Tag: policy

Today’s blacklisted Americans: South Alabama University suspends 3 professors for 2014 Halloween costumes

2:07 pm

The cancelled Bill of Rights

They’re coming for you next: The University of South Alabama this month suspended three professors for wearing Halloween costumes back in 2014, seven years ago.

The photos show “then-Mitchell College of Business dean Bob Wood dressed as a Confederate general and professors Alex Sharland and Teresa Weldy posing with a whip and a noose,” WKRG5 reports.

The three teach in the university’s Mitchell College of Business. Wood and Sharland, who have tenure, have apologized, while Weldy, who is not tenured, “chose not to apologize,” the news station reports.

University brass is reportedly taking heat from the campus community for being aware of the photos since 2020 but not doing more about it. With that, [university President Tony] Waldrop upped his efforts on the nearly 7-year-old matter, calling the costumes and poses “offensive” and “contrary to our core principles of diversity and inclusion.” He pledged in his statement that the university will “address this situation in a manner that demonstrates our unwavering commitment to diversity, inclusion, and a safe and welcoming environment for every member of our community.” [emphasis mine]

» Read more

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Space Force awards launch contracts (two each) to ULA and SpaceX

10:08 am

Capitalism in space: On March 9th the Space Force announced that it has awarded four new launch contracts, two each to ULA and SpaceX, for a total cost of just under $400 million, all to launch in ’23.

Under the task orders issued March 9, ULA and SpaceX will each launch two missions. ULA was awarded $225 million to launch and integrate the USSF-112 and USSF-87 missions on its Vulcan Centaur rockets while SpaceX was awarded $160 million to launch and integrate USSF-36 and launch NROL-69 on its Falcon 9 rockets.

Based on these numbers it appears ULA is charging about $113 million per launch for its new Vulcan Centaur rocket, while SpaceX is charging about $80 million using its Falcon 9.

For ULA, that is less that what it would charge using its Atlas 5 rocket, but not by much. For SpaceX this price is high, probably because the military might be demanding the company use new boosters for its launches.

These high prices for both are to me a sign of how little our federal government cares about saving any money for the taxpayer. While the competition brought on by SpaceX’s arrival is saving the military money, the way these contract awards are structured, with both ULA and SpaceX guaranteed to win them, neither company has an incentive to reduce its prices. Instead, they can overcharge and the military can do nothing about it.

In a more sane world the military would use the competition in the launch market to get an ever better deal. Instead, our federal government sees its budget as a blank check, and they are using it.

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A proposal to rebuild Arecibo as a better radio telescope

9:47 am

Even as the National Science Foundation (NSF) proceeds with the disassembly of the destroyed Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico, some astronomers are proposing that a new radio telescope be built in its place, with a new design that will not require the instrument platform floating above a single dish.

Here’s the idea as outlined in a white paper circulated by Roshi and his colleagues: The Next Generation Arecibo Telescope would pack hundreds, maybe even more than 1,000 smaller radio dishes into the same space now occupied by the single 305-meter dish. Those smaller antennas would combine forces to act like a single larger telescope (no suspended instrument platform required).

Ideally, those dishes would be on a single, tiltable platform to access more of the sky from the Arecibo site; it’s possible multiple platforms could do the same.

The revamped telescope would have twice the sky coverage of the legacy dish, 500 times the field of view in individual images, at least double the sensitivity, and five times the radar power.

The cost for this new radio telescope is presently estimated to be about half a billion. Considering that the NSF didn’t have the money to operate the old Arecibo telescope, which was why it wasn’t properly maintained and collapsed, I doubt it has the cash to build this replacement. Congress, which likes printing money it doesn’t have, might step in and fund it, but if so that will only add to the national debt that is certainly going to cause the bankruptcy of the nation at some point in the future, a point that is getting closer and closer with each new trillion that Congress nonchalantly spends, on almost a monthly schedule.

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NASA sets March 18th for next SLS static fire test

9:38 am

NASA has now scheduled the next static fire test of the core stage of its SLS rocket for March 18th.

The background:

NASA attempted the hot fire test on January 16, but computers terminated the test after 67 seconds instead of 485 seconds because of the conservative test parameters that were set. This is not a test vehicle, but the actual core stage that will be used for the first SLS launch. NASA needs to ensure the testing does not damage it.

NASA decided to redo the test and scheduled it for February 25, but a problem with a pre-valve forced another delay.

If this March test is successful, it will take a month to prep the core stage for shipment by barge to Florida, where it will take several months to prep it for launch linked to its two solid rocket boosters now stacked and ready for launch. If that schedule moves fast, NASA is still aiming for a late ’21 launch, though most industry experts expect that date to shift into early ’22.

If the March test has any problems however this schedule goes out the window. Worse, it increases the chance that the two boosters will have reached the end of their 12-month use-by date (approximately December ’21), and will have to be dissembled and inspected. If that happens the launch will certainly be delayed by many months.

There is another possibility. NASA might waive that 12-month use-by date requirement for the boosters. If the agency does this, however, it will be another example of the same management mistakes that caused both the Challenger and Columbia shuttle failures, a desire to put aside proper engineering to meet a schedule.

One more thought: That it takes about four months to assemble the solid rocket boosters for SLS illustrates well the cumbersome and inefficient nature of this rocket. Launches not only cannot happen within days, they really cannot happen for months. Depending on such a rocket with such a low launch cadence will make the exploration of the solar system practically impossible.

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Nicaragua forms space agency

2:30 pm

The new colonial movement? In what appears to be a complete surprise within its own scientific community, the government of Nicaragua today announced the formation of its own space agency.

[T]he National Assembly approved the creation of the agency for the “defence of supreme interests” in space. It will seek “to expand the country’s capacities in the educational, industrial, scientific and technological branches”, according to president Daniel Ortega´s proposal.

The article at the link provides little information about this government effort, and instead is mostly filled with commentary by other scientists expressing their opposition to it. Nor can I blame them. Unlike rich countries like the UAE, Nicaragua is one of the poorest in Latin America. It can’t afford to buy the educational resources of the United States, as the UAE did.

Moreover, it is ruled by a socialist/communist government whose ability to produce wealth is exceedingly limited. If anything, the nation’s poverty is because of that government’s top-down policies. Establishing a space agency is merely another aspect of this approach, and will likely only act to provide photo ops for its leaders and little benefit to its citizens.

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Today’s blacklisted Americans: Conservative student journalism conference shut down by city of Alexandria, Virginia

11:57 am

They’re coming for you next: Based on a single anonymous complaint, the city of Alexandria, Virginia, shut down a conservative student journalism conference this coming weekend, claiming it was not following its Wuhan flu health regulations.

About 72 hours before the Intercollegiate Studies Institute’s Collegiate Network student editors’ conference was slated to begin this weekend, Hilton was told it could not take place due to COVID health regulations, organizers said. “We received news from our hotel that the local department of health … in response to an anonymous health complaint, someone called expressing concerns about the safety of the attendees at our conference,” John Burtka, president of the ISI, told Fox News’ Tucker Carlson on Wednesday.

“In response to that complaint, an eager and willing bureaucrat complied and reclassified ISI’s educational program as a social event, and all social events in the state of Virginia are limited to only 10 people, effectively canceling our student journalism conference,” he said.

Burtka said there are many other conferences being held throughout the state and ISI is willing to complying with all COVID safety regulations.

“This had nothing to do with public health,” he said. “What it had to do with is there was someone who clearly did not want this event to happen. … We are working to find another city that welcomes freedom, diversity and civil discourses for a variety of perspectives.”

Note the dishonest game played by Alexandria government. They clearly misused their insane and odious COVID rules — rules that make no sense under any definition of scientific and medical research — to silence a political event that they disagreed with, proving once again that these COVID restrictions never had anything to do with preventing the spread of COVID, but instead were designed to prevent the spread of ideas hostile to leftist ideology.

The organizers of the conference say it will go on, but they will not publicize the location or any details, meaning that only previously registered attendees will be included, and that anything said at the conference will essentially be muzzled from the public square.

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First results from UAE’s Al-Amal/Hope Mars orbiter

10:36 am

First data from Al-Amal
Click for full image.

The first science results from the United Arab Emirates Al-Amal Mars orbiter (“Hope” in English) have been released by the American universities operating one instrument.

The image to the right shows that data. The right globes show the areas of actual temperature data for both the Martian surface and atmosphere, with the left globes extrapolating that data across the entire planet.

The purple-green-blue hues show that the measurements were taken of the Martian nightside, although dawn on the planet can be seen on the right-hand side of the surface temperature image, as depicted by the red hues. Features such as Arabia Terra, which has cold nighttime temperatures, can be observed in the upper left portion of the surface temperature data, depicted by the blue and purple hues.

“EMIRS [the infrared spectrometer] is going to acquire about 60 more images like this per week once we transition into the primary science phase of the Emirates Mars Mission,” said EMIRS Instrument Scientist Christopher Edwards, who is an assistant professor and planetary scientist at [Northern Arizona University]. “We’ll use these images and sophisticated computer programs to build up a complete global, daily understanding of the Martian atmospheric components, like dust, water ice, water vapor and atmospheric temperature.” [emphasis mine]

The highlighted words above illustrate the true nature of this U.S./UAE joint mission. Right now the spacecraft is being operated by Emirate engineers in the UAE, but the spacecraft and its instruments were really built by U.S. universities, paid for by the UAE. As such, those American universities remain in charge of running those instruments, though UAE students are also being used to do that work as part of their education.

None of this is to denigrate the effort by the UAE. It used its financial resources to buy the expertise of American universities and companies to build this Mars orbiter, but did so with the express requirement that those American universities and companies also educate and train its people in such work.

That deal however once again illustrates the value of private enterprise and freedom. The UAE wanted to teach its people how to fly a planetary space mission. American universities had the knowledge to do it. The former then bought the skills from the latter, while the latter then got a science mission for free.

A match made in heaven with both benefiting marvelously.

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NASA completes assembly of SLS’s first two solid rocket boosters

10:11 am

The stacking and assembly of the first two solid rocket boosters for the first launch of SLS has been completed at Cape Canaveral.

The boosters, built by Northrop Grumman, now only wait for the arrival of Boeing’s core stage, which is still awaiting the successful completion of its final static test, now tentatively set for sometime in the next week or so.

Stacking of the boosters began in November 2020, which means that the first SLS launch must happen by November ’21 because the boosters have a limited life span of about a year. To make that November launch happen on time however is becoming increasingly difficult. Assuming the mid-March core static static fire test in Mississippi is successful, NASA will have to then ship the stage to Florida and get it assembled with those two boosters. NASA has previously said it will take about six months to do this. Their margin between now and November is thus getting quite tight.

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NASA forges deal with private company to put American on Russian Soyuz

9:57 am

Capitalism in space: It appears NASA used the private company Axiom as its go-between to obtain a seat for an American astronaut on the next Soyuz launch to ISS in April.

The deal is very complex.

Based on the initial partnership arrangement between the Russians and NASA, astronauts for both countries would fly in equal numbers on each other’s spacecraft in a barter arrangement that involved no exchange of funds. Russia however has been balking at flying its astronauts on Dragon, claiming it does not yet meet their standards for a manned spacecraft. Thus, they have been demanding that NASA pay them to fly an American on Soyuz.

NASA meanwhile doesn’t have the funds, but it still wants to make sure there is always an American on board ISS, and to do that requires a second ferry besides Dragon to provide redundancy. With Boeing’s Starliner delayed, they have been trying to get a seat on Soyuz as part of that barter deal, to no avail.

The solution? Private enterprise! To get that Soyuz seat at no cost it appears NASA made a barter deal with the private space company Axiom. Axiom is apparently paying the Russians for a seat on next month’s Soyuz flight, which will be filled by a NASA astronaut, and gets in return from NASA a free spare seat on a later American capsule.

The result? NASA pays nothing to the Russians, and still gets its seat on Soyuz. Where Axiom is getting the financing for its purchase is unclear, but because it is getting an extra seat at no cost that it can sell later for a big profit, I suspect that financing was not difficult to obtain.

The details for Axiom’s deal with Roscosmos have not as yet been revealed, though I am sure the Russians charged Axiom plenty for the seat on Soyuz. I also suspect that amount was far less then what the Russians would have charged NASA directly.

Once Starliner finally becomes operational NASA will have enough redundancy for getting Americans to ISS it will no longer need the Russians. Hopefully that will happen by the end of this year. If so, such shenanigans will no longer be required.

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China and Russia sign partnership agreement for lunar exploration

2:11 pm

The new colonial movement: China and Russia today signed an agreement outlining a partnership to jointly build a base and orbiting station on and around the Moon.

The International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) is described as a comprehensive scientific experiment base built on the lunar surface or on the lunar orbit that can carry out multi-disciplinary and multi-objective scientific research activities including exploration and utilization, lunar-based observation, basic scientific experiment and technical verification, and long-term autonomous operation. Statements from Roscosmos and CNSA underline that the project will be “open to all interested countries and international partners.”

Though not explicitly stated it is understood that the ILRS would be constructed at the lunar south pole.

Russia is slowly breaking off its partnership with the U.S. because the U.S. is insisting it sign the Artemis Accords, which require all signatories to honor property rights in space. Neither Russian nor China wish to do that, instead reserving those rights wholly to their own governments, their citizens be damned.

Thus, we have a deal for Russia and China to work together. China actually doesn’t need Russia, as it has clearly shown in the past five years that its space capabilities are quite sufficient and well funded. Russia however needs China, as its capabilities have been declining in recent years due to corruption within its aerospace industry as well as a shortage of funds caused by a poor economy and the drop in oil prices.

Working together however could help speed what they achieve while simultaneously fueling the growing international competition in space. In the end this will benefit everyone, as more will get done faster.

How we shall settle the disagreement over property rights and government power in space is a entirely different question, one that I address at great length in my next soon-to-be published book, entitled Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and into the future. Stay tuned!

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Today’s blacklisted American: Leftist professor who demanded others be fired for their conservative opinions has now been fired for her leftist opinions

1:31 pm

The cancelled Bill of Rights

They’re coming for you next: Lora Burnett, a leftist professor who demanded that conservative teachers be fired or punished for expressing their conservative opinions, in February lost her university job due to the virulence of her own leftist opinions, expressed in a number of very ugly tweets.

The Collin [College] administration has now confirmed it won’t renew the untenured scholar’s contract, which ends in May, for not conducting herself “in a professional manner.”

Burnett shared images from the human resources letter she received, which allege she violated “delineated standards of conduct” through her “insubordination, making private personnel issues public that impair the college’s operations, and personal criticisms of co-workers, supervisors, and/or those who merely disagree with you.”

She characterized the firing as retaliation for “mean tweets.”

No, those tweets were not merely “mean,” they were part of a long tract record of demanding the punishment or firing of anyone whose politics disagreed with Burnett’s. For example,
» Read more

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Russian astronauts begin work to seal 2nd Zvezda leak on ISS

9:27 am

After successfully sealing the largest crack on the twenty-year-old Zvezda module on ISS, Russian astronauts have now begun work on sealing a second such crack.

The report, from Russia’s state-run news service TASS, is not very informative. It does not report the size of the leaks, their nature, and any other important conclusions the Russians have gathered about Zvezda’s overall condition and future, based on these cracks.

Nor has state-run NASA been very transparent on this subject, releasing little further information. The silence from these government entities about the cracks is very worrisome, as it suggests these fixes are merely bandaids on a more serious issue with Zvezda’s structure, and our dishonest and bureaucratic governments do not wish to reveal this fact to the public.

I hope I am wrong, but suspect I am not. If Russia follows its pattern for the past half century, they will provide a more detailed report only after the problem has been completely solved. If these patches are merely temporary fixes over a more serious problem, don’t expect that detailed report for some time.

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Hubble goes into safe mode

3:19 pm

Due to a software issue, the Hubble Space Telescope shifted into safe mode early yesterday and stopped doing its programmed science observations.

The engineers seem confident all will eventually be well, but we must also remember the telescope’s infrastructure (not its instruments) was built in the early 1980s and has been in space since 1990. That makes many parts of this telescope 40 years old. We are increasingly faced with the possibility of a fatal fault occurring that shuts it down for good, with no way at the present time to reach it and fix it, and with the only comparable optical space telescope in the works one being built by China to fly in formation with its space station.

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NASA increases ISS prices to commercial customers by 700%

9:03 am

On February 25th NASA quietly announced that it was increasing the prices it charges for private commercial payloads to ISS sevenfold, immediately putting some customers out of business.

In the statement, published with little fanfare on the agency’s website, NASA said it was updating that price list “to reflect full reimbursement for the value of NASA resources.” The decision to do so, NASA said, was based on “discussions with stakeholders, the current market growth, and in anticipation of future commercial entities capable of providing similar services.”

By removing the subsidy, the prices of those services went up significantly. The cost to transport one kilogram of cargo up to the station, known as “upmass,” went from $3,000 to $20,000. The cost to bring that one kilogram back down from the station, “downmass,” went from $6,000 to $40,000. One hour of crew member time, previously $17,500, is now $130,000.

The sudden change in prices, which took effect immediately, took some ISS users by surprise. An executive with one company, who spoke on background because that company is still evaluating the impacts of the pricing change, was not aware of NASA’s decision to raise prices until contacted by SpaceNews.

“NASA has not done a good job communicating with the stakeholders,” said Jeffrey Manber, chief executive of Nanoracks. “We are in discussions with customers and suddenly we are being notified of a major increase.” That sudden increase in prices, he said, forced Nanoracks to suspend discussions with two potential customers, who he said were “priced out of their budget” by the increase.

Note that NASA’s statement apparently contained a lie. It claimed the agency talked with “stakeholders,” but apparently those stakeholders knew nothing about it until it happened.

I strongly suspect this is a Biden administration decision, not one from NASA. Democratic Party politicians don’t see government as a servant of the people, but as a tool to rule them. A private industry is beginning to sprout using government resources in space, and rather than encourage its growth they instead want to squeeze as much cash from it as possible.

Moreover, why is NASA charging anything for bringing cargo to ISS? They don’t provide the transportation, launch companies like SpaceX and ULA do. The only appropriate charge NASA should be charging is rental at the station.

If this was a NASA decision solely and Trump was in power, I would expect it to be soon canceled. Under Biden there is no chance. More likely that administration either endorsed it or imposed it.

What this means is that future commercial flights will soon shift away from ISS. I expect Axiom to work hard to get its station modules launched and separated from ISS as quickly as possible. I also expect to see more independent Dragon manned tourist missions, like the one planned for this fall, that do not dock with the station.

In fact, here is a thought that I think has already entered Elon Musk’s brain. In the next year SpaceX is likely going to do its first Starship orbital test flight. Why not put a test habitable module on board that can be used by tourists at a reasonable price? There is money to be made here, especially because NASA is gouging its customers and there is plenty of margin to undercut the agency’s absurd prices.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Student blackballed for saying “a man is a man, a woman is a woman”

11:38 am

They’re coming for you next: The “Education” department for one of New York’s state universities has suspended a student from its program because he had the nerve to simply say in public that “A man is a man, a woman is a woman. A man is not a woman and a woman is not a man.”

“After review of all available materials, I find that, based on your continued public stance and social media presence, you do not consistently demonstrate behaviors required by the Conceptual Framework of the School of Education,” the Dean of the School of Education wrote in an email to Stevens.

The university claims that Stevens violated the school’s inclusivity doctrine, which requires teachers to foster “a diverse campus community marked by mutual respect for the unique talents and contributions of each individual.”

The Dean also insinuated that future teachers are required to support all aspects of homosexuality and gender identity. … The Dean told Stevens that his scientific stance on biology is “in conflict” with the state’s Dignity for All Students Act. “You continue to maintain, ‘I do not recognize the gender that they claim to be if they are not biologically that gender,’” the Dean said. “This public position is in conflict with the Dignity for All Students Act requiring teachers to maintain a classroom environment protecting the mental and emotional well-being of all students.”

In other words, no student in this university education program is allowed to publicly state some common basic facts about life, humanity, and biology. We must make believe we believe in falsehoods simply because others demand we do so. If what you say contradicts the beliefs of these bullies you must be blacklisted, blackballed, canceled, and destroyed.

Worse, can you imagine the incompetent educators that are going to come out of this program? Do you want these people teaching your children?

Not only has the student received threats of violence from others because of his stance, the university’s president, Denise Battles, also blasted him in a university-wide email. She claimed,

“There are clear legal limitations to what a public university can do in response to objectionable speech,” the president wrote. “As a result, there are few tools at our disposal to reduce the pain that such speech may cause.”

It is not there job to “reduce the pain” some speech might cause in others. That’s what freedom of speech is all about, protecting offensive speech so that society can absorb all sides of a debate.

Battles’ position also shows that she is taking sides. Her goal is entirely focused on protecting leftists and sexual deviants from hearing anything they might not agree with and which thus might offend their delicate self-images. She cares not at all about the pain inflicted on this student. He doesn’t rate a safe space ever.

Finally, Battles and the university have clearly decided to violate the legal limitations placed on them by the first amendment, despite what she claims. Their actions to punish this student for his legally-protected speech make them very vulnerable to a major lawsuit, one that they are likely to lose.

More important, why is anyone going to such a school? You not only won’t learn anything useful, you will be taught many things that are false and harmful.

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NASA lunar rover experiences big budget overruns

9:48 am

NASA revealed yesterday that the budget for VIPER, a new NASA-built lunar rover, has increased from $250 million to $433.5 million.

The cost of the mission has gone up significantly. At the time NASA announced VIPER in October 2019, it projected a cost of about $250 million. As part of the confirmation review, known as Key Decision Point C, NASA set a formal cost commitment for the mission. NASA spokesperson Alison Hawkes said March 3 that the new lifecycle cost for the mission is $433.5 million.

NASA didn’t disclose the reason for the cost increase, but NASA officials said in June 2020 that they were postponing VIPER’s launch by about a year to late 2023 to change the rover’s design so it can meet the goal of operating for 100 days on the lunar surface. At the time, the agency declined to comment on VIPER’s cost.

This is very typical of modern NASA. Even though its planetary program produces some spectacular spacecraft and results, that program — like all NASA-built programs — rarely does so for the budget promised. For the planetary program, however, the overage for VIPER is startlingly high, especially in so short a time.

Be prepared for more delays and overages for this project, since that is usually what happens for NASA projects that experience such large budget increases.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Non-profit blackballs student for daring to defend free speech

1:50 pm

The cancelled Bill of Rights

They’re coming for you next: A Florida environmental non-profit canceled a student’s community service event because she had dared to write an article defending free speech and her decision to vote against the impeachment of a student senator simply because he had asked a valid question about a proposed bill allocating funds to a black student organization..

The student, Karoline Tyrrel, is also a student senator at Florida Gulf Coast University. Apparently she was one of only two senators to vote against impeaching that other senator for asking his question. As she wrote in her article,

“During the discussion, a respected senator stood up and asked a question. He’s known for asking tasking questions, which I greatly appreciate, as we are supposed to question bills, appointments, and more. The senator expressed his concerns of the bill description. He found terms such as “black excellence” to imply black superiority, and suggested a possible rephrasing of this one line, saying he believes that all races should be treated and held to the same level of excellence,” she summarized.

…The following week had talks of impeachment and removing him from his role because of his “racist” and “disgusting” comments,” Tyrrel added.

As a result, the student senator was one of two people who voted against impeaching the individual who asked the question, noting “many senators who I know ethically sided with the senator expressed their feelings to me, but when it came time to vote, all but one other person and myself voted to save their image.” [emphasis mine]

The non-profit then wrote her to cancel her volunteer event, stating that her article and vote “provoked diverseness.” The non-profit’s statement was intellectually dishonest to the extreme, in that in one sentence they claim they support diversity and inclusion, even as they in the very next sentence reject diversity and inclusion by blackballing her.

Meanwhile, the highlighted words in the quote above illustrate the main problem. I suspect a majority of the students were horrified by this call for impeachment, but most were too cowardly to stand up to the bullies and vote against it. Instead, they bowed their heads and violated their personal ethics so as to avoid causing trouble for themselves.

This cowardice is probably the biggest reason the blacklisting attempts by the left across America are working. People are afraid, and are also too timid to stand up to fight back.

As Burke said, “For evil to triumph good men need only do nothing.” Tragically we’ve got a lot of nothing going on right now. And its going to lead to a lot more evil.

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Piece of foam caused launch failure according to pseudo-private Chinese company

10:11 am

The new colonial movement: According to a press release from iSpace, one of the pseudo-private companies that China’s government is allowing to exist, the reason its February 1st launch failed was because a piece of foam broke off from the rocket.

According to iSpace a piece of foam insulation, intended to fall off, struck and impeded one of four grid fins at the base of the first stage. The insulation foam later fell free, resulting an a change of angle of the grid fin and then subsequent rapid change of attitude and breakup of the launch vehicle.

The loss of the mission coincidentally followed 18 years to the day of the Columbia disaster. A piece of foam insulation broke off from the Space Shuttle’s external tank during launch and damaged a wing of the Orbiter, later leading to catastrophe on reentry.

ISpace is the only pseudo-private company in China to have successfully achieved an orbital launch, achieving that in July 2019 with its Hyperbola-1 rocket. It appears they redesigned the rocket significantly, and intend with its next iteration, Hyperbola-2, to attempt vertical landings. The grid fins and foam on the failed rocket were probably early tests of that technology. They are aiming to begin vertical hop tests next year.

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Scheduling conflicts at ISS delay Starliner unmanned demo flight till May

10:32 pm

NASA and Boeing have been forced to again delay the second unmanned Starliner demo mission to ISS due to scheduling conflicts with Soyuz and Dragon missions in April, forcing the flight to slip to May.

A Russian Soyuz capsule is set for launch April 9 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan with two Russian cosmonauts and a U.S. astronaut. The Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft will dock with the space station about three hours after launch, and an outgoing three-person crew will depart and return to Earth on April 17.

SpaceX’s next Crew Dragon flight to the space station is set for launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida around April 20 with astronauts Shane Kimbrough, Megan McArthur, Akihiko Hoshide, and Thomas Pesquet. Their mission, known as Crew-2, will last about six months.

The four astronauts who flew to the station last November on the Crew-1 mission — aboard the Crew Dragon “Resilience” spacecraft — will return to Earth in late April or early May. Both docking ports capable of receiving the Boeing Starliner capsule will be occupied during the crew handover in late April.

They had hoped to launch on April 2nd, but I suspect strongly that Boeing and NASA are glad to have this extra time.

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AZ Dept of Ed: 3-month-old white babies are already racists

9:34 pm

They’re coming for you next: The Arizona Department of Education has created what it calls an “Equity Toolkit” for use by parents and teachers that claims that 3-month-old white babies are already racists, and that the schools should take “pro-active” action against white children, continuously.

More details here.

The toolkit teaches, among other things, that babies start to become racist at just three months of age. The toolkit insists that babies must be spoken to about race, as “letting children draw their own conclusions based on what they see” leads to racism. It is unclear how allowing children to think for themselves leads to racism.

It also suggests that white children specifically are strongly biased in favour of their own race by the time they are five years old, but claimed that such a phenomenon does not exist among black and “latinx” children.

The toolkit also teaches that if a white person disputes the accusation “that they are a racist [it] is taken as evidence of racism. The reading says that white people deny their own racism ‘to feel better about themselves.'”

I have already written my state representative, a conservative Republican, though I have doubts much will come of it. As I told him,

Do you think your leadership might be able to move their asses and put an end to this bigoted school program, now?

I have my doubts. Prove me wrong.

I do not expect much from him, even though I know he will sincerely want to do something. His Republican Party leadership in Arizona is a bunch of quisling backstabbers whose only goal is to gather campaign donations and compromise with corrupt and bigoted Democrats. They have been useless for years, which is why they are steadily losing ground in the state.

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Sunspot update: February activity declines to predicted values

3:51 pm

Time to do another sunspot update. Below is NOAA’s March 1, 2021 monthly graph, showing the Sun’s monthly sunspot activity. It is annotated by me as always to show the previous solar cycle predictions.

February continued the decline of sunspot activity seen in January after a very unusually active November and December. Though the actual sunspot number was more than the prediction, the difference in February was trivial.
» Read more

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Update on ISS leaks: Several to be drilled & sealed over next 5 days

8:44 am

According to Russia’s state news service, astronauts on ISS have located several leaks in the 20-year-old Zvezda module of ISS, and will spend the next five days fixing them.

This report clarifies a previous report that left more questions than it answered. It appears that there are several leaks that were found using a microscope sent to the station and temporarily sealed. Now the goal in the next five days will be to permanently seal them.

[A] hole will be drilled at one of the fracture’s ends, which will be filled with cold welding and sealed with a fluoroplastic film on top. The same procedure will be done with other holes. After that, the surface will be sanded and wiped with alcohol wipes and covered with a sealant. Overall, the cosmonauts will put three layers of the sealant.

The repair method suggests that they are all cracks. To stop a crack from growing you drill out the end.

That they are all cracks further suggests that these are all stress fractures. Thus, no matter how permanent these particular repairs are, they cannot solve the greater problem of the aging module itself. We should expect more cracks to appear in the future unless something more drastic is done.

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State legislatures proposing repeals of 2020 election revisions that made fraud easy

1:46 pm

I’ll believe it when I see it: The state legislatures of Arizona, Georgia, and Pennsylvania — all strongly controlled by Republicans — are now considering numerous proposals to repeal the many improvised revisions to state election laws that made fraud easy and contributed to the widespread belief of many that the 2020 presidential election was stolen by the Democrats.

Significant legislative attempts are underway in multiple U.S. states, including key battleground states, to roll back major changes in voting rules and regulations to various pre-2020 status quo antes. The efforts come after an historically chaotic election process that has left millions of Americans doubtful of election fairness, security, transparency and accountability.

Changes to election rules — some of them enacted prior to 2020 and others put in place in response to the COVID-19 pandemic last year — have included expansive mail-in voting, expanded early voting, relaxation of verification rules, and extensions to ballot receipt deadlines.

Those rules likely contributed to a record 158,000,000-plus votes cast in the 2020 election. But the relaxation of various voting requirements has also led to significant distrust in the election system: Nearly 40% of voters believe that U.S. elections are beset by fraud, while a similar number claim that such concerns haven’t been properly vetted by public authorities.

As far as I am concerned, until these changes are actually imposed and enforced, stories like this are nothing more than another example of Republican Party failure theater: lots of big talk that means nothing.

And if you sense a bit of contempt for these Republicans, you are not mistaken. I have watched them stand by impotently for decades as the the principles of freedom and individual rights that this country stands for were trampled upon and nullified, step-by-step by the corrupt and power-hungry Democratic Party. Why should I hold any respect for them?

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Today’s blacklisted American: Bi-racial make-up artist fired for singing a rap song as requested by black actor

1:00 pm

They’re coming for you next: An experienced bi-racial make-up artist was immediately fired from a new Amazon television project for simply singing a rap song — with the black actress who had suggested it and had joined in — that happened to contain the evil N-word that must never be spoken.

Earlier this month, Page Six reported that the artist in question was canned from the “Untitled Tracy Oliver Project” — the new show from the “Girls Trip” creator dubbed the “Black Sex and the City” — for allegedly saying the N-word repeatedly in front of one of the show’s lead actresses, while singing along with a rap song. (We know both the name of the actress and the makeup artist, but we aren’t going to print them due to the sensitivity of the situation. The makeup artist is a veteran of many major TV shows and movies.)

Now Page Six is told that her peers are outraged that the artist was fired for using the word — especially, we’re told, because the makeup artist is biracial.

Her union has done nothing to help this artist, though it graciously decided not to pursue charges against her. How nice of them.

I also do not have much respect for the so-called outrage of the artist’s “peers.” They only care because of her race. If the artist had been white and done the same, inspired by the black artist, I don’t believe they’d care at all. In the modern leftist culture that these people are seeped in the only thing that matters is race. If you have the right minority race, you can do no wrong. If you don’t, your rights are forfeit, and instead you must bow like a slave to that culture.

This is also par for the course for Amazon, which is enthusiastically embracing blackballing for petty and political reasons, almost always against conservatives or anyone who criticizes their leftist racist identity politics.

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Astra wins three-launch contract from NASA

8:59 am

Capitalism in space: Astra, which as yet not achieved its first orbital launch, has won a three-launch contract from NASA valued at just under $8 million.

Astra, the Alameda-based space launch startup that recently announced its intent to go public via a SPAC merger, has secured a contract to deliver six cube satellites to space on behalf of NASA. Astra stands to be paid $7.95 million by the agency for fulfilment of the contract. This will be a key test of Astra’s responsive rocket capabilities, with a planned three-launch mission profile spanning up to four months, currently targeting sometime between January 8 and July 31 of 2022.

There is no word on when the first flight of its rocket, dubbed Rocket, will occur. The company has completed two test launches, with the second nearly making orbit.

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Military admits F-35 is impossible to use, expensive, and an utter failure

3:45 pm

Another typical federal project: The military has now admitted that Lockheed Martin’s F-35 fighter jet, a decades-long project to replace the F-16, is an utter failure and must be replaced.

The list of basic problems with the jet are truly appalling.

In spite of its advanced technology and cutting-edge capabilities, the latest stealth fighter suffers from structural flaws and slew of challenges.

Most recent among them is a structural engine flaw and shortage in its production. The F-35’s engine problem is partly based in not being able to deliver them for maintenance as fast as needed, in addition to a problem with the heat coating on its rotor blades which shortens engine lifespan considerably. Defense News described it as a “serious readiness problem”, suggesting that as soon as 2022, nearly 5 to 6 per ent of the F-35 fleet could be effectively grounded as it waits for engine replacements.

Another challenge is the plane’s software. Most modern fighter jets have between 1 to 2 million lines of code in their software. The F-35 averages 8 million lines of code in its software, and it’s suffering from a bug problem. To fix this, the US Department of Defense is asking three American universities to help figure it out.

The fighter jet also suffers from a slightly embarrassing touchscreen problem. After making the switch from hard flipped switches to touch screens, pilots report that unlike a physical switch that you’re confident has been activated, touch screens in the plane don’t work 20 percent of the time says one F-35 pilot.

The worst part of this story is that this kind of incompetence has been par for the course for big federal projects like this for decades. Our government in Washington is corrupt and unqualified to even be dog catcher, but we voters don’t seem to have the courage to fire them. We certainly don’t fire the politicians who appear quite willing to encourage this corruption.

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Today’s blacklisted American: The pioneers who settled the west

12:28 pm

The Oklahoma Land Rush: cancelled
The Oklahoma Land Rush, wiped from history.

They’re coming for you next: A local community college in Oklahoma has removed a monument that commemorated the pioneers who settled the state in the 1800s because some people complained it was “not inclusive.”

The monument depicted the Oklahoma land run of 1889, which occurred on the day the U.S. government opened Oklahoma up to homesteaders for settlement. Apparently, there were complaints about this depiction on social media (which usually translates as a Twitter mob) as well as threats of violence. The college’s response to these mob threats?
» Read more

24 comments

Today’s blacklisted Americans: Two educators in NYC fired for refusing to do Black Panther salute

11:53 am

They’re coming for you next: Two different educators in New York City, one Jewish and the other a Dominican-American who calls herself Afro-Latina, have been fired for refusing to do the Black Panther salute popularized by the Disney sci-fi 2018 movie, Black Panther.

The latter, Rafaela Espinal, was fired as head of the Community School District 12 in the Bronx and forced to take a demotion in order to save her retirement and health benefits. Not only did she refuse to do this salute because she believed it created a racial divide, she found the policies of New York’s Department of Education (DOE) particularly offensive and bigoted, as described in her $40 million lawsuit filed against New York’s DOE.
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Fellow DOE administrators also allegedly told Espinal she wasn’t “Black enough” and she should “just learn to be quiet and look pretty,” she claims in the $40 million suit.

Espinal, 50, claims racial fissures began to emerge in superintendent meetings in the fall of 2017, when some Black administrators would meet separately after the larger group’s monthly gatherings. Soon, only the birthdays of Black superintendents were recognized at official meetings, she claims.

The other educator, Karen Ames (who is also suing the DOE), experienced equally bigoted treatment before she was fired.
» Read more

11 comments

China commits to building its own SLS

9:16 am

The new colonial movement: China yesterday officially announced that it has approved construction of a heavy-lift rocket, dubbed Long March 9, that would by 2030 be able to put 140 tons into orbit.

The rocket is planned to have a lift capacity of 140 metric tons, with the capability of sending 50 or more tons into lunar orbit. It would be an immense vehicle, with a 10-meter diameter core and 5-meter side boosters. China would also like to eventually make the rocket, or at least part of it, reusable.

China is also developing another large rocket more comparable to the Falcon Heavy, though this other rocket has no name and information about it is more scarce.

Both projects indicate the long term commitment of the Chinese government to its space program. They also indicate that the present-day international competition to get into space is fueling far more development than the last forty years of international cooperation.

Whether these giant government rockets from China will be practical and efficient is an unanswered question. Just building something to compete is not the same thing as actually competing. The rockets have to be affordable, with the ability to launch frequently to make in-space exploration possible. If not, they will nothing more than big photo ops for incompetent politicians, kind of like SLS is for the U.S.

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Another detailed essay demanding SLS be cancelled

5:21 pm

Link here.

The analysis is detailed, thoughtful, thorough, and technical. It is worthwhile to read every word, slowly, carefully, and with an open-mind. The lead:

The SLS axiomatically cannot provide good value to the US taxpayer. In that regard it has already failed, regardless of whether it eventually manages to limp to orbit with a Falcon Heavy payload or two.

The question here is whether it is allowed to inflict humiliation and tragedy on the US public, who so richly deserve an actual legitimate launch program run by and for actual technical experts.

The best time to cancel SLS was 15 years ago. The second best time is now.

While this essay is brilliant, its real significance is that it is another data point in the growing sense I have that the Washington community is preparing itself for cancelling SLS at last. Such an essay would not have been written or paid attention to five years ago. I know. I wrote my own and got no traction.

Today attention is getting paid. More importantly, we are seeing a range of people and news organizations advocating similar anti-SLS positions, positions that would have been thought politically impossible only a few short years ago.

The clock is ticking on SLS. If any of its planned upcoming tests or flights fail, it will face a firestorm of hostility. And even if they succeed, its days appear numbered.

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