Tag: policy

Pushback: Christian adoption agency wins against NY’s attempt to force it to send kids to queer families

12:05 pm

New Hope: willing to fight for its religious beliefs
New Hope: willing to fight for its
religious beliefs

Bring a gun to a knife fight: When two different New York state agencies threatened to investigate and penalize the Christian nonprofit New Hope Family Services because it refused to place orphans with queer couples, instead insisting that the children under its care be adopted only by a mother and father, New Hope sued — twice — and has now won two settlements that will allow it to continue to place children in the manner that matches its beliefs.

Faith-based adoption provider New Hope Family Services secured a second victory against New York state officials, after securing a favorable settlement and a payment of $250,000 for attorneys’ fees in a related lawsuit settled last month. In settlement of the second lawsuit—which challenged an attempt by a different New York state agency to punish New Hope for adhering to its religious convictions—New York officials agreed to pay an additional $25,000 in attorneys’ fees and costs, and broadly confirmed New Hope’s right to continue its critical work of placing infants in permanent homes without government harassment.

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ESA to live-stream image downloads from Mars Express

9:36 am

To celebrate Mars Express’s 20th year in orbit around Mars, the European Space Agency (ESA) has announced that tomorrow it will for one hour live-stream the image downloads coming from the orbiter.

I have embedded that live stream below. According to the press release, new images will arrive about once every 50 seconds. The camera that will be taking the pictures however is not one of Mars Express’s main instruments, but designed instead to simply monitor the separation of the Beagle-2 lander from the orbiter in 2003. Since 2007 however the science team has used its low resolution global images of Mars for public relations, education, and even some science research.

That the science team is not providing the live feed from its high resolution camera however illustrates why Mars Express gets so little press coverage, compared to Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). All MRO images are released to the public, usually only a month or so after they reach Earth. The ESA however has never made the archive of Mars Express accessible, as far as I have been able to discover. All it does is periodically issue a press release about once every few months touting one new image, even though the spacecraft is taking dozens daily.
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Pushback: If the young are beginning to resist the leftist queer agenda, then there is real hope

12:01 pm

A little child shall lead them, by James Johnson
“A little child shall lead them,” painting by James L. Johnson.

And a little child shall lead them: There appears to be increasing evidence that it isn’t just the parents that are becoming aware and opposed to the queer and Marxist agenda that the public schools and leftist governments have been force feeding down children’s throats for the past decade. It now appears the students themselves are beginning to rise up in rebellion.

This story from May 29, 2023 illustrates the point:
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North Korean rocket fails in attempt to put spy satellite into orbit

9:04 am

In North Korea’s first attempt today to place a spy satellite into orbit since 2016, the rocket failed shortly after launch, dropping into the ocean.

But the rocket lost thrust and plunged into the sea with its satellite payload, the official Korean Central News Agency reported. It added that authorities would investigate the “serious defects” revealed by the launch and conduct another test as soon as possible.

South Korea’s military said it had managed to locate and salvage a portion of the suspected debris. It released images showing a large barrel-like metal structure with thin pipes and wires at the bottom, which experts said might be a liquid fuel tank.

The U.S., Japan, and South Korea all condemned the launch as violating UN sanctions, as did the UN’s secretary-general.

The recovery by South Korea could yield a great deal of technical information about North Korea’s rocketry and missile program.

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Russia delays launch of its Luna-25 mission one month to August

8:55 am


Click for interactive map.

Russia today announced that it is delaying the July launch of its Luna-25 mission to August.

No reason for the delay was revealed. The mission itself has been under development for almost a quarter century, with numerous delays. It will be the first lunar probe by Russia since the 1970s.

The lunar mission will be launched atop a Soyuz-2.1b carrier rocket with a Fregat booster from the Vostochny space center in the Russian Far East. Under the lunar project, the Luna-25 automatic station will be launched for studies in the area of the lunar south pole. The lander is set to touch down in the area of the Boguslawsky crater.

The green dot on the map shows this crater, with the white cross the Moon’s south pole. The other two missions are also targeting launches this summer, with Chandrayaan-3 set for a July launch and Nova-C in late September.

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Spain becomes 25th nation to sign Artemis Accords

8:36 am

In a ceremony yesterday in Spain, that country became the 25th nation to sign the Artemis Accords, a bi-lateral agreement with the United States that was designed during the Trump administration to act as a work around to the limitations to private enterprise in space created by the Outer Space Treaty.

The full list of signatories so far: Australia, Bahrain, Brazil, Canada, Columbia, Czech Republic, France, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, New Zealand, Nigeria, Poland, Romania, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, the Ukraine, and the United States.

This alliance gives the United States a great deal of leverage in establishing legal policy, if it is used as originally intended. It however at present remains unclear if the Biden administration intends to do so, considering its general hostility to the private sector and freedom.

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New data gives the same result as old data: Like the flu, COVID hurt NO ONE who was young and healthy

1:19 pm

Lysenko with Stalin
Trofim Lysenko (on the left), the person now considered the ideal
scientific model by health officials, preaching to Stalin as he destroyed
Soviet plant research, persecuted anyone who disagreed with him,
and caused famines that killed millions.

New data from Israel has now confirmed what was obvious almost from the beginning, that COVID-19 was nothing more than a variation of the flu, a danger only to the elderly and the chronically sick.

According to newly revealed Israeli Ministry of Health data, during the entire epidemic there were zero deaths (that’s 0, nil, none, naught, zilch, null) from COVID to anyone under fifty who was of average and reasonable health.

Zero healthy individuals under the age of 50 have died of COVID-19 in Israel, according to newly released data. “Zero deceased of 18–49 years of age with no underlying morbidities,” the Israel Ministry of Health (MOH) said in response to a formal request from an attorney. Officials noted that the statement only applies to COVID-19 deaths where the MOH conducted an epidemiological investigation and had received information about the underlying diseases.

“Zero is a very, very clear number, and cannot be subject to interpretation,” Yoav Yehezkelli, a specialist in internal medicine and medical management, and former lecturer in the Department of Emergency and Disaster Management at Tel Aviv University in Israel, told The Epoch Times.

“Why were all the extreme measures of school closures, vaccination of children, and lockdowns needed?” he added. [emphasis mine]

This data simply confirms what numerous health experts unwilling to play political games with the data have said from the beginning, that COVID was essentially similar to the flu, harmless to healthy people and only a risk to the elderly and those with serious chronic health issues. Just like the flu, if you are healthy you have no reason to fear it, and in fact, you should be unbothered about getting it as it will give you natural immunity, thus making the spread of the virus more difficult and reducing the risk to those whom the virus (and the flu) could kill.

Trump — along with a lot of other Washington officials — proved this point when they all got COVID in October 2020 and quickly recovered. As I wrote then:
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SpaceX confirms Starship prototype to fly on next Superheavy test flight

9:19 am

SpaceX has confirmed that it will use Starship prototype #25 to fly on top of Superheavy prototype #9 on the next orbital test flight.

Starship #25 does not include a lot of the upgrades that have been installed on later Starship prototypes, but by using it SpaceX tells us its focus on that next orbital test flight will be to test Superheavy. Using this less capable Starship gets it used and out of the way so that the kinks in Superheavy can more quickly be worked out.

It also means SpaceX’s prime focus on that second flight will not be reaching orbit, though the company will try nonetheless.

The article at the link also notes that this next orbital test cannot take place any sooner than August, based simply on engineering requirements.

Ship 25 is now at the launch site and awaiting a six-engine static fire test, with Elon Musk noting the pad modifications should be complete in a month, ahead of another month of testing before the next test flight.

This gives the FAA two full months to approve the launch license. I predict however that come August, that launch license will still not be approved, and we will still have no clear idea of when that approval will come. Nor should we be surprised if approval does not come before the end of this year.

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Chinese launch yesterday set record for number of humans in space

8:59 am

The launch yesterday of three Chinese astronauts to that country’s Tiangong-3 space station established a new record, seventeen, for the number of humans in space.

The launch of the next crew to China’s Tiangong space station late Monday (U.S. time) added three astronauts to the population of humans in space, which reached a record number of 17 people in orbit — six Chinese citizens, five Americans, three Russians, two Saudis, and one Emirati astronaut.

The arrival of Chinese astronauts Jing Haipeng, Zhu Yangzhu, and Gai Haichao in space following their launch atop a Long March rocket broke the previous record of 14 people in orbit at one time.

Meanwhile, the four-person crew of the commercial AX-2 mission to ISS, has undocked from ISS, with SpaceX’s Freedom capsule expected to splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico at 11:09 pm (Eastern) tonight.

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China sends a new crew to its Tiangong-3 space station

7:31 pm

Using its Long March 2F rocket, China today (May 30th in China) sent a new three-man crew to its Tiangong-3 space station for a five month mission.

The launch was from the Juiquan spaceport in the interior of China, so both the four side strap-on boosters as well as the core stage crashed somewhere in China. No word of any damage or injuries.

The Shenzhou capsule is expected to dock with the station about six hours after launch. The old crew’s stay will overlap with this new crew for a short time before returning to Earth.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

35 SpaceX
20 China
8 Russia
5 Rocket Lab

American private enterprise still leads China 40 to 20 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 40 to 36. SpaceX alone now trials the rest of the world combined 35 to 36, but trails the entire world including American companies 35 to 41.

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How real is the Texas legislature’s proposed ban on the racist “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” programs at colleges?

11:27 am

Failure Theater!

Failure theater? This week the Texas legislature passed a proposed ban on race-based “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” (DEI) programs at its public colleges, requiring all such offices be closed within six months with the staff of such offices terminated.

The final legislation says universities cannot create diversity offices, hire employees to conduct DEI work, or require any DEI training as a condition for being hired by or admitted to the university. All hiring practices must be “color-blind and sex-neutral.” The bill would also prohibit universities from asking job candidates to provide written answers about how they consider diversity in their work or sharing how they would work with diverse populations, commonly known as diversity statements. Critics have equated diversity statements with ideological oaths, while supporters say they help ensure job candidates are prepared to support students from all backgrounds.

The legislation says university governing boards must adopt policies to discipline employees who violate these rules. Under the final version of the draft, university leaders cannot spend state money until they have declared to the state they are in line with the new law.

The bill still has to be signed by Texas’ Republican governor Greg Abbott, but that signature is expected.

Will this ban work? » Read more

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China unveils next Shenzhou launch date and crew to its space station

9:07 am

China today revealed the next three-man crew to occupy its Tiangong-3 space station, with a planned launch in a Shenzhou crew capsule targeting May 30, 2023, Chinese time.

Because of time differences, that launch will occur tonight at 6:28 pm tonight, Pacific time. The rocket will be a Long March 2F taking off from China’s western interior Jiuquan spaceport. The rocket’s lower stages will therefore crash somewhere in China.

The crew will remain on board the station for five months, and with one astronaut the first Chinese to fly in space four times.

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