Tag: bankruptcy

As Space Force switches to capitalism model for its satellites, it will also not name the companies it hires

9:58 am

Capitalism in space: The main reason President Trump got the Space Force established in his first term was because the Air Force resisted rethinking its space military operations. It insisted on building large government-built satellites that took years to complete and always went overbudget and behind schedule.

The creation of the Space Force gave new people the ability to push for a major change, switching to the capitalism model whereby the government designed and built nothing but instead acted as a customer buying what it needed from the private sector. In addition, it allowed a major shift from those big satellites — easy targets for destruction — to the large private constellations of many small satellites, cheap to build and launch and difficult for other militaries to take out.

The Space Force — in order to protect the satellite companies it hires to build these satellites — has now announced that it will no longer publish the names of those companies.

The U.S. Space Force plans to keep the names of commercial companies participating in its new space reserve program under wraps, aiming to protect them from potential adversary threats as commercial satellites play a growing role in military operations.

Col. Richard Kniseley, director of the Space Force’s Commercial Space Office, said companies signing agreements under the Commercial Augmentation Space Reserve (CASR) program can disclose their participation but are not required to. “That potentially puts a target on their back,” Kniseley told SpaceNews, underscoring the risk to private-sector firms providing space-based services during wartime.

Under this program, the Space Force has already signed contracts with four satellite companies, but the names remain undisclosed.

Though there is some logic to this decision, it carries great risk of corruption and misbehavior. Almost every time government bureaucrats and private companies are allowed to work in secret we routinely see kickbacks, bribery, and contract payoffs. And don’t expect congressional oversight to prevent such things, since there is now ample evidence from DOGE that our federal lawmakers have been quite willing to take their own payoffs to allow such corruption to prosper.

The switch to capitalism by the Pentagon is unquestionably a good thing. It will get more done for less. Letting it act in secrecy is a mistake however. Better to live with the risk of attack than allow our government and the companies it issues big money contracts to do things behind closed doors.

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NASA confirms DOGE contract cancellations totaling about $420 million

12:40 pm

According to Space News, NASA officials have now confirmed a DOGE post that described contract cancellations totaling about $420 million.

In a statement to SpaceNews late March 24, NASA press secretary Bethany Stevens confirmed a post by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) that NASA had terminated about $420 million in “unneeded” contracts. “NASA is committed to optimizing its workforce and resources in alignment with the Department of Government Efficiency’s initiatives. As part of this effort, NASA has identified and phased out $420 million in contracts that were determined to be redundant or misaligned with our core mission priorities,” Stevens said in the statement.

…NASA did not answer questions about specific contracts selected for termination or details about how it determined those contracts were redundant or misaligned. The DOGE post, published just before midnight March 21, said only that it included three contracts worth $15 million each to consultancies for “Change Management Support Services.”

Though it is not yet clear what specific contracts were cancelled, the statements from both NASA and DOGE, as well as the research by Space News‘s own reporter, suggest strongly these contracts had nothing to do with space or aviation engineering, but were related to management and DEI related projects, all of which have nothing to do with NASA’s “core mission priorities.”

As always, the Space News genuflects to the swamp, implying these cuts are the precursor to the utter destruction of NASA’s science research. In truth, NASA — like all government agencies in the 21st century — is bloated and wasteful. There is plenty of room for cuts, without doing any harm to the work the agency does. If anything, by getting rid of the waste the agency will be more efficient, able to do science and engineering research more effectively.

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Rolling Stone provides more details about Jared Isaacman and his nomination as NASA administrator

10:08 am

Jared Isaacman
Jared Isaacman

This article from Rolling Stone published yesterday provides a wealth of new information about Jared Isaacman, Trump’s still unconfirmed pick to become NASA’s next administrator.

Two key details: First, the article quotes Isaacman saying he opposes NASA’s policy of signing up two companies, SpaceX and Blue Origin, to build manned lunar landers.

I will try to help, but this is why I get frustrated at two lunar lander contracts, when will be lucky to get to the [Moon] a few times in the next decade. People falsely assume its because I want SpaceX to win it all, but budgets are not unlimited & unfortunate casualties happen.

In other words, he opposes using NASA to develop an aerospace industry with multiple companies capable of doing things NASA needs done. He also appears to dismiss the value of redundancy that two landers provides.

Second, the article provides links to the financial [pdf] and ethics [pdf] disclosures that he submitted to the government after being named as nominee. In the financial statement he indicates he paid SpaceX more than $50 million for providing the transportation for his multi-mission Dragon/Starship Polaris Dawn manned program. In the ethics statement he asserts he would end that contract if confirmed as NASA administrator, with SpaceX refunding any monies for services not yet rendered. The program itself would be suspended until Isaacman completes his term as administrator.

The Rolling Stone article, though detailed and fair-minded, appears to strongly endorse Isaacman, and thus joins a growing public campaign from many insider Washington players — a large number of whom have been passionately hostile to Donald Trump — to get Isaacman approved. At the moment however his nomination appears stalled because the Trump administration has not yet submitted to the Senate the paperwork needed to allow that body to schedule hearings.

The strange campaign by many of Trump’s opponents to endorse Isaacman continues to suggest to me that the Trump administration has had second thoughts about its NASA nominee. The swamp now wants him, and this is raising hackles inside the administration, which thus explains the slow-walking of his paperwork.

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NASA drops its DEI emphasis on race and sex in describing who will fly on first Artemis lunar landing

8:55 am

Not surprisingly, considering Trump’s executive orders demanding all government agencies discontinue their racial and sex quotas based on the bigoted Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies, NASA has now deleted any mention of launching the first “woman and person of color” on its first Artemis lunar landing mission.

The Artemis landing page of Nasa’s website previously included the words: “Nasa will land the first woman, first person of color, and first international partner astronaut on the Moon using innovative technologies to explore more of the lunar surface than ever before.” The version of the page live on the website on Friday, however, appears with the phrase removed.

During the Biden administration every single press release about this first Artemis lunar landing touted these racial and sexual qualifications, as if it was the only thing that mattered in choosing the right astronauts for the job. It was not only illegal discrimination against men and whites, it was insulting to minorities and women.

This change in language does not mean that NASA will now purposely exclude “women or people of color” from that mission. Instead, it ends the emphasis on race and sex. The astronauts NASA chooses for the flight will now be picked based on more important considerations, such as experience and talent. Picking someone because of their race or gender is like picking someone because of the color of their eyes or hair. It is stupid and misguided. Trump has now ended that stupidity.

Or at least he is forcing NASA’s management make its bigotry less obvious. We should not be surprised if that management still intends to make race and sex a major criteria. They will simply no longer blast that decision with a bullhorn.

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The insane left keeps shooting itself in the foot!

1:41 pm

Tesla vandal identified and arrested
Click for video.

The recent string of vandalism of Tesla vehicles as well as swatting attacks on well known conservatives by leftist crazies might be scary, horrifying, and disgusting, but if you take a step back from these emotions for a second to look dispassionately at the situation, you will realize these attacks are only the dying screams of a bankrupt political movement that has no proposals, no ideas, and no goals except the obtaining of power — now through the use of violence because its political support has dropped to such record lows.

First, the attacks are beyond senseless. In the case of the vandalism of Teslas, the attacks are actually doing harm to those who in the past were most likely to have supported the Democratic Party’s leftist political agenda. Conservatives in general have not been buying electric vehicles, because they have no need to virtue signal leftist climate goals. So, by damaging Teslas owned by innocent bystanders, just because the car was built by a company founded by Elon Musk, the vandals are not only not winning converts to their cause, they are making enemies of people who were once on their side.
» Read more

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Florida’s two senators introduce bill to move NASA HQ to their state

2:25 pm

It what seems to be a direct response to the demand earlier this week by Ohio state and federal lawmakers to make Ohio the new home of NASA’s headquarters, Florida’s two senators today introduced a bill that would legally require the headquarters go to Florida instead.

The bill [pdf] itself is short, barely more than two paragraphs, and if passed would simply require the headquarters to move to Florida’s Brevard County within one year of enactment.

The last word however is critical. There is no chance this idiotic bill will be passed. The only reason these senators introduced it today is to up their game against Ohio and any other state that wants NASA’s headquarters moved there.

And if it is passed by some miracle? It will then become a perfect example of congressional micromanaging in the stupidest way.

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Launch window for first launch of German rocket startup Isar rocket revealed

10:39 am

Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea
Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea

According to filings from the Norway’s Andoya spaceport, the launch window for Germany’s rocket startup Isar Aerospace for the first test orbital launch of its Spectrum rocket is now from March 20, 2025 to March 30, 2025.

On 12 March, Andøya Space, the mostly government-owned commercial entity that operates Andøya Spaceport, published a launch period notice covering 20 to 30 March. In relation to a maritime danger-area warning, the notice specifies launch windows between 12:30 and 16:30 CET throughout the 11-day period.

While the notice does not explicitly mention Isar Aerospace, as the company is currently the launch site’s sole customer, it can only refer to Isar. The company itself has yet to make a formal announcement regarding the published launch window.

In general Isar has been very closed-mouthed about its launch plans, so this supposition is not uncertain. The article however is right that there is no other rocket entity at Andoya that the launch window could refer to.

If Isar succeeds at this launch, it will win the race among about a half dozen European rocket startups to get an orbital launch off the ground first. Rocket Factory Augsburg had hoped to launch last year, but a fire during the one of the last rocket engine tests destroyed the rocket.

Regardless of whether Isar’s launch is successful, Norway meanwhile will win the race to be the first European spaceport to achieve an orbital launch. Though it shifted to orbital commercial operations much later than the two UK spaceports, years of regulatory red tape has prevented those UK spaceports from launching.

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Is the nomination of Jared Isaacman as NASA’s administrator facing political headwinds?

10:18 am

Jared Isaacman
Jared Isaacman

I admit immediately that I have no inside information to back up the speculation that will follow. Instead, it is based entirely on my fifty years of experience observing the political machinations that take place inside the DC swamp.

In the past week there have been a slew of stories all aimed at pressuring Congress to quickly confirm Jared Isaacman (billionaire, jet pilot, businessman, and commercial astronaut), Trump’s pick to be NASA’s next administrator. For example, two days ago NASA’s last Republican-appointed administrator Jim Bridenstine publicly called for Isaacman’s confirmation by the Senate.

“I think Jared Isaacman is going to be an amazing NASA administrator,” he said. “I think he’s got all the tools to be what could be the most consequential NASA administrator given the era in which we live in now.” That era, he said, involves greater reliance on commercial space capabilities. “He’s going to be able to take that and do things that have never been able to be done before.”

This week there was also an article in Space News, touting Isaacman’s desire to increase funding to NASA’s planetary defense program, expressed by him in February when it looked like asteroid 2024 YR4 had a good chance of hitting the Earth in 2032.

Furthermore, a group of seven Republican senators this week also joined the chorus, sending a letter [pdf] to Senators Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D-Washington), the chair and ranking members respectively of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, extolling Isaacman in glowing terms and calling for his quick confirmation.

So with all this enthusiastic support bubbling out everywhere, why do I suspect Isaacman might actually be in trouble?
» Read more

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Poland fires head of its space agency

10:29 am

Apparently due to his failures in min-February dealing with debris dropped on Poland from a de-orbiting Falcon 9 upper station, the government has fired the head of its space agency.

The President of the Polish Space Agency, Grzegorz Wrochna, has been dismissed following a botched response to the uncontrolled re-entry of a Falcon 9 second stage that scattered debris across multiple locations in Poland.

It appears Wrochna’s office had sent its reports on the debris to the wrong email address, so that the people higher up in the command chain were not informed properly about what was happening. This failure was then compounded in early March when the space agency’s computer systems were hacked, forcing it to shut down its access to the internet.

You might ask why Poland even has a space agency, and if you do you are asking the right question. The nation does not have “a space program,” which would require an agency. Instead it has a handful of new rocket startups, mostly focused on suborbital flights. All these need is the right legal framework to succeed, not a bureaucracy telling them what to do.

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NASA shuts down three unneeded departments, including its DEI office

10:06 am

NASA this week began complying with Trump’s executive orders by finally shutting down its DEI office as well as two other unneeded departments.

NASA’s Office of Technology, Policy and Strategy; the Office of the Chief Scientist; and the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility branch in the Office of Diversity and Equal Opportunity will be shuttered, in compliance with Trump’s executive order, “Implementing the President’s Department of Government Efficiency Workforce Optimization Initiative.”

A total of 23 employees were laid off. All three offices were established during the Biden administration, and provided no real value to the agency. The first two merely gave advice to top management, advice unneeded if the right people are put in charge. The third agency, DEI, was worse than unneeded, because it shifted the agency’s focus from good engineering and space exploration to favoring some races over others in hiring and promotions.

In fact, the DEI office had already been neutered prior to this week’s layoffs, based on the nature of NASA press releases in the past two months. Prior to Trump taking office, almost every single NASA press release touting the work of one or more of its employees would be entirely focused on the race or ethnicity of that employee, with almost every profile featuring a woman or minority. White men need not apply.

Since January 20, 2025, the range of employees featured in these profiles has changed radically. While minorities and women have been profiled, their race and gender is no longer mentioned. Instead, the releases tout their experience, skills, and talent. More important, the releases have now stopped blacklisting white men (who actually make up a majority of NASA’s workforce), highlighting many new and long term such individuals in just the past three weeks. The change has been quite refreshing.

Meanwhile, most of the propaganda press has been lying about these layoffs, attempting to paint them as a major disaster that will destroy NASA’s ability to accomplish anything in the future, with the worse example this headline from the science journal Nature: “NASA begins mass firings of scientists ahead of Trump team’s deadline”. That headline is a total lie. This was certainly not a “mass firing” and no space scientist was fired. Of those let go from the first two offices, all were managers, one of whom was also a “climate scientist”, not a space researcher.

More layoffs are expected of course under Trump’s campaign to shrink the federal government. If later layoffs follow the pattern of this first one, they will likely improve NASA’s workforce, eliminating the fat so that what remains can be more focused on what needs to be done.

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Expect no end, no slowdown, in Trump’s non-stop offensive

1:41 pm

Trump defiant after being shot
Trump defiant

For those like me who have been around for awhile, the present Trump administration is truly remarkable in that it harks back to an old, very fundamental American military strategy established by Ulysses S. Grant: Never stop your offensive, not for one instant.

When Grant won a battle he didn’t rest on his laurels. He immediately pushed forward because he knew he had his enemy on the run and at its weakest. When he lost a battle (which almost never happened) he didn’t pull back to lick his wounds, but instead re-configured his forces to push forward nonetheless, knowing that his victorious enemy was likely unprepared for a new assault.

Eisenhower demonstrated his understanding of this strategy during the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944. The Germans had surprised the Allies with their offensive, and thus had successfully pushed a major westward prong splitting Eisenhower’s forces in two. Rather than retreat, however, Eisenhower immediately went on the offensive, moving to pinch off that salient from the north and south and thus trap the German army behind enemy lines. That strategy ended up defeating the Germans, forcing them either to surrender or retreat.

This Trump administration is different from all other Republican presidents, including Trump’s first term, in that he is following this basic winning military strategy, keeping the pressure up continuously, with an enthusiasm that is breath-taking. » Read more

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After a decade of development, ESA finally starts testing a part of its Callisto grasshopper

9:12 am

Callisto's basic design
Callisto’s basic design

My heart be still! First proposed in 2015 as Europe’s answer to SpaceX’s Falcon 9, the European Space Agency, in partnership with Japan, has finally begun acoustical testing of just one part of its Callisto grasshopper-type reusable test prototype, as shown on the right.

Callisto consists of five main sections: the Aft Bay, which includes the engine and landing legs, the LH2 Tank, the LOx Tank, the VEB, and the Fairing. The VEB houses much of the demonstrator’s electronics, including its onboard computer, avionics, and a reaction control system that uses H2O2 propellant. Its distinctive features include a pair of control fins.

In addition to confirming that the VEB had been transported to the CNES facilities in Toulouse, the 4 March Institute of Space Systems update also revealed that the acoustic test campaign for the key Callisto module had commenced last week. The acoustic test campaign simulates the intense sound vibrations the demonstrator will experience during flight to ensure structural integrity and component reliability.

The whole project has a budget of $100 million. The first test hop won’t occur until 2026, eleven years after the project began, and six years behind its original launch date. In that same time, SpaceX has completed several hundred commercial landings of its Falcon 9 first stage, reusing those stages up to two dozen times.

Nor is Callisto part of any program to develop a similar reusable rocket. It is a typical dead-end government project, with ESA having no clear goal to apply it commercially. The best Europe can hope for is that the engineering lessons from its tests will be given freely to the new European commercial rocket startups, so that they can use it someday.

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Once again the leftist propaganda press takes out its knives to stab SpaceX and Musk

11:18 am

Superheavy captured safely by the chopsticks, for the third time in four attempts
Superheavy captured safely yesterday by the chopsticks,
for the third time in four attempts

As should be expected, the destruction of Starship yesterday just before it made orbit on its eighth test flight was immediately used by partisan leftist media outlets to play “Let’s beat up on SpaceX and Elon Musk because he’s a friend of Trump!”

All these outlets decided to emphasize the falling debris and disruption to air traffic, but in doing so they all spun the story in a very dishonest way. First, both SpaceX and the FAA had been prepared for this possibility, and had used well-established procedures — in league with all other involved nations — to respond to the launch failure. The air space was cleared for only about fifteen minutes, as only this Florida Today article noted. Take-off delays at affected airports ranged from minutes to almost an hour, but hardly much different that normal delays seen every day.

Most important, no one was hurt, no planes were damaged, and there were no negative consequences. If anything, yesterday’s Starship flight illustrated the competence shown by SpaceX as it runs a very ambitious and radical development program of the most powerful rocket ever built. For example, why so little mention of the successful catch of Superheavy, something SpaceX has been able to do three times in the first four test flights? That achievement is truly mind-blowing.

The obviousness of these attacks is truly getting tedious. Moreover, why the hostility to one of the most spectacular efforts by an American company? Shouldn’t the American news outlets above be enthused by this effort? Have they become so hateful of their own country in all things, they want it to fail, always?

Sadly, I think we know the answer to that last question. The leftist indoctrination effort that now dominates almost all of America’s universities has produced a generation that does hate America, because they literally know nothing of its history except the distorted lies put forth by these Marxist colleges. They would rather destroy success than have America succeed.

It is both tragic and shameful, and a perfect example of someone cutting off their own nose to spite their face.

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French official lauds Ariane 6 launch; demands Europe have its own launch capability

10:08 am

Philippe Baptiste, France’s Minister for Higher Education and Research, yesterday loudly touted the second successful launch of Ariane 6 rocket, even though it occurred years late and costs far more than any other rocket on the market today.

Baptiste did so even as he insisted the Europe must continue to have its own launch capability so that it need not depend on rockets from other countries.

Europe must have sovereignty in space and “not yield to the temptation of preferring SpaceX or another competitor that may seem trendier, more reliable, or cheaper,” Baptiste [said]. “This first commercial launch of Ariane 6 is not just a technical and one-off success. It marks a new milestone, essential in the choice of European space independence and sovereignty. In the labyrinth of the global space race, Ariane 6 is the guiding thread of our strategic autonomy for the years to come.

“We must also collectively advance, as Europeans, on the governance of Europe’s space ambitions. We must ask ourselves all the questions, without taboos. For Europe in space, I am convinced that the European Union must fully assume its role as the political leader in this matter. The challenges are immense, no one knows this better than we do.”

Note Baptiste’s focus on having the European Union (EU) run things, with a focus on Ariane-6, despite its high cost. He was previously head of France’s space agency CNES, which for years has used the EU and the European Space Agency’s (ESA) partners help pay for France’s space program by requiring that all rocket launches be run by ESA’s commercial division, Arianespace.

That situation is now changing, with other ESA nations (Germany, Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom) all breaking free from Arianespace and instead encouraging the development of competing private rocket startups independent of ESA or Arianespace. Moreover, these ESA partners have aggressive reduced Arianespace’s areas of control. It no longer runs the French Guiana spaceport. Its management of the Vega-C rocket has been transferred back to the Italian company Avio, which builds it. All it now has is Ariane-6, which has limited value because it is so expensive.

So while Baptiste desire for European autonomy matches the efforts of these European countries, his apparent desire to keep all control within the continent’s centralized government authority has been rejected. Europe has a chance to compete, but only because it is freeing its rocket startups from government control.

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Democrats: A party so filled with hate it can’t even cheer a child because Trump introduced him

1:32 pm

In the next day or so you will hear a lot of analysis of Trump’s speech yesterday to Congress, both good and bad. The bulk of that commentary will focus on what Trump has or has not accomplished, for good and ill. Some will talk about the overall foolish behavior of many Democrats, who refused to applaud anything Trump said (something Trump predicted would happen near the start of the speech), with one Democrat getting ejected from the building for heckling the president and refusing to stop.

During such speeches presidents usually tout their past achievements and future goals. With each proclamation, the members of that president’s party will repeatedly give him a short standing ovation, with the opposition party usually sitting quietly. This fake theater is one reason I generally don’t watch such events, relying on reviewing them after the fact to save a LOT of time.

Another tradition during these speeches is for the president to invite several ordinary citizens to attend in order to honor them in some way. At these moments, when the president introduces the citizen, the entire room would routinely stand and cheer, because these individuals are generally not party partisans, and the ruling president and his party usually have nothing to do with that person’s particular achievement.

Last night however was starkly different, and the screen capture below captures the one moment that demonstrates so fully the utterly bankrupt nature of the Democratic Party. One of the private citizens Trump invited to honor was a 13-year-old boy, DJ Daniel, who five years ago was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer and given only six months to live. Five years later he is still alive and healthy, and proudly wears a police uniform frequently in public because of his dream to be a cop someday.
» Read more

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The real underlying battle between Trump and Zelinsky

2:01 pm

The kerfuffle last week between the United States and the Ukraine, instigated by the unprecedented ugly end to the press conference that concluded the visit of Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to the White House, is actually quite understandable if one is willing to consider the perspective of both sides. Unfortunately, I have seen little such analysis anywhere. Instead we get emotional attacks. On the left Trump is a vicious politician who wants to carve the Ukraine up for the benefit of Russia. On the right Zelensky is a corrupt barbarian who simply wants the war to continue forever so that he can steal as much U.S. foreign aid as possible for his own private benefit.

Neither of these conclusions are very helpful. Nor do they provide any insight to what is really going on.

So, what are the different perspectives that caused this confrontation?
» Read more

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Falklands government approves changes that will allow SpaceX to provide Starlink service

3:38 pm

After a small negotiating kerfuffle, the executive committee of the Falklands government has now approved a major licensing fee change that will allow SpaceX to offer its Starlink service to island residences.

The Executive Committee (ExCo) of the Falkland Islands Government has officially approved a considerable reduction in the VSAT licence fee – it is “minded” to slash it from £5,400 to just £180 but it will stay at £5,400 until final agreement in ExCo in early May. This decision paves the way for Starlink to begin providing services in the Falkland Islands, creating a game-changing step towards modernising the Islands’ telecommunications.

It appears that getting this approval required a major grassroots effort, as the government had initially been reluctant to change anything, despite the fact that numerous people were already using Starlink terminals illegally because there were no other options for good internet access, especially because the government’s deal with OneWeb had produced no results.

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Musk: Verizon’s upgrade of air traffic system failing; proposes Starlink instead

11:05 am

In a series of statements in the last few days Elon Musk has claimed that the $2.4 billion upgrade of the FAA’s air traffic system by Verizon is failing, and further suggested, in a proposal fraught with conflict-of-interest issues, that SpaceX take over the contract instead.

The CNN article that I link to above is surprisingly well written. It describes the situation fairly, and includes no slanderous asides on Musk or SpaceX, as I have found typical of almost every other article written by the propaganda press about this particular subject (or any about Musk).

If Musk says Verizon’s upgrade is failing, I would tend to believe him. That Verizon has barely begun work installing the upgrades, two years after winning the contract, reinforces his accusations. SpaceX has already provided the FAA at no cost three Starlink terminals for testing, and if it does get the job we can be sure the upgrade would be installed far quicker than this.

The conflict-of-interest issue however remains. I am not sure how, or even if, Musk or SpaceX can get around it.

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SpaceX reschedules the 8th Starship/Superheavy orbital test flight to March 3, 2025

9:40 am

SpaceX has rescheduled the 8th Starship/Superheavy orbital test flight from today to March 3, 2025, with the launch window opening at 5:30 pm (Central).

The company gave no reason for the delay, but it also indicated that the FAA has still not closed out the investigation of the Starship failure on the last test in January, nor issued the launch license.

That SpaceX is pushing for this quick launch date suggests it either expects the FAA to issue the permit momentarily, or it is purposely highlighting continuing delay tactics and is applying pressure on the agency. Unlike the Biden administration, which was very hostile to Musk and SpaceX and worked to harass it with lawfare, Trump will not take kindly to such tactics. By making such tactics patently obvious Musk and SpaceX will force Trump to step in.

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House committee holds hearing to protect its Artemis pork

9:50 am

The space subcommittee of the House science committee yesterday held a hearing which appears to have been mostly designed to protect the Artemis pork that both parties have been funding for decades, designed not to get us into space but to funnel tax dollars into their districts.

The hearing had only two witnesses, one pro-SLS (Dan Dumbacher) and one only very slightly skeptical of it (Scott Pace). Both these men have been deep members of the Washington swamp for decades, and both made it clear that funding should continue for SLS, at a minimum through the third Artemis launch, presently scheduled for ’27, a launch date so uncertain no one should believe it.

NASA had been invited to send a witness, but it apparently declined to do so.

Pace, the supposedly skeptic of SLS, has actually been a big supporter for years. As executive secretary for Trump’s National Space Council during Trump’s first term, he consistently advocated big space and NASA-built rockets, showing continuous skepticism of commercial space. Even now, his suggestion that SLS be reconsidered after that third launch was very hesitant.

Essentially, this committee hearing was called by these congress critters to advocate the status quo, which is likely why NASA declined to send a witness. Why give them a chance to blast any potential or major change in Artemis and have the propaganda press savage NASA and the Trump administration with negative soundbites?

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