AROUND THE WORLD: Voting And Such Other Trivialities

Normally, if I were a real blogger, I would apologize for not updating any posts recently so that  my dear readers would not abandon me. But, because I am neither a real blogger nor a blog with actual readers, I'll just say hello to myself.  Hi, me.  Hey.  How are you? Meh, I'm ok.  K.  Great.  Anything in the news?  Oh yes, indeed:

AT HOME:

People are actively soliciting voter registrations from "disillusioned" groups... which in this case happens to mean dogs.  This dog, who has been dead for more than two (2) years, received a voter registration form, a legit one, in the mail.  Because voting is no big deal and the security of your civil rights is irrelevant.

Speculators are speculating about the United States' continued prominence (existence actually).  Predict possible Armageddon, moral decay, financial collapse, continued poor leadership, lack of responsibility... the usual.

Sensitive progressives really aren't very sensitive.  Mock Anne Romney's multiple sclerosis.

NASA-1977 is accomplishing a lot more than NASA-2012.  Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, after 35-ish years, are about to break out of our solar system (currently, they are 11.1 and 9.1 Billion miles from home, respectively, and still functioning).  NASA-2012 replied to NASA-1977, "Huh? What are these things you call 'science' and 'outer space'?  Teach us your ways of the flying object... and can we borrow some money.  We have no money."

ABROAD:

Crazy Ivan/Vlad the Putin has returned to prominence.  Is acting very scary as of late. 

Vlad, plus Iran, plus Syria, plus CHINA is a whole lot of crazy and even scarier.  Currently, planning war games.  Gee, I wonder who this is supposed to be a message to...

Egypt is destabilizing, threatening Israel (following its stabilization by ousting foreign interests i.e. American NGO's encouraging civil rights in the country... applied here to mean discouraging the murder of women for learning to read and going outside of the house).

CURRENT WORLD STATUS:  Ignorantly Chipper.

Here's the Awesome Scale as I imagine it.

(UTTERLY AWESOME) ------ (IGNORANTLY CHIPPER) ------ (IGNORANT IN GENERAL) ------ (FINANCIAL BAILOUT / T.A.R.P.) ----- (QUANTITATIVE EASING; QE2; QE3) ------ (EURO BAILOUT) ------ (PROGRESSIVE AGENDA SUCCESS) ------ (LOAD THE CAR & RUN)

Now, you might think that Utterly Awesome would be the "good" side of the scale but unfortunately you're wrong because this scale monitors world mood, not the actual state of existence.  So the closer we are to the Utterly Awesome side of things, the closer we are to impending destruction.  I like to think that this very-backward approach is a good representation of how quixotic things are.

NASA's Demise- Unveils "New" Old Rocket

This week, NASA released an artist's rendering of what it hopes will be America's replacement for the Space Shuttle program.

The SLS or Space Launch System (NASA's most banal acronym to date) is a derivative of 20 year old Shuttle engines and solid rocket boosters... and a 40 year old Saturn second stage rocket.

The good news is, it will be ready in just under a decade. (Note, it took your Dad's generation a decade to go from never being in space before to strolling around on the moon).

With the SLS, we are going backwards in time with both technology and ambition. I like recycling (not really but I pretend to) but mashing together old, outdated parts to make something this pathetic is not something I support (or at least pretend to). NASA Administrator and galactic idiot, Charles Bolden, said of the new rocket design, "President Obama challenged us to be bold and dream big, and that's exactly what we are doing at NASA." http://www.nasa.gov/exploration/systems/sls/sls1.html

This is not dreaming big, Mr. Bolden, and please don't try and sugarcoat it. If you're going to go retro with your rockets, go all the way.

Boldly Going Nowhere...

The demise of NASA is shocking and painful to watch. It is a topic I tend to avoid thinking about, but there are times where I feel I require punishment.

Congress has asked NASA for clarification on it's plans so many times that I think NASA's tired of trying to come up with a good story. The White House said this week that:

"It is this administration's goal to use NASA's resources for more real world applications such as weather monitoring and seashelf erosion tracking while scaling back our astronaut corps."

There's two very interesting things about this press release. The first one is that I made it up. The second is that it clearly shows how this administration has abandoned our manned space program.


Why is having a viable manned space program important? For one, because other nations are catching up... some faster than others. Take Europe for example. The European Space Agency is starting to make a bit of progress in its space program. But once they develop a rocket fuel mixture that doesn't react violently to cigarettes, the skys the limit for them.

So, here we are, the Shuttle program was supposed to be replaced by the Constellation program (canceled) and now the International Space Station may have to be abandoned because we can't catch a ride.

There was a time when this American supported abandoning the multi-billion dollar boondoggle known as the International Space Station. But the stakes have been raised recently. China is seeking space supremacy and plans to have a permanently manned space station by 2020...the same year the ISS is scheduled to be moth balled. What to do? How about selling the ISS to the Airforce in 2020 and put this man in charge of redecorating the place.