Tag: government

An Indian tribe has sued and three researchers have countersued over possession of two 10,000-year-old skeletons unearthed during construction in San Diego.

8:15 am

Fighting over bones: An Indian tribe has sued and three researchers have counter-sued over possession of two 10,000-year-old skeletons unearthed during construction in San Diego.

Not surprisingly, the problem here stems from a poorly written federal law amended by a bureaucratic rule in 2010 that gives any Indian tribe control over any ancient human bones found in the U.S., even if those bones come from a human that lived long before the tribe even existed.

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Massachusetts state officials are restricting the kinds of foods that can be sold at bake sales.

7:38 am

We’re here to help you: Massachusetts state officials are restricting the kinds of foods that can be sold at bake sales.

Bake sales, the calorie-laden standby cash-strapped classrooms, PTAs and booster clubs rely on, will be outlawed from public schools as of Aug. 1 as part of new no-nonsense nutrition standards, forcing fundraisers back to the blackboard to cook up alternative ways to raise money for kids.

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The Labor Department has abandoned its effort to ban kids from working on farms.

12:34 pm

A victory of sorts for freedom: The Labor Department has abandoned its effort to ban kids from working on farms.

The reason I consider this merely a temporary victory is that the desire to regulate these matters still exists in the people running the federal government. These same people also don’t understand that, as a free nation, they have no moral right to impose these rules in the first place. Thus, they remain a threat, waiting only for another opportunity to try again.

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Killing private space

9:31 am

The financial foolishness in Congress, by Republicans this time, continues. In making its budget recommendations for NASA, the report [pdf] of the House Appropriations Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies subcommittee also demands that NASA immediately choose one commercial company for its commercial space program. (Hat tip to Clark Lindsey for spotting this.)

The number of ways this action is counter-productive almost can’t be counted.
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The Space Launch System is a threat to JSC, Texas jobs

9:23 am

An op-ed in Houston: “The Space Launch System is a threat to JSC, Texas jobs.”

It appears that even some NASA employees are beginning to see the madness of spending billions on a launch system that will likely only fly one mission almost a decade from now. And it will seem even more mad to more people should Dragon and Cygnus prove successful in the coming year.

To put it bluntly, the long term politics are very much hostile to SLS. It is going to die, if only because the federal government is bankrupt and can’t afford it. I just wish our elected officials had the brains to realize this now rather than three years down the road.

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It’s not just a good idea, it’s the law!

8:59 am

Mexico has passed its own very strict climate change law.

The new law contains many sweeping provisions to mitigate climate change, including a mandate to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 30% below business-as-usual levels by 2020, and by 50% below 2000 levels by 2050. Furthermore, it stipulates that 35% of the country’s energy should come from renewable sources by 2024, and requires mandatory emissions reporting by the country’s largest polluters.

Some predictions:
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Senate panel proposes major NASA/NOAA budget changes

8:59 pm

A Senate panel today proposed shifting the responsibility for building weather satellites from NOAA to NASA.

It is very unclear from this article why the Senate panel proposed this shift. They claim it will save money but I don’t see how.

What I can guess is that there is probably a turf war going on in Congress over this money. For example, shifting these weather satellites to NASA almost certainly means that the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland will get more money, which is almost certainly why Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-Maryland) is for it.

One thought however: NASA generally focuses on individual missions, not long term operational stuff like weather. I suspect it probably is not a good idea to give this work to NASA.

The same article above also outlined the panel’s proposals for other areas of NASA’s budget. To me, the key issue is the budget for commercial space. The White House requested $830 million. The Senate panel has instead proposed $525 million.
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Coming and going

9:10 am

There are really only two important stories today concerning space exploration. The story that is getting the most coverage is the big news that the space shuttle Discovery is making its last flight, flying over Washington, DC, as it is delivered to the Smithsonian for permanent display.

Of these stories, only Irene Klotz of Discovery News seems to really get it. This is not an event to celebrate or get excited about. It is the end of an American achievement, brought to a close probably three to five years prematurely so that the United States now cannot even send its own astronauts to its own space station.

The other news, actually far more important, has gotten far less coverage, and includes three different stories all really about the same thing.
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