Protesters rampage against Kosher Cafe because owner supports Trump

6:49 pm

They are coming for you next: A Kosher cafe in Los Angeles has seen violent protests, including the throwing of feces against its windows, merely because the owner, an ordinary citizen, exercised his free speech prerogative to express support for President Trump.

What set the protest off is the local Chamber of Commerce, which was going to participate in the cafe’s grand opening. When this California organization, typical of fascist California, discovered the political leanings of the owner, however, it canceled his membership and backed out of the grand opening. It then apparently used its contacts in the community to whip up anger against the cafe itself.

“They really intensely protested and accosted all the visitors that came to our grand opening event,” said son David. “It was very scary,” said Shalom’s daughter Yael. “There was a lot of people protesting outside wearing masks […] and they threw a significant amount of feces at our windows.”

I wonder, maybe Californians might want to force these evil conservatives to wear gold stars, so they can be identified easily? Maybe they should all be tattooed, so that they can’t hide their evil political positions?

Why not? It now sure appears that if you dare express a dissenting opinion to the dominate leftist culture of California, they are going to send a mob after you, to threaten violence and to try to destroy you. Why not make it easy and gather up all these evil Republicans in one fell swoop? It would be such an easy and final solution.

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Threats by Portland Occupy ICE protesters force closure of homeless food cart

6:39 pm

They are coming for you next: Violent threats by Occupy ICE protesters in Portland have forced a food cart, whose profits were used to feed the homeless, to shut down.

Scott Hakes said some of the protesters told his daughter they would hurt her. He said the threats got worse after his daughter sold food to a DHS officer. “They’re constantly cussing at her and screaming at her. You know she’d finally had enough. She finally called me up on the phone, crying,” Scott Hakes said. “They already know what she drives. They see her walking around, and they run after her. You know, they videotape her, and they’re telling her they know where she’s at. And there’s no reason for it. She hasn’t done anything,” said Julie Hakes.

The cart, located at 0651 SW Bancroft St., is owned by the nonprofit homeless outreach organization, Operation Off The Grid, according to its Facebook page, and helps pay for food, clothing and hygiene products for the homeless. “Unfortunately, over the last month, we have been threatened and verbally attacked for not backing the immigration agenda at the DHS location and wanting to stay neutral and serve all who are hungry,” said a post on the cart’s Facebook page. “We tried repeatedly to try to work out peaceful solutions with the organizations and individuals protesting, but it all came back to being told almost daily to either support the anti-DHS agenda or suffer the consequences.”

The Happy Camper’s Facebook post says owners have not received any help from Portland police.

The Portland government is in league with these fascists. God forbid you are an ordinary citizen who happens to disagree with them. Expect to experience a modern version of Kristallnacht.

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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 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

New FISA release confirms Obama and FBI illegally conspired to spy on Trump

12:20 pm

Working for the Democratic Party: The release this weekend of the heavily redacted FISA application that apparently began the Russian collusion investigation at the FBI has confirmed that the warrant was obtained under false pretenses, and that Obama and FBI illegally used it to justify spying on Trump and the campaign of their political opponent.

Several takeaways noted in the article:

  • Peter Strzok is a liar, though this is hardly news
  • The FISA warrant hung entirely on the claim that Carter Page was working as a spy for the Russians, but two years later he has never been charged with any crimes, suggesting that his name was used merely as a tool to open the spying operation on Trump and the Republicans.
  • The FISA warrant was almost entirely dependent on the fake dossier that had been produced as opposition research by the Clinton campaign, paid for by Clinton campaign dollars, and was not verified then, and remains unverified now. In fact, it remains an absurd tissue of lies and falsifications that should never have been brought before a judge.

More here, including the fact that it appears the warrant application was far too dependent on news stories from partisan Democratic press outlets, information that is unverified and unacceptable to use as justification for a warrant to spy on any American, no less a presidential candidate, and by the opposing party as well.

Even more here, including showing that James Comey is also a blatant liar.

The first link above sums up as follows:

The FBI’s use of flimsy and uncorroborated evidence to support spying on Page, combined with the fact that a 3-month extension was granted despite the fact that it was obvious by June, 2017 he wasn’t a Russian agent, will most certainly embolden those, like President Trump, who have called the entire Russia investigation a “witch hunt.”

The second link also adds:

What I really want to know is the identity of the judge who signed off on the surveillance of Carter Page, based on such flimsy grounds. Some are speculating that he must be from Hawaii.

That judge should be removed from office.

Moreover, the entire FISA law should be repealed. It is unconstitutional, and designed to encourage the abuse of power by those in power. Not enough people are saying this, but it really is the fundamental takeaway from this whole scandal. Just because Obama abused the law does not mean Republicans won’t. It must be repealed.

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SpaceX successfully launches commercial communications satellite

9:54 am

Capitalism in space: SpaceX last night successfully launched Telstar 19v, a commercial communications satellite.

This was the second Block 5 rocket to fly successfully.

Correction: Previously I had said that these two flights served to satisfy NASA’s demands for seven successful Block 5 launches before they would certify it for commercial crew. It turns out that neither accomplishes this, because the tanks within are not the finalized versions. Thank you readers!

The leaders in the 2018 launch race:

20 China
13 SpaceX
8 Russia
5 ULA
4 Japan

In the national standings China is now only one launch ahead of the U.S., 20-19.

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Conscious Choice cover

Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!

From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.

 
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.  
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.

 

“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of the Mars Society.

 

All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. All editions can also be purchased direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from the author (hardback $29.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $6.00). Just send an email to zimmerman @ nasw dot org.

Starliner has propellant leak during launch abort test

9:28 am

Capitalism in space: Boeing’s Starliner capsule experienced a propellant leak near the end of a launch abort test in late June.

The company said it conducted a hot-fire test of the launch-abort engines on an integrated service module at the White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico in June. The engines successfully ignited and ran for the full duration, but during engine shutdown an anomaly occurred that resulted in a propellant leak. “We have been conducting a thorough investigation with assistance from our NASA and industry partners,” the statement said. “We are confident we found the cause and are moving forward with corrective action.”

The capsule being tested is an engineering model, not one that is intended to fly. Boeing also has said that “they believe there is an operational fix to the problem rather than a need to significantly rework the Starliner spacecraft itself.”

This incident however is certain to delay Boeing’s crew launch schedule, especially considering NASA’s own timidity about the privately built space capsules. The agency will insist on a complete review, no matter how long it takes, even if the company has pinpointed the problem already and has instituted corrections.

In a normal world, this event should not effect SpaceX’s schedule. I also expect however that the agency will use this event to slow SpaceX down again, demanding further reviews there as well.

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Leaving Earth cover

Leaving Earth: Space Stations, Rival Superpowers, and the Quest for Interplanetary Travel, can be purchased as an ebook everywhere for only $3.99 (before discount) at amazon, Barnes & Noble, all ebook vendors, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.

If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big oppressive tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Winner of the 2003 Eugene M. Emme Award of the American Astronautical Society.

 
"Leaving Earth is one of the best and certainly the most comprehensive summary of our drive into space that I have ever read. It will be invaluable to future scholars because it will tell them how the next chapter of human history opened." -- Arthur C. Clarke

Europe initiates website to name ExoMars 2020 rover

9:26 am

The European Space Agency has created a website where people can offer their suggestions to name the ExoMars 2020 rover.

Astronaut Tim Peake is leading the hunt for a great moniker. He wants everyone to go to a special website set up for the purpose and enter a suggestion. But don’t think “Spacey McSpaceFace” is a goer because this is not an online poll. All ideas will be put before an expert panel and it is they who will make the final choice.

If all goes right, 2020 should see two new rovers arrive on the Martian surface.

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“They’re coming for you next.”

3:57 pm

This week we had a number of really ugly examples of the hate the left has for anyone who might dare express an opinion that might suggest even the slightest support for President Donald Trump.

But then, how is this week different from any other week since Trump was elected president in 2016?

The top example however is how Judge Jeanine Pirro was treated when she appeared on the The View. I have embedded the video below. You must force yourself to watch. It is painful and ugly, but the hate and very clear close-mindedness of those who disagreed with her, especially from Whoopie Goldberg, illustrates well the terrible state we are in.


» Read more

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Most biomedical research cannot be replicated

9:13 am

New studies looking at the work of scientists in the biomedical field has found that their research is difficult if not impossible to replicate, partly because much of their raw data is never made available for other researchers to review.

But over the past several years, a growing contingent of scientists has begun to question the accepted veracity of published research—even after it’s cleared the hurdles of peer review and appears in widely respected journals. The problem is a pervasive inability to replicate a large proportion of the results across numerous disciplines.

In 2005, for instance, John Ioannidis, a professor of medicine at Stanford University, used several simulations to show that scientific claims are more likely to be false than true. And this past summer Brian Nosek, a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, attempted to replicate the findings of 100 psychology studies and found that only 39 percent of the results held up under rigorous re-testing. “There are multiple lines of evidence, both theoretical and empirical, that have begun to bring the reproducibility of a substantial segment of scientific literature into question,” says Ioannidis. “We are getting millions of papers that go nowhere.”

There’s a lot more. Read it all. It appears that much if not all of biomedical research is suspect. Their conclusions might be correct, but their methods are questionable, at best.

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Trump administration proposes revisions to Endangered Species Act

8:58 am

The Trump administration has proposed some regulatory revisions to Endangered Species Act that would scale back somewhat its sometime draconian powers.

The proposed regulatory changes are both technical and consequential. One, for instance, bears the deceptively dull title of “elimination of blanket 4(d) rule” (E&E News PM, 4 April). The ESA prohibits the “take” of species designated as endangered, while Section 4(d) of the law allows the agency to establish special regulations for threatened species. In 1978, FWS used this authority to extend the prohibition of take to all threatened species. This is known as the “blanket 4(d) rule.”

Take covers a wide range of actions, including those that “harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture or collect” a threatened or endangered species. This blanket 4(d) rule for threatened species can be modified by a species-specific 4(d) rule.

Conservatives and private-property advocates have previously sought to scale back the blanket 4(d) rule, which they say erases what should be a meaningful distinction between threatened and endangered species. The proposal would cover only future listings. “Some of our regulations were promulgated back in 1986, and frankly, a great deal has been learned by the agencies administering the act and by the public,” Deputy Interior Secretary David Bernhardt told reporters today.

Another change would establish that the “foreseeable future” definition used in making ESA listing decisions extends only so far as officials “can reasonably determine that the conditions posing the potential danger of extinction are probable.”

A potentially key change involves critical habitats, which are areas important for recovery of a species. Sometimes an area can be considered important for recovery even when it is not currently occupied by the species in question. Under the new proposal, FWS and NOAA Fisheries will designate unoccupied critical habitat only when the occupied areas are inadequate to ensure the conservation of the species or if inclusion of unoccupied areas would yield certain other specified benefits.

In some “rare” cases, officials say, there may be no critical habitat designated.

The article above, from the journal Science, shocked me by its reasonable discussion of these proposed changes. I had expected an anti-Trump screed, similar to the original version of this Daily Mail article from yesterday. Today it reads more reasonably, but yesterday the article was far more devoted to airing opposition to the Trump proposals.

No matter. There is madness out there, it has taken possession of the entire anti-Trump community. It won’t make a difference how reasonable the administration’s proposals might be, there will be over-the-top declarations about the evils of these proposals and how they will destroy everything.

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A detailed look at upcoming SpaceX launch recovery operations

11:19 pm

Link here. They are expanding their drone fleet and their capsule recovery fleet. Though we should expect some big developments in the coming year, there was also this tidbit:

Earlier this year, the company’s president Gwynne Shotwell told CNBC that next year will see a decrease in the company’s launch cadence. The slip is due to a decline in the number of large geostationary communications satellites needing a launch.

Missions to a geostationary transfer orbit make up the majority of launches requiring a droneship recovery. Therefore, it is unlikely that two east coast droneships will be needed to support Falcon 9 over the next year or two.

It appears that after five years of effort, SpaceX has finally begun to clean out its backlog of contracted launches, caused by the initial development delays of the Falcon 9 and its two failures.

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China developing a robot satellite refueling spacecraft

11:11 pm

The new colonial movement: China today reported that it is developing a robot satellite that would attach itself to satellites that are out of fuel and use its own fuel to make the spacecraft usable again.

Hu Di, the chief designer of the vehicle, said compared with foreign research that focuses on refueling satellites that have run out of fuel, their option is much simpler and efficient. The vehicle will take about two years to complete.

Hu Di is wrong. In fact, I wonder if they have stolen this idea from Northrop Grumman, which as Orbital ATK has been developing a project exactly like this for several years.

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Hayabusa-2 finds Ryugu covered with scattered large boulders

11:02 pm

Hayabusa-2 has found that the asteroid Ryugu is covered with many scattered large boulders.

The Hayabusa 2 space probe discovered many boulders scattered on the asteroid Ryugu, suggesting it was formed from fragments of other celestial bodies, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said July 19. More than 100 rocks larger than 8 meters in length were confirmed on the surface of the “spinning top” asteroid from images captured by Hayabusa 2, according to JAXA. The largest boulder was about 130 meters in length near the south pole.

The rocks are likely too big to be meteor fragments from collisions with Ryugu, which has a diameter of about 900 meters. “(The finding) is compelling evidence to prove that the Ryugu asteroid was formed by fragments of larger celestial bodies,” said Seiichiro Watanabe, head of the study team and professor of Nagoya University.

The asteroid’s slightly tilted axis of rotation gives Ryugu two seasons: summer and winter. Hayabusa 2 found the temperature ranged from about 20 to 100 degrees on Ryugu’s surface.

Surprise! This finding makes Ryugu very different from every other asteroid previously visited. Most have had relatively smooth surfaces, with lots of dust.

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Dust storm update on Mars

2:03 pm

Link here. This press release basically reviews what each Martian spacecraft, in orbit or on the surface, is doing to study or survive the global dust storm that erupted on Mars in in early June.

The storm itself has not yet eased, and the general expectation is that it will last for a couple of months, through August.

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Global mosiacs of Titan in infrared

8:53 am

Titan in infrared

The Cassini science team today released global infrared mosaics of Titan, created from images accumulated during the more than 100 fly-bys of the moon during the spacecraft’s thirteen years in orbit around Saturn.

The image on the right, cropped and reduced in resolution to post here, is only one such global mosaic. Go to the story to see them all.

Making mosaics of VIMS images of Titan has always been a challenge because the data were obtained over many different flybys with different observing geometries and atmospheric conditions. One result is that very prominent seams appear in the mosaics that are quite difficult for imaging scientists to remove. But, through laborious and detailed analyses of the data, along with time consuming hand processing of the mosaics, the seams have been mostly removed. This is an update to the work previously discussed in PIA20022.

Any full color image is comprised of three color channels: red, green and blue. Each of the three color channels combined to create these views was produced using a ratio between the brightness of Titan’s surface at two different wavelengths (1.59/1.27 microns [red], 2.03/1.27 microns [green] and 1.27/1.08 microns [blue]). This technique (called a “band-ratio” technique) reduces the prominence of seams, as well as emphasizing subtle spectral variations in the materials on Titan’s surface. For example, the moon’s equatorial dune fields appear a consistent brown color here. There are also bluish and purplish areas that may have different compositions from the other bright areas, and may be enriched in water ice.

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July 17, 2018 Zimmerman/Livingston podcast

1:32 pm

The podcast of my two hour appearance on The Space Show is now available here. I like this quote from David’s summary of the program at the link:

Bob spent the better part of the first segment of the program responding to Linda and in the customary Zimmerman fashion, making the case for private commercial space to champion because of freedom and liberty and the core values of the country.

Twas a really interesting show. Lots of very good questions as well as intriguing dialogue from callers.

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New close-up images of Ceres

12:15 pm

Cerealia Facula on Ceres

Cool image time! The image on the right, cropped and reduced in resolution to post here, is one of two images released today by the Dawn science team of the double bright spots found in Occator Crater, taken from the spacecraft’s tight final orbit above Ceres. This image shows what they have dubbed Cerealia Facula. The second image shows Vinalia Faculae.

This mosaic of Cerealia Facula is based on images obtained by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft in its second extended mission, from an altitude as low as about 21 miles (34 kilometers). The contrast in resolution obtained by the two phases is visible here, reflected by a few gaps in the high-resolution coverage. This image is superposed to a similar scene acquired in the low-altitude mapping orbit of the mission from an altitude of about 240 miles (385 km).

Inset of Cerealia Facula

The second image on the left is a crop at full resolution of the area in the white box above. This gives you a taste of the many interesting things found in the full resolution image. For example, the bright spots scattered throughout this image suggest they are recent upwellings from below. The ridgelines in the upper right are either the remains of the water-ice volcano they think once stood here but subsequently slumped back down to form a depression, or pressure ridges being pushed up by later upwellings.

The full image has lots more. So does the image of Vinalia Faculae. Check them out.

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