Space: good news/bad news

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Jun 032023

Good news:

In a First, Caltech’s Space Solar Power Demonstrator Wirelessly Transmits Power in Space

This is *many* orders of magnitude away from a practical solar power satellite… but ya gotta start somewhere.

And on the other hand, bad news:

Boeing finds two serious problems with Starliner just weeks before launch

Problem one: bits of the parachute system aren’t as strong as they should be. Bad, but readily solvable.

Problem two: the wiring is flammable. This… is monumentally stupid, a problem that has been well understood since the Apollo 1 fire. this may well require that the capsule be largely disassembled so that *miles* of wiring can be replaced.

Good luck with *that.*

And while Boeing continues to struggle to get a capsule not fundamentally different from Apollo flying SpaceX continues to send crews to the ISS in Dragons.

19 years later… pic.twitter.com/2xead0zqaA

— Rare North American Space Koala (@culpable_mink) June 1, 2023

“The Davenport” was a disaster

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Jun 022023

Today I swung by “The Davenport,” the century-plus old apartment building that partially collapsed a few days ago. Roads were closed off for a radius of a block or two around it so I couldn’t get very close in my car, and I didn’t have the time to find someplace to park and walk. Ehhh, oh well. Anyway, a lot of information has come out about it; the city of Davenport has released a bunch of inspection reports and other documents going back several years showing that it has been falling apart for some time. Bricks have been popping out of the face of the building for years. It looks like the sort of place that your average person would have been able to look at and go “Nope” and run to some other accommodations.

Someone’s gettin’ sued.

The City of Davenport website with the documents:

https://www.davenportiowa.com/cms/One.aspx?portalId=6481456&pageId=19580321

In retrospect this sort of thing is not too surprising. A lot of the buildings around here are old brick structures, and The Davenport was only a few blocks from the Mississippi river. “500 year floods” seem to happen every few years now; this had *got* to have an effect. Whether water seeps into the ground that far inland I don;t know, but having tens of thousands of tons of new watery overburden from time to time has got to cause the ground to flex at least some. There are also the occasional earthquake; small by the standards of even Utah, but if you have a brick building not built with earthquakes in mind… that’s not so great.

In all honesty, “The Davenport” looks like a *lot* of buildings in this part of the midwest. Built a century ago, having seen better days. Like our roads and bridges, the infrastructure has not been well looked after. I won’t be surprised if the next few years are filled with increasing tales of buildings and bridges falling. Imagine if the dozens of trillions dumped down the black hole of welfare were instead spent on repairs, maintenance and replacements of structures that needed it.

No, those aren’t Ukrainian missiles in Mexico

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Jun 012023

A recent Mexican TV news piece showed a cartel member wandering about with a shoulder-fired AT-4 anti-tank rocket slung over his shoulder. A number of commenters immediately leaped to one or both of two wrong conclusions:

1: It’s a Javelin missile

2: It’s a missile we gave to Ukraine, which they then turned around and sold on the black market.

Number 1 is easy enough to debunk; it’s simply not a Javelin. Number 2 is more troubling: but then there’s a little detail on the launch tube that makes it clear that wherever the cartel got this thing… it’s not something to fret about too much.

Virgin Orbit sold off

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May 252023

Given the vast amount of money spend on Virgin Orbit to develop a rocket that promised to be cheap, the fact that the company failed is no surprise whatsoever (see HERE). But their failure is other companies gains.

No one should be surprised Virgin Orbit failed—it had a terrible business plan

Stratolaunch bought VO’s modified 747 with the intention of using it to launch things. This probably makes a lot more sense than their gigantic ROC carrier aircraft… too much airplane for many missions, and not exactly capable of landing on every runway in the world. Big as the 747 is, there are a *lot* of airports with decades of experience accommodating it.

Stratolaunch Expands Fleet with Virgin Orbit’s Modified Boeing 747

And the New Zealand/American company Rocket Lab has purchased a fair chunk of VO’s infrastructure:

Rocket Lab Bolsters Neutron Rocket Program with Purchase of Virgin Orbit Long Beach California Assets

Good for them. Instant growth, and, hopefully, continued employment for some VO staff. And if nothing else at least the ChiComs didn’t get it.

There are so few actual white supremacists…

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May 232023

… that the market for them is being filled by non-white people. There was the “white supremacist” Mexican, and now this guy who was supposed to have tried to ram his U-Haul into the White House:

19-year-old Missouri man arrested in U-Haul crash at White House security barriers

U.S. Park Police on Tuesday identified the driver as Sai Varshith Kandula, 19, of Chesterfield, Missouri.

That’s a weird name for a Whitey McWhiteGuy.

This is Sai Varshith Kandula, the Missouri man who drove a U-Haul into the White House gates

The media is referring to him as a “white supremacist” after authorities found a Nazi flag in the vehicle

Just wanted to share his driver’s license photo

PC: @karol pic.twitter.com/15PgcmsGTz

— DC_Draino (@DC_Draino) May 23, 2023

NEW: Investigators pulled what appears to be a Nazi flag out of the U-Haul, but they haven't provided any further details.

Here's what we know: https://t.co/cXt81Ji2NA pic.twitter.com/jBsb1uPJA3

— Troy Pope (@troycpope) May 23, 2023

Behold, modern “journalism:”

19 year old who rammed White House barrier threatened president

News of the arrest just feet from the White House comes amid a climate of fear and hostility as Republicans continue to demonize diversity programs while downplaying the threat of white supremacist violence.

Yeah. *THAT’s* the big problem plaguing society… white supremacy that’s so

An anomaly at Amazon

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May 222023

With the release of my latest book, I went to Amazon to see if my previous works are currently available (SR-71: yes; B-47/B-52: yes; Vol 1: currently no). In the process, I was surprised to see that there is a *hardback* version of my SR-71 book available. This is surprising for several reasons…

1: No mention of it was made to me by the publisher

2: It’s a relatively slim volume for a hardback

3: There has been some discussion, so far quite preliminary, of an expanded version of the SR-71 book at some point in the future, which would be more appropriate as a hardback.

Anyway, the listing looks like this:

“Huh,” sez I, so I click on the “hardback” link to see what it looks like. And… it looks like this:

Wait, what?

Now, that’s a perfectly fine book. I have a copy myself. But it’s not *my* book.

I also noticed that there are 187 reviews, which is substantially more than I recall there being. And that’s because the reviews for Goodall’s book are mashed in with reviews for mine.

Somebody hit the wrong button somewhere.

So if you want to get a copy or three of my book – an urge I wholeheartedly support – just make sure you order the right book. I’ve contacted the publisher about this and they’re baffled; they’ve contacted the people they need to to try to get this weirdness resolved.

Oh, and there’s this, for whatever it’s worth:

Woo, and, indeed, hoo.

Radioactive Toothpaste

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May 212023

History is *filled* with astonishingly bad ideas. And who would have guessed that some of the worst would come out of collectivist totalitarian systems like Nazi Germany?

The Case of The Radioactive Toothpaste

Curiously, the toothpaste in question was filled with Radium, the radioactive element of choice for insane and/or stupid product manufacturers in the early 20th century, but Thorium. Why Thorium? Well… “why not” seems to have been the answer.

Republic? Democracy? Or something else?

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May 202023

So, what is the current form of American government? To the simple, it’s a democracy. To those who actually have *some* understanding of the theoretical workings of the US Federal government, it’s a representative republic. But to those who have watched how the Feds and a startling number of state and local governments work, a more accurate descriptor is one that most probably haven;t heard of… but rest assured, you *will* be hearing it a lot so long as the means of communications remain reasonably free and accessible:

Anarcho-Tyranny

Coined in 1995, “Anarcho-tryanny” is a form of government that is characterized by taking a hands-off approach to dealing with actual criminality at all levels… but exercising draconian oppression upon the average citizens. Sound familiar? Cities that let criminals loot and burn and protest and terrorize at will… but toss people who defend themselves into the hoosegow for show trials. States that do diddly to deal with gangs and murderers of all stripes, but ban common firearms and standard magazines. Federal law enforcement agencies that welcome in whole armies of invaders, and hire armies of armed bureaucrats to hunt down small business owners who might have made small mistakes on the deviously complex tax returns.

And then there are the “glowies.”

If you, as an average, law-abiding citizen who wants nothing more than to be left alone to live your life and pursue happiness, fear the government descending upon you more than the guy breaking into your car or shoplifting your store does… you may be in an anarcho-tyranny.

Well, I’m torn

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May 192023

So the latest internet distraction is the case of a white pregnant nurse who was declared a “racist” and a “Karen” because she tried to use her White Privilege to steal a bicycle from some black guys, and get the cops called on them to get them killed. Shock of all shocks, it turns out that that narrative was in fact a lie; the guys stole the bike from *her* and filmed her and released a video in order to smear her.

How the fraudulent narrative got going:

This is unacceptable! A white woman was caught on camera attempting to STEAL a Citi Bike from a young Black man in NYC. She grossly tried to weaponize her tears to paint this man as a threat. This is EXACTLY the type of behavior that has endangered so many Black men in the past! pic.twitter.com/CLUMNzjSDY

— Ben Crump (@AttorneyCrump) May 15, 2023

How it’s going:

NYC hospital ‘Karen’ paid for Citi Bike at center of viral fight with black man: lawyer https://t.co/VZ07f7iW7t pic.twitter.com/IuHBgJ8GTr

— New York Post (@nypost) May 18, 2023

She has apparently lost her job and been chased out of her home due to threats from the usual mob. A Gofundme has been set up to generate some living expenses… presumably, after her lawyer gets done reaming her former employer, she’ll be set for a good long time, but that will probably take a while.

Help Sarah Comrie fight being branded a “Karen”

Now here’s where I’m spit down the middle. The story as related above, if that was the sum total of it, would make Sarah the aggrieved party and fully worthy of sympathy. But this is what’s written on the Gofundme:

My name is Bob Roe, and this past Saturday, my niece, Sarah Comrie, a Physicians Assistant at Bellevue, became embroiled in a much-publicized incident with a Citibike that unfairly painted her as a racist “Karen.” The facts have since proven this is a lie, but the damage has been done. In fact, Sarah is a dedicated healthcare worker who is six months pregnant. She holds racial justice and equity dear, and has dedicated her life to serving NYC’s most challenged individuals. She does not wish to become a cause celebre, but the legal bills to save her livelihood and her reputation obviously are mounting. Please help!

Ummm… She holds racial justice and equity dear

Does she now. If that’s the case… she just got a good dose of racial justice and equity. She got what she holds dear. This would seem to make her about as sympathetic as the proud mayor of a “Sanctuary City” getting upset about all the buses of migrants showing up.

Now, I don’t know. Perhaps her uncle just made that up, spewing the sort of virtue signalling that far too many people think needs spewing in the futile hope of staving off the unthinking hordes of protestors. After Bud Light and Target and Ford and Miller Lite, I have lost the last little bit of patience I have for this nonsense.

Rushing in to stand on corpses

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May 152023

Whenever there’s an “incident,” no matter how horrifying, that can be used for political purposes, it *will* be used for political purposes. But sometimes those attempting to do so go about it in such a brazen and dishonest, yet bumblingly incompetent, manner that you just have to sit up and take notice.

For instance, the mass shooting in Allen, Texas. One of the first witnesses to dash before the cameras was one Fredd Steven Spainhouer, who said he rushed to render aid to the wounded, performing CPR on three of them.

He used this soapbox the argue against civil rights by way of disarming citizens:

He seemed to be out in front of cameras rather a lot. Turns out there’s a reason for that: he’s a Texas State Democrat Party Executive Committee member. It was an opportunity to not just tell his story, but to spin a political narrative. But there’s a problem, one the Allen Police Department has gone public with: he’s lying.