Tag: policy

Today’s blacklisted American: Biden administration increases closures of gun stores by 500%

11:36 am

The goal of Democrats: Banning the 2nd amendment
The goal of Democrats: Banning the 2nd amendment

They’re coming for you next: The Biden administration has increased its forced closures of legal gun stores by more than 500%, often revoking licenses for minor reasons such as typos.

In the years before the Biden-Harris administration took over the White House, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives usually revoked an average of 40 Federal Firearm Licenses (FFLs) per year. But, in the 11 months since Joe Biden declared war on “rogue gun dealers,” the ATF has revoked 273 FFLs — an increase of more than 500%. However, rather than targeting the true rogues, Biden’s ATF is revoking FFLs for the most minor of paperwork errors, which were never a concern for the ATF until Biden weaponized the agency.

“This has nothing to do with the ATF and everything to do with the DOJ,” said John Clark of FFL Consultants. Clark is a firearm industry expert who said the ATF announced the number of revocations at a recent Firearm Industry Conference. “The vast majority of the ATF don’t like this any more than the industry does,” he said. “It’s Biden.” [emphasis mine]

Meanwhile, the investigative journalism project of the the Second Amendment Foundation has been stonewalled by the ATF, having filed freedom of information requests with it on this issue almost a year ago, with no response.

The consequences of this harsh Biden policy has of course not reduced the number of gun crimes, in the slightest. What it has done however is to discourage gun dealers from working with the ATF, out of fear of being shut down for the slightest infraction:
» Read more

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Ariane-6 rocket delayed again

9:27 am

Capitalism in space: The first launch of ArianeGroup’s new rocket, Ariane-6, has been delayed again, and will not launch this year as planned.

The new delay appears mostly related to getting the rocket’s ground systems up and running.

The rocket, being built for the European Space Agency’s commercial division, Arianespace, had originally been scheduled for launch in 2020. Initially the rocket struggled to find customers, because it is not reusable and is thus more expensive. That changed in the past few months with the Ukraine War eliminating Russian rockets as a competitor combined with a new gigantic launch contract from Amazon to launch a large number of its Kuiper satellites using Ariane-6.

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Firefly founder stepping down as CEO

9:08 am

Capitalism in space: Tom Markusic, the founder of the smallsat rocket startup Firefly, is now stepping down as CEO, apparently forced out by the company’s new investors.

The company said that Markusic would shift from chief executive to a new role of chief technical advisor, effective June 16. He will remain a member of the company’s board and a “significant minority investor” in the company.

The move comes four months after AE Industrial Partners (AEI), a private equity firm, agreed to acquire a “significant stake” in Firefly from Noosphere Venture Partners, which sold its interest in Firefly at the request of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. Noopshere is a fund run by Ukrainian-born investor Max Polyakov. In March, AEI said it was leading Firefly’s $75 million Series B round.

The statement suggested that Firefly’s new owners wanted new leadership for the company as it prepares a second launch of its Alpha rocket. That launch is expected no earlier than mid-July from Vandenberg Space Force Base, nearly a year after the first Alpha launch failed.

Essentially, the two people that created this company and then saved it have been forced outt, largely as a result of federal government demands. Polyakov was forced to sell to AEI by the government because he was not American, and it appears AEI then forced Markusic out.

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NASA shuffles crew for first Starliner manned mission

8:48 am

In a press release yesterday, NASA announced the two-person crew that will fly on the first manned mission of Boeing’s Starliner capsule to ISS.

[C]ommander Barry “Butch” Wilmore, whom NASA assigned to the prime crew in October 2020, will join NASA astronaut Suni Williams, who will serve as pilot. Williams previously served as the backup test pilot for CFT [crew test flight] while assigned as commander of NASA’s Boeing Starliner-1 mission, Starliner’s first post-certification mission. As CFT pilot, Williams takes the place of NASA astronaut Nicole Mann, originally assigned to the mission in 2018. NASA reassigned Mann to the agency’s SpaceX Crew-5 mission in 2021.

The crew for this flight, delayed now more than two years, has changed several times. In 2020 astronaut Chris Ferguson dropped out for personal reasons. Then NASA listed the crew as Wilmore, Mike Finke, and Nicole Mann, with Williams then assigned to Starliner’s next mission, its first long term flight to ISS.

With this change, the crew has been reduced to two, and Finke is now listed as a backup should something further change with the prime crew.

The press release made no mention of an actual launch date, though it did say that Boeing and NASA are still reviewing the data from Starliner’s unmanned demo mission:

The Starliner team is in the process of delivering the initial test flight data to NASA and jointly determining forward work ahead of a crewed flight. These engineering and program reviews are expected to continue for several weeks, culminating in a launch schedule assessment at the end of July, based upon spacecraft readiness, space station scheduling needs, and Eastern Range availability.

The goal had been to fly before the end of this year. It appears NASA and Boeing are still pushing to meet that goal.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Arizona State University blacklists American flag for flags promoting the queer agenda and the evils of America

12:04 pm

American flag banned by Arizona State University
Banned at Arizona State University so that queers and racists could
be celebrated instead

As part of the celebrations this month for the fake holidays Juneteenth and Pride month, Arizona State University decided the American flag must come down and be replaced with flags celebrating the queer agenda and the Marxist and the racist anti-American agenda that Juneteenth represents.

On Wednesday, Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk blasted Arizona State University for replacing American flags lining a street with Juneteenth and Pride flags. Kirk posted photos of ASU’s downtown Tempe, Arizona campus, with streets lined with alternating colorful pride flags, and the Juneteenth flag bearing a large star.

“Originally, the flags outside my apartment on campus were all American flags, then, at the start of June following the Memorial Day holiday, they replaced every other flag with pride or ‘progress’ flags.

“About a week later, my two roommates and I watched through our window as one of the American flags was taken down and replaced with a ‘Juneteenth’ flag. By the next morning, all the American flags were replaced by the Juneteenth flags,” said an ASU student who wished not to be named.

Since I guarantee almost none of my readers know what this fake Juneteenth holiday stands for, here is the BBC’s liberal spin:
» Read more

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SLS dress rehearsal countdown set for June 20th with launch delayed again

9:28 am

According to NASA officials, the next attempt to complete a dress rehearsal countdown for its SLS rocket will take place on June 20, 2022, with the earliest date an actual launch can occur delayed again, and now set at best for an August 23 to September 6 window.

The article also notes that during a different press conference, NASA administrator Bill Nelson hinted that “there could be slips” in the present target date of ‘2025 for landing humans on the Moon.

Ya think? I guarantee that NASA will not land humans on the Moon in ’25, at least not using SLS. Based on all the issues confronting SLS, as well as NASA’s normal way of doing things, this mission will certainly slip at least one to two more years. And I am being very very very very optimistic.

We must also note that when first proposed by Bush Jr. in 2004, he predicted a NASA manned lunar landing by 2015, which means this launch will be at least one decade behind schedule, with it more likely being later than that.

But then, I can hear our glorious president yelling at me for complaining. “C’mon man! What’s a decade or two when you’re scheduling something important?”

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Today’s blacklisted American: Biden administration purging conservatives from FBI

1:20 pm

Chris Wray, FBI director and jack-booted thug
Chris Wray, FBI director and jack-booted thug

Blacklists are back and the Democrats have got ’em: According to numerous whistleblowers talking to the office of Congressman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the FBI has been aggressively blacklisting any employee who happens to express any conservative opinions at all.

Jordan detailed the most recent actions in a June 7th letter [pdf] to Chris Wray, director of the FBI, which was also a follow-up on another such letter sent in May.

We continue to investigate allegations that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is retaliating against FBI employees for engaging in disfavored political speech. On May 6, 2022, we sent you a letter that detailed examples of the FBI suspending the security clearances of FBI employees for their participation in protected First Amendment activity.1 To date, you have failed to acknowledge our letter or begin to arrange for the requested briefing. Since our May 6 letter, we have received new protected whistleblower disclosures that suggest the FBI’s actions are far more pervasive than previously known. Multiple whistleblowers have called it a “purge” of FBI employees holding conservative views. [emphasis mine]

The earlier May 6th letter [pdf] was even more blunt:
» Read more

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Our oppressive federal government really does want to squash SpaceX

10:35 am

Targeted by the government for destruction
Targeted by the government for destruction

In order to understand the full context of the FAA’s environmental reassessment of SpaceX’s Boca Chica facility in Texas and its approval of Starship/Superheavy launches there, it is important to take a closer look at the entire document [pdf] that was released on June 13, 2022. While that approval will now allow SpaceX to proceed, the nature of the document shows us that this government permission has been given very reluctantly, and that there are factions in the federal bureaucracy that are working hard to lay the groundwork to block it at first opportunity.

First, what did the reassessment conclude about the impact of future heavy-lift rocket launches at Boca Chica?

In summary, the FAA concluded that SpaceX’s planned operations “would not result in significant environmental consequences.” [emphasis mine] It then proceeded to provide many pages of analysis for each of the following issues, with almost all coming to the same exact conclusion [emphasis mine]:
» Read more

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South Korea postpones tomorrow’s second test launch of its Nuri rocket

9:57 am

The new colonial movement: Because of unexpected sensor reading in the oxygen tank as the rocket was lifted upright at the launch pad, South Korea has postponed its planned launch tomorrow of its home-built Nuri rocket.

According to KARI [South Korea’s space agency], readings of the oxidizer tank sensor normally change when the rocket is being erected. Readings on Nuri’s sensor, however, did not show any change during the process. “The sensor itself could be problematic, or it could be an issue with the cable or the terminal box,” the official said.

This launch would have been the second attempt to complete an orbital launch, with the first Nuri launch failing in October 2021 when tanks inside the third stage broke free during launch.

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Evidence of explosion in ’21 detected from orbital images of Chinese launchpad

9:46 am

Explosion at Chinese spaceporty
Click for full image.

Using orbital images, an amateur space observer has detected evidence that an explosion had occurred at the Chinese Jiuquan spaceport some time in October 2021.

Evidence of the explosion was discovered by space enthusiast Harry Stranger using imagery from Airbus and CNES and posted on Twitter June 10.

The incident occurred at facilities constructed around 16 kilometers to the southwest of Jiuquan’s two main launch complexes. The pair of launch pads are used by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) for hypergolic Long March rocket launches for human spaceflight, civil, military and scientific missions and were unaffected by the blast.

…Further satellite imagery from Planet’s Super Dove satellites seen by SpaceNews indicates that the explosion occurred between 0316 UTC on Oct. 15 and 0407 UTC Oct. 16 (11:16 p.m, Oct. 14 and 12:07 a.m. October 16 Eastern).

At almost exactly the same time China had launched a manned mission from this same spaceport, so the explosion apparently was not related to that launch. Instead, the images suggest that this was related to testing of solid rockets, and could be related as well to the delay in any further launches of the Kuaizhou-11 rocket. According to a press release several months earlier, that rocket was being prepared for a launch by the end of 2021, but no such launch ever occurred.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Scientist destroyed because he dated a co-worker

2:35 pm

David Sabatini: Scientist blacklisted

Persecution is now cool! The career and work of a world-renowned molecular biologist scientist David Sabatini has been utterly destroyed because of unproven accusations against him from a co-worker whom he had been casually dating for a short time.

The story at the link is long and detailed, and utterly horrifying. Not only did Ruth Lehmann, the head of the the Whitehead Institute where Sabatini worked and who fired him, never talk to him face-to-face, the report she based her actions on was filled with hearsay and unsubstantiated accusations.

No matter. Sabatini had been accused of sexual harassment, and thus he must be destroyed, without due process or any fair trial.

In the 24 hours after the report came out, Sabatini’s life fell apart. MIT put him on administrative leave. The Howard Hughes Medical Institute, another prestigious non-profit that funds biomedical research and was paying Sabatini’s salary, fired him. He resigned from the Whitehead, and eventually MIT, at the advice of his lawyers who thought it would help him secure his next job. (“I one hundred percent regret that,” Sabatini told me).
» Read more

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Today’s blacklisted American: Professor, discriminated because of his race, forced to resign from South Florida University

12:58 pm

Academia: dedicated to segregation!
South Florida University: dedicated to segregation?

“Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!” Professor Andrew Bugajski was forced to resign after three years of teaching at the nursing school at South Florida University because, according to his lawsuit, he was subjected to racial harassment by his dean because of his white skin color.

Bugajski was on track to be a tenured professor, but said he resigned because of discrimination and harassment he faced at the hands of Usha Menon, Dean and Senior Associate Vice President for USF Health. “Shortly after being hired, Plaintiff (Bugajski) immediately recognized his supervisor Vice Dean Usha Menon exhibiting hostility towards Caucasian men,” wrote Christiane L. Nolton, Bugajski’s lawyer. “Indeed, Plaintiff witnessed this disconcerting behavior which also occurred in front of other employees on multiple occasions. Specifically, Vice Dean Menon told Plaintiff and others that USF’s upper administrators were ‘a bunch of f***ing white male conservatives.’”
» Read more

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