Very brief descriptions, with appropriate links, of current or recent news items.
Couldn’t be soon enough for me! Two senate Republicans introduced a bill on Friday to defund public radio and television.
Great Britain has slashed its UN contribution, including eliminating all funds to four UN agencies. Key quote:
The British actions change the focus of the debate, from gauzy generalizations about the need for and importance of the U.N. to a realistic look at what it actually achieves.
The FAA is seeking funds for a new space prize, $5 million for launching a small payload into Earth orbit.
No further details are yet available. One wonders what the criteria will be, as many established companies already routinely launch payloads into orbit.
FOIA documents show that the TSA has plans to expand its jurisdiction to searching random people on city streets. More here.
Five hundred customers into space in the first year of operation.
The Glory climate satellite has crashed in the Pacific when its rocket failed during launch today.
The uncertainty of science: Unexpectedly large amounts of flowing water and refrozen ice found at the bottom of the Antarctic icecap. Key quote:
It’s too early to know whether this new finding means that global warming will melt ice sheets slower or faster than scientists have predicted. But the work does suggest that current models of ice sheet dynamics are missing a huge factor, said glaciologist Donald Blankenship of the University of Texas, Austin. “The take-home message of this work is that [the bottom of ice sheets] can no longer be ignored” in the models, he says.
The secrets of Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space project.
The new civility: Sheriff deputies find rounds of live ammunition outside the Wisconsin capitol building.
This is a typical union warning to those whom they dislike. When I was producing non-union movies in New York City back in the 1980s it was not unusual for me to find live rounds appearing in unexpected places on the set.
Judge gives Obama administration seven days to appeal or Obamacare is dead. And he really means it.
Cutting the federal budget — two weeks at a time.
A look at some truly different commercial caves.
This is both good and bad: Russia appears to lack enough available rockets to fulfill its 2011 launch plans.
The Leonardo cargo module was permanently installed on ISS yesterday.
Puncturing the myth that more roads mean more congestion Key quote:
Read enough of these studies and you get a sense that much of the induced-demand hubbub is really a sub rosa extension of the war on the suburbs: Stop highway expansion and you can make life miserable enough for the minivan-driving masses that they’ll move out of their gauche “urban-fringe developments” and back to high-density metropolitan cores, where they belong.
In reading the full essay, I was struck by how much the scientific campaign against road construction reminded me of climategate.
The launch of the Air Force’s second X-37B is set for March 4.
29 teams, one purchased ride, and one mystery for the Google Lunar X Prize.
Some thoughts on how a government shutdown would affect NASA.
The Soyuz fly-around of the space station to photograph it with the shuttle docked has been canceled.
Faced with pressure from Congress and the courts, Interior Secretary Salazar finally stopped stalling and issued late Monday the first Gulf of Mexico drilling permit since the BP oil spill.
As the 14 Wisconsin Democrats run, meet the numerous Illinois Tea Party activists giving chase.
Repeal Obamacare already! And for fifty straight weeks, the majority in every poll has agreed.
The civility of a mainstream Democrat lawmaker: “You Are F***king Dead!”
The crash of the computer that runs the station’s robot arm stranded a spacewalking astronaut in space for about 20 minutes yesterday.
The Southwest Research Institute has purchased two tickets from Virgin Galactic for its scientists to fly on SpaceShipTwo.
Not all space agencies (think NASA) have budget problems: India has given its space agency ISRO a 35% hike for 2011.
The sponge-like Saturn moon. Key quote:
Hyperion measures about 250kms across; it rotates chaotically and has a density so low that it might house a vast system of caverns inside.
R.I.P. Leif J. Robinson, who served as editor of Sky & Telescope for twenty years, passed away Sunday at the age of 71 at his home in Costa Rica.
