Once Upon A Time in Heaven: Senator Webb on "white privilege"

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Friday July 23, 2010 · 10:37 AM PDT

2010/07/23 · 10:37

Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) injects some much needed reality into the recent unpleasantness in his Wall Street Journal op-ed.

Forty years ago, as the United States experienced the civil rights movement, the supposed monolith of White Anglo-Saxon Protestant dominance served as the whipping post for almost every debate about power and status in America. After a full generation of such debate, WASP elites have fallen by the wayside and a plethora of government-enforced diversity policies have marginalized many white workers. The time has come to cease the false arguments and allow every American the benefit of a fair chance at the future.

revprez

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Saturday July 10, 2010 · 10:30 AM PDT

2010/07/10 · 10:30

Dr. Paul D. Spudis is a smart guy, pretty apolitical and keeps up a damn good blog for Air & Space Smithsonian on issues relating to space exploration and its future settlement. His latest uncharacteristically tears into "Flexible Path," or as I like to call it--"Vision for Space Exploration minus the Vision and the Space Exploration."

Here are the highlights:

revprez

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Friday July 09, 2010 · 9:13 AM PDT

2010/07/09 · 09:13

Commercial space takes off

First off, a much belated congratulations to Elon Musk and the folks at SpaceX for last month's successful test launch of the Falcon 9 vehicle. The video is as spectacular as the story of a company, that for pennies on the dollar, hbas shown a path to reducing launch costs by a whole order of magnitude. A month on, and SpaceX's work is already paying off:

Space Exploration Technologies has signed a $492 million deal to carry Iridium Communications' mobile telecommunications satellites into space starting in 2015.
Space Exploration, better known as SpaceX, said Wednesday that the deal represents "the largest single commercial launch deal ever signed." Iridium provides mobile voice and data services around the globe.

revprez

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Thursday June 10, 2010 · 11:26 PM PDT

2010/06/10 · 23:26

At the beginning of the 3rd century of the common era (you fuckin' atheists), the most awesome period in history ever to be gender-flipped by the Japanese happened.

And in the past seven years, we've barely mentioned it FOUR times. Prove me wrong, mu'fucas!

Y'all know what I'm talkin'bout, Willis.

Three Kingdoms, bitch.

Once Upon A Time In Heaven: Roundup - Astronauts v. the Senate

revprez

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Thursday May 13, 2010 · 11:05 AM PDT

2010/05/13 · 11:05

Not convinced our space policy is in the shitter? The Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee met yesterday to reveal its penultimate ignorance and lack of ambition in what had to have been two-thirds self-laudatory fluff followed by the most ignorant kabuki dance between Congresscritter and Executive branch flunky you could imagine.

revprez

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Tuesday May 11, 2010 · 10:57 AM PDT

2010/05/11 · 10:57

I aim to post daily roundups of space-related news going forward. It'd be really awesome of others interested did the same.

revprez

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Monday May 10, 2010 · 10:01 AM PDT

2010/05/10 · 10:01

Heavy-lift, alive but knee-capped.

In his April 15 speech at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, Fla., U.S. President Barack Obama said the space agency would spend the next five years studying new technologies and materials before settling on a heavy-lift rocket design. But NASA documents and comments from agency officials suggest the White House already has a design firmly in mind.

The document was revised between May 3 and 5 to eliminate a particularly foolish fuel constraint. Spaceref has the modified request.

Summary: We're going to take five years to reinvent Ares V, and God knows how long to actually build, test and the fly the damned thing...if at all.

revprez

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Saturday May 08, 2010 · 1:27 PM PDT

2010/05/08 · 13:27

Not exactly why this was news this week. VX-200 successfully test fired in 2009, and it looks like Ad Astra's facing a 2 year delay before they can start their space-borne VF-200-1 tests.

Economic Times

WASHINGTON: NASA is looking forward to flying a plasma-powered rocket to survey an asteroid that could take astronauts to Mars in a little over a month's time.

The rocket called Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket (VASIMR) is a twin of one being developed for testing aboard the International Space Station.

VASIMR technology uses radio waves to ionise propellants like argon, xenon or hydrogen, and heat the resulting plasma to temperatures 20 times hotter than that on solar surface. It uses magnetic fields instead of metal nozzles to control the direction of the exhaust.

Equipped with an electric propulsion system, the rocket is being built to transport astronauts to Mars in 39 to 45 days someday - a fraction of the six to nine months the trip would take with conventional chemical rockets.

revprez

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Friday March 19, 2010 · 11:11 AM PDT

2010/03/19 · 11:11

Via Fox News, so mark this (especially the count) as unconfirmed:

Just when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seemed to be one vote shy of the number needed for health care reform to pass, a Democrat who voted for the bill last year announced he is switching his vote to no.

The vote tally on health care reform is starting to look like the Dow.

Just when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seemed to be one vote shy of the 216 she needs for health care reform to pass, a Democrat who voted for the bill last year says he's switching his vote to no.

The opposition from Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., dials back the number of House members leaning toward voting yes to 214, and the number leaning toward voting no to 217.

RSS

Once Upon A Time in Heaven: Senator Webb on "white privilege"

Obama space policy ripped by Air and Space blogger

Once Upon A Time In Heaven: Commercial Space Takes Off

Seriously...not enough Three Kingdoms on this DKos sh*t...

Once Upon A Time In Heaven: Roundup - Astronauts v. the Senate

Once Upon A Time In Heaven: Roundup

Once Upon A Time In Heaven: Roundup

"The engine is actually firing right now."

DeFazio switches to no