e-Claire

I Get Email ...

must’ve fallen from that light in the sky t’other night...

Tycho Ted here, writing from Luna City, located near Shackleton Crater.  I live here in about 2110, and I’ve been reading a bunch of history books recently, Luna City, as you probably don’t know, since it ain’t happened yet, was founded by several private firms in 2020, primarily SpaceX and Bigelow Aerospace.  NASA first paid us a visit around 2025, having leased a ride from SpaceX.  The concierge from Bigelow asked NASA to park around in the back, so as not to embarrass the paying customers—tourists.

I understand that back there in 2010 you’ve got a President named O’Bama.  What, was he from Ireland, or something?  He was black, wasn’t he?  From Ireland?

But I digress.  Back there in 2010, O’Bama actually did something that was incredibly important.  (I just checked my history book.  I got his name wrong; he wasn’t Irish at all, was he?)

President Obama opened up the Solar System.  He’s the reason I was born here in Luna City, and why my daughter’s out there beyond what we call the “Continental Shelf” homesteading.  That’s helping build an O’Neill colony out beyond the orbit of Pluto, in the Kuiper Belt.  I just got some email from her, too; things are going fine.  (No, we haven’t figured out how to send information faster than light; forget it, will ya?  Slower than light’s the way the Universe is built.)

Obama didn’t mean to do all this.  Not at all!  From what I read in my history books, he was what you folks called a “stone-cold” socialist.  ("Stone-cold," You don’t know what “stone-cold” is until you’ve ice mined at the bottom of Shackleton.) (Oh, by the way, why’d you folks elect him?  After all of the evidence from the 20th Century that socialism doesn’t work, that it leads only to death and poverty, well, didn’t any of you pay any attention?)

I digress again.  Sorry.

Well, socialism doesn’t work.  That’s not a digression; that’s the central fact.  The facts are clear from history.  Socialism didn’t work in Russia, it didn’t work in China, it didn’t work in Vietnam, it didn’t work in China—and it didn’t work for NASA either.

What?  Did I say something that offended you?  That somehow surprised you?  Of course NASA was nothing but a socialist enterprise.  Look up the definition of what “socialism” is and then give a look at what the histories say about what NASA did from about 1970 until about 2010, when Obama changed things.

Obama eliminated a program within NASA that was supposed to take specially selected government employees—the only ones allowed to go into space by the American government before the skies were opened up to everyone by private enterprise (I think they were called “astronauts")—that was impossible to pay for.  Even a blue ribbon committee appointed by President Obama in 2009 stated that even if the Ares I rocket and its Orion crew capsule were to show up entirely developed for free, that NASA would have to immediately cancel the program, because it couldn’t afford to operate it.

You could look it up.  It’s true!

And furthermore, the Aries I rocket was incredibly badly engineered.  It wouldn’t have worked; it was a deathtrap.  By the time President Obama canceled it, NASA wasn’t capable of safely engineering any rocket.

Now Obama didn’t do this because he was a fan of capitalism, like us here in Luna City.  No, he was a socialist to the core, and several of the tenets of socialism are that humans are bad, that technology is bad, that exploration is bad, and most certainly, that expansion and growth are bad.  From what I have read about the rest of this one-term president, he believed all of those tenets with his very soul (if he had one).  No, what he thought he was doing was shutting down having any Americans going into space, even if they were specially-selected members of the Aerospace Nomenkultura, them there “astronauts.” This was a view that his cronies in the Democrat Party almost entirely shared, too.  Look at what President of the Proletariat Pelosi (isn’t that what you folks called her?) thought about spaceflight with humans—or technology of any sort—throughout her career.  Is it any surprise that Obama promulgated a policy that his minions in Congress wanted?  (Or was he the minion of the Democrats in Congress?  The histories aren’t clear on this to me.)

These dummies didn’t believe in private enterprise.  Business was Bad, wasn’t it?  Private enterprise was evial, wasn’t it?  These idiots thought that by getting the socialist enterprise called “NASA” out of the way, that private enterprise, which they didn’t believe in, couldn’t do the job of opening things up in space.  This would serve their purpose: to shut down American human spaceflight.

You folks in 2010, you’ve got to help me out here; you’ve got to explain some things to me that I don’t understand when I read my histories.  The Republicans, who as I understand things, were supposed to be the champions of free enterprise and the very enemies of socialism, were the most staunch opponents of Obama’s space plan.  Why did they support continuing a socialist space program?  Were they so in love with the pork that came into their districts—some of them—from the government tax redistributions caused by NASA—that they not only abandoned their principles, they not only turned their back on them, but strongly fought to continue what had for 40 years been an expensive and obvious failure?  I don’t get it.  Perhaps you can explain it for me?

Well, in any case, thank Klono’s Claws that Obama’s plan was actually carried out.  In shutting down NASA’s 2004 plan to go back to the Moon, by canceling it, Obama utterly and completely inadvertently opened up the rest of the Solar System, unleashing the forces of private enterprise and allowing humanity to expand outward into the Up and Out, where energy and mass are plentiful and where doomsday has been canceled.  At the time it seemed like the end of the world to some.  And to some it was—the socialist parasites of the American Nomenkultura.  But to the real space pioneers, like Buzz Aldrin (but not Neil Armstrong) and Elon Musk, Jeff Greason and Pat Bahn, it was the beginning of the beginning they’d worked for their entire lives.

And now I gotta go read what my daughter’s up to.  Hey, they’re talking about building a worldship for an interstellar voyage!  Those crazy kidz!  Now, why would anyone want to do that?!

1. OK, now, just where is the galaxy did that come from?

   I though it was interesting the way Armstrong (the strong, silent one) lined up against His Wonderfulness’ Grand Plan, while Buzz Aldrin lined up on t’other.

   “President Obama opened up the Solar System.”
   If your timeless correspondent is correct, that’s enough to make His Immenseness the greatest President ever.

   “... the socialist enterprise called “NASA”...
   I think that’s a bit of a stretch.  When JFK said “OK, now, let’s send somebody out to stomp around on the Moon and get him back here to tell about it”, there wasn’t a single commercial entity big enough, or well-endowed enough to tackle that job.

   Everything - everything had to be invented from scratch, designed from scratch, built from scratch. Of course, we had a little help from the likes of von Braun (Hitler’s favorite rocket scientist), and our guys (like Goddard) were pretty clever, too.  But even GM (history buffs may want to look back at one of the biggest, most profitable, most successful companies in the country) couldn’t do it.  It took everybody - including some of the best and brightest scientists and engineers of the time - almost all of whom have either retired or died.  (Look at the ages of the Astronauts: Aldrin: 80; Armstrong: 80; Borman: 82; Slayton: died in 1993, age 69).  That talent probably doesn’t exist any more in this country, thanks mainly to our wonderful education system.

   The private sector is working hard to get Out There, but it’s rough going - partly because they’re competing.  Ordinarily, that’s a Good Thing, but there are some areas where you just gotta join forces.  In war, f’r’example, you don’t hire the Acme Army to fight a battle, and if they don’t succeed, you hire the Microsoft Special Forces to see how that works out.

   I give much credit to the Rutan brothers, Elon Musk, &c.  But it’ll be a long time before any of them put boots on the Moon.

   And when they do, there’ll be a few Chinese takeouts ready for them to grab a bite to eat.

   Posted by ZZMike  on  04/16/10  at  10:01 PM

2. Really?  This isn’t a political analysis site; no, this is a senseless Obama-bashing site.  If readers would like REAL political commentary that employs REAL data without partisan spin distortions and lies, head over to http://nikflorida.org, where we don’t tell you WHAT to think, just to think.

   Posted by NikFlorida  on  04/17/10  at  06:40 AM

3. Hrm… this clever piece of creative postulism is reminiscent of Ayn Rand (or L Ron Hubbard, perhaps?) Unfortunately, as clever as it is, it’s dead wrong.  The “narrator” writes, “Socialism didn’t work in Russia, it didn’t work in China, it didn’t work in Vietnam, it didn’t work in China—and it didn’t work for NASA either.”

   Without pointing out the obvious, regarding what it ‘was’ (from a future amateur historian’s viewpoint) that didn’t work in the Soviet Union (largely Russia) or North Vietnam, let me point out that China is fast becoming the world’s leader in many respects, and “socialism” as the author calls it (without a clear understanding of what it is, apparently) works very well there, if results are any kind of measurement.

   What apparently DOESN’T work (it caused the Roman Empire to fall, the USSR to fall, and is currently causing the demise of the US) is focusing resources on security and war rather than on citizens and domestic issues.  The Roman Empire couldn’t hold together because Rome was content to allow the conquered folks to maintain a completely foreign culture, and simply extracted a tax from them, the USSR was unsustainable because the Soviets placed a higher monetary priority on defense than on feeding their citizens, and the US is proving that Osama Bin Ladin’s folks succeeded mightily by now spending more than half of the entire vast federal budget on security and, like the citizens of Sodom, vilifying its poor and afflicted rather than helping them. 

   We can disagree, but let’s not lie.

   If you’d like to read and respond to political analysis based on facts and not pre-conceived agenda items that misuse data and present obtuse perversions as underlying assumptions, go to http://nikflorida.org, where we don’t tell you WHAT to think, just to think.

   Posted by NikFlorida  on  04/17/10  at  06:55 AM

4. Nice blogphish, Nik; but I’m gonna leave your mannerless dropping.  Maybe my 12 hits a day will generate you some traffic. Good Luck with that.

   Just as an aside, it’s interesting that while you feeel this blog “tells you what to think,” you keep coming back.  Maybe you’re looking for something…

   As to China, maybe you want to think about the organ farms [they wait in prison until their organs are harvested and sold on the ‘medical tourism’ market], filled with folks whose “crime against the state” is to pray for its downfall.  [not work actively toward it, like, say Alinsky, Ayers or Davis—merely pray] Is that your definition of “works very well?”

   Or the hundreds of millions of Chinese peasants who subsist on less than $1 a day?  “works very well?” Or China’s overbalanced dependence on its export markets - which are failing due to “the worst economic times since the Great Depression,” leaving China with piles of unsold product and unpaid slave wages.  “works very well?”

   Ask the Ukrainians and Moldavians about the Soviet “success” in “feeding their citizens.” Oh, wait....

   As to the “empires” that “succeeded” by not “focusing resources on security;” we’ve never heard of them because they ceased to exist, having been taken over by their neighbors. *cough*human nature*cough*

   PeeEss:  over 60% of the Federal Budget goes to entitlement programs [SocSec, Medicare, etc].  Yanno “taking care of our citizens.” Less that 20% goes to defense.

   Hint:  Google can be your friend.

   Posted by Claire  on  04/17/10  at  07:21 AM

5. “What apparently DOESN’T work (it caused the Roman Empire to fall...”

   Interesting grasp of history.  And of political systems.

   Your “Today’s Poll” on healthcare is one of the most loaded, slanted, leading-question polls I’ve ever encountered.  So much for “I let you think without ‘pre-conceived agenda items that misuse data’ “.

   Posted by ZZMike  on  04/17/10  at  11:05 PM

6. PS: This may help with your ROI search (found with a little iDetective work):

   NASA Budget
   “... “the $25 billion in 1958 dollars spent on civilian space R & D during the 1958-1969 period has returned $52 billion through 1971—and will continue to produce pay offs through 1987, at which time the total pay off will have been $181 billion. The discounted rate of return for this investment will have been 33 percent.”
   ...
   “The economic benefits of NASA’s programs are greater than generally realized. The main beneficiaries (the American public) may not even realize the source of their good fortune. . .”
   ...
   “— 352,000 (mostly skilled) jobs created or saved,and;”
   ...
   “According to the “Nature” article, these 259 applications represent “. . .only 1% of an estimated 25,000 to 30,000 Space program spin-offs. These benefits were in addition to benefits in the Space industry itself and in addition to the ordinary multiplied effects of any government spending.”

   Not at all bad for a big ol’ socialist organization.

   Posted by ZZMike  on  04/17/10  at  11:21 PM

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