s commercial capsules could have gotten this business, but because of the delays NASA has imposed on their initial launches, they haven’t yet flown, so they lost the chance to compete for this.

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European satellite designed to test space junk removal released from ISS

9:40 am

Europe’s RemoveDEBRIS satellite was released from ISS yesterday in preparation for its testing a variety of technologies for removing and deorbiting space junk.

The article at the link does a terrible job trying to describe this mission. Better to return to a news story from 2016, when Europe first announced this project. The video from that story, embedded below the fold, does an excellent job detailing the four experiments, which are mostly aimed at testing technologies that could be added to satellites that would make either their capture or deorbit easier.

Maybe the most interesting aspect of this mission however is how it got into space. It was launched as part of a SpaceX Dragon cargo mission. It was deployed by NanoRacks, using its privately developed deployment system attached to Japan’s Kibo module.

Launch from ISS means that the satellite’s deployment and orbit were far more controllable than if it had been launched directly into space as a secondary payload during a rocket launch. NanoRacks is selling this approach commercially, and this satellite is the largest deployed by them to date.
» Read more

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Deorbit soon for China’s second test space station module?

9:14 am

China has lowered the orbit of Tiangong-2, its second test space station module, suggesting that they intend to deorbit the station in a controlled manner in the near future.

Orbital information published by the U.S. Strategic Command’s Joint Force Space Component Command, through the Joint Space Operations Center, indicates that Tiangong-2 has moved from an altitude of around 380 by 386 kilometers down to 292 by 297 kilometers.

No announcement regarding the status of the Tiangong-2 space lab has been made. The China Manned Space Engineering Office (CMSE), which manages China’s human spaceflight and space station related missions, did not respond to a SpaceNews request for comment.

Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, told SpaceNews that, “it seems likely that the lowering of Tiangong-2’s orbit is the first step in safely disposing of it.”

Like Tiangong-1, this module was built to test a variety of technologies required for China’s full size station, planned for assembly in the next two years. Unlike Tiangong-1, they have not lost control of it, so they will be able to deorbit it properly.

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On the radio

12:59 pm

I will be spending a half hour today at 5:05 pm (Central) with Robert Pratt of Pratt on Texas, aired on 790-AM KFYO in Lubbock, 1470-AM KYYW in Abilene, and 1290-AM KWFS in Wichita Falls.

The subject will be the recent successful legal push back by conservatives against the oppressive lies from the left, as outlined in my post earlier this week, Some victories against modern leftist oppression.

And it appears that this push back is gaining steam, something we will certainly discuss.

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Martian dust storm goes global

12:51 pm

Data from orbit and from Curiosity at Gale Crater confirms that the dust storm that has shut down Opportunity is now a global storm, encircling Mars.

The Martian dust storm has grown in size and is now officially a “planet-encircling” (or “global”) dust event.

Though Curiosity is on the other side of Mars from Opportunity, dust has steadily increased over it, more than doubling over the weekend. The sunlight-blocking haze, called “tau,” is now above 8.0 at Gale Crater — the highest tau the mission has ever recorded. Tau was last measured near 11 over Opportunity, thick enough that accurate measurements are no longer possible for Mars’ oldest active rover.

This will be first global storm to occur on Mars since Curiosity landed in 2012, thus giving scientists the best opportunity to study such an event.

Meanwhile, Opportunity remains silent. This does not mean it is dead, but that it doesn’t have enough sunlight to charge its batteries. It might die during this storm if the storm lasts long enough, but we won’t know one way or the other until the storm finally eases.

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Senate kills House bill to cut $15 billion from passed $300 billion spending deal

11:29 am

Failure theater: The Senate today killed a House bill that would have cut $15 billion from the $300 billion spending deal passed in March.

In a 48-50 vote, senators failed to discharge the measure from committee. A majority vote was needed.

GOP Sens. Richard Burr (N.C.) and Susan Collins (Maine) joined 48 members of the Democratic caucus in voting against bringing up the bill. “My belief … is that it’s the job of Congress to comb through these accounts and that’s what we do on the appropriations committee,” Collins said.

The vote is a blow to conservatives and the White House, who pushed the package in response to backlash from the GOP base over a mammoth rescissions package passed in March.

I wish Burr and Collins would simply switch parties. At least that way there would be no way for them to fool anyone into thinking they believe in smaller government or controlling spending.

The bill was garbage anyway, as it really did little to really promote smaller government or controlled spending. All it did was give House Republicans a fake talking point when they campaign for re-election in the fall. “I fought to cut the budget!” they will scream, citing the House vote that passed the bill, even though they all knew the bill did little, and that it was almost certain the Senate would kill it.

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