Gingrich: Politics Is a ‘Nasty, Vicious, Negative’ and Disgusting Business

Gingrich: Politics Is a ‘Nasty, Vicious, Negative’ and Disgusting Business: In an interview with ABC News, Newt Gingrich accused his Republican opponents of lying in their negative ads and offering “no hope they will be any good as president.” “Politics has become a really nasty, vicious, negative business and I think it’s disgusting and I...

More on Gingrich

In an earlier post, I mentioned a series of videos posted on this site, which is referred to as Victory of Death.


I wanted to revisit that series because of something that Gingrich said about Bush's 2004 campaign against Kerry.  Here's a screen shot of the passage:

Gingrich says that Bush in 2004 wanted to run a campaign based upon personalities, as opposed to ideas.

He said that Bush was uncomfortable with ideas.  Fast forward to 2011, and you get Romney going after Newt as being zany and now going after him for his weeping incident.   Another campaign about personality?

Romney refuses to debate with Gingrich too.  Why?  Is he afraid or uncomfortable with ideas?

That leads to an executive who won't veto bills.  He goes on to say that this is absolutely necessary because Congress cannot discipline itself.  If an executive doesn't have the broad authority to sustain his vetoes, you'll end up with a lot of unwise spending.

The election of 2006 was a message.  How did the Republicans respond?  Was succeeding until the market collapse in 2008.  Gingrich says that you can always win on issues-- but not with personalities.

Gingrich has a game plan.  Will the Republicans buy into it?  Why not?  Hasn't it worked before?

Et tu, Ann? The unkindest cut of all.

William A. Jacobson: So much of what the left-wing said about Coulter turns out to be true

quote:

Who would have expected it. Ann Coulter in her endorsement of Mitt Romney gave a very misleading account of Rick Santorum’s immigration record, asserting that he voted against E-Verify.

Comment:


I feel this one because it had an influence upon me.  I like Coulter, but you sometimes get a situation in which a stalwart goes bad.  I don't know if that's happening here, but this wasn't good.

Steve Deace: Why I Am Endorsing Newt Gingrich for President

stevedeace.com

quotes:

• Sadly, there are only two candidates offering a real means by which to actually undo that which the Left has done to this country for the past 50 years, and not just conservative platitudes. One of those candidates is Ron Paul  [ Comment:  And Paul isn't a realistic choice.]
• The Left has used unelected judges and judicial oligarchy to reinvent the American way of life, from secularism to the loss of the sanctity of life, to the redefining of marriage, the confiscation of private property, and the granting of imaginary rights. [ Comment:  I wrote about a ConCon in order to deal with this.]
• The future is at stake, and we may never get another environment with the country so prepared to challenge the system as we have right now.
• Sometimes the most broken people are the ones God does the most tremendous work through. I know that has been true in my life.

Comment:

I did a post about a series of videos Deace made about Presidential hopefuls.  There's one about Romney, and here's the one he made about Gingrich



Iowa's caucuses are almost here, but Texas is two months away yet.

I haven't made my mind up yet, but last night I gave it some thought.  I have said and will say again that I am leaning towards Gingrich.  Why?  I think Gingrich will tell you what you need to hear, not necessarily what you want to hear.  To me, this give his words more credibility.  Anybody can tell you what you want to hear.  It takes a bit of political courage to say and do what is not necessarily the most popular thing.

I recall reading somewhere that Harry Truman once said that good leadership is getting people to do what they don't want to do and liking it.  If I am reading Gingrich right, I think he could be that kind of leader.

E-Cat Weekly -- December 29, 2011

pesn.com

Comment:

I checked out one of the articles here, titled "Could Starships Use Cold Fusion Propulsion?"  Personally, I didn't think so when I started reading, so that is not what I'm posting about here.

No, it is that the article is quite skeptical about the E-cat, and actually does a good job of debunking it.  Yes, it is a good job, the best I've seen so far.  Actually, the article doesn't do the heavy lifting, but only links to it here.  A concerted effort to read through it all should leave some significant questions for Rossi to answer.

But I am not totally convinced.  I'll tell you what gave me pause, and that is the protection from gamma rays.  Not being well trained in this area, I can see why this got past me before.  It doesn't seem likely that Rossi's device is doing what he claims unless he has more shielding than what he has.  But the reaction chamber is really small ( only a little over 3 cubic inches (50 cm3)).  Shielding that shouldn't be too difficult, but how do you know that Rossi actually did that?  That something that could lead to a quick dismissal of Rossi's claims.  But it could also lead to a confirmation.

The other part that may be significant is the copper ash of the claimed reaction.  I worked through these myself.  Now, I can see getting to copper 63, but not to copper 65 in the amounts claimed.  I think this is a significant point, and it is another thing that got by me.  But I never claimed to be an expert.

No, I'm not totally convinced one way or the other.  But Rossi has to prove his point.  He has done so yet.

We will pay the price for giving Romney a free pass

William A. Jacobson

quote:

There is every reason to believe that the lines of attack which worked for Kennedy and McCain will work for Obama

Comment:

I don't know that this will work for the Democrats, though.  It work for the Bain ads in Massachussetts, but would the same ads work everywhere else?  Polls show that class warfare is not a winning strategy for the Democrats.

If Romney is to be attacked successfully by the Dems, it will have to be on some other issue.  Flip flops?  Maybe.  But the independents may not care about that.

Obama's foreign policy failures have yet to explode, but when they do . . .

Caroline B. Glick

quotes:

• His supporters argue that Obama's foreign policy has been a massive success. If he had as much freedom of action on domestic affairs as he has on foreign affairs, they argue, his achievements in all areas would be without peer.
•  Indeed, a cursory examination of the impact so far of Obama's foreign policies in country after country and region after region indicates that his policies have been more damaging to US national interests than those of any president since Jimmy Carter.
• So how is that that while Carter was perceived by the majority of the American public as a foreign policy failure, a large plurality of Americans views Obama's foreign policy as a success?
• First, to date the US has not been forced to contend directly with the consequences of his failures.
• To date, Obama's foreign policy failures have yet to explode in a manner that can make the average American aware of them.

Comment:

The left ran against Reagan's ideas in the last election.  Carter was rehabilitated.  It should not be surprising then, that we should get the same kind of things from Obama as we got from Carter.  It is just a matter of time before it really does explode.

Announcement

In case anybody is wondering, I have dropped out of Facebook.  I have also cancelled the People for Space Colonization page.  It wasn't working like I had hoped anyway.

First Demonstration of Time Cloaking

Technology Review

quote:

Fridman and pals have clearly made themselves an interesting toy but they modestly refrain from speculating about the applications for their time cloak.

Comment:

They may be too modest, but not I.  If you can prevent the recording of events, isn't that tantamount to "stopping the clock"?  If you can stop the clock and if you can still traverse space, your speed can be infinite.  It's like dividing by zero.  It can be a freakin' warp drive.

But that is just wild speculation.  There's probably a catch in there somewhere.

Update:

I'm going to do more reading about this and continue to update this claim through the day.

This National Geographic story makes it look more like light shifting than time bending.

This physorg.com story leaves me with the impression that it is just an illusion:

The result is light emerging from the end of the cable that appears to be unaltered

If time was bent, then the light would be altered.  If the light is not altered, then whatever happens to the light, happens inside the device.  The device only prevents the observation of the event, as opposed to the event itself.  How then can it be said that time is altered?  I don't get it.

I think I've seen enough.  Here's is what you can do:  Just measure the speed that the light travels.  The possibilities are:  slower light speed, the same light speed, or faster light speed.  My guess is that it is slower light speed.  The lag is in the middle where speed of light is decelerated, and then sped up again.  However, the time lost in the lag cannot be made up.  Therefore, the speed of the light at the end is slower than the usual speed.  Time is not bent, only the light waves.

From Informavore No. 487

EGO OUT

A couple links therefrom:


Towards artificial photosynthesis for solar hydrogen generation: Algal protein gives boost to electrochemical water splitting

A way to produce hydrogen?

Novel device removes heavy metals from water

Cleans water and mines the polluted water for resources.  A two fer.

ROBERT REICH: Get Ready For A Obama-Clinton Presidential Ticket

Business Insider

quote:

According to the latest Gallup poll, the duo are this year’s most admired man and woman This marks the fourth consecutive win for Obama while Clinton has been the most admired woman in each of the last 10 years.

Comment:

Cult of personality, anyone?

REPUBLICANS HAND OBAMA BIG WIN!

DICK MORRIS TV: LUNCH ALERT!

Comment:

Not exactly "new" news.  But he did mention that the House Republicans are about to step in it again.

Romney’s electability is overblown

William A. Jacobson

quote:

Earlier in the fall when Democrats gently started going negative on Romney, Romney’s numbers dropped, but then the Democrats pulled back. There is every reason to believe that once the Kennedy-like attacks on Romney start in earnest, his electability will be in doubt.

Comment:

Freakin' A.   The media and the Democrats, which are practically one and the same, want Romney.    The media will turn on him on a dime.    Nobody should vote for the guy unless he is right on the issues.

Now, Ann Coulter has one issue which she says is a deal maker--- Romney supports E-verify.

Coulter's take on Romney is that he won a blue state and that is a plus.  The electability issue is important, she says, because that is the only way to get rid of Obamacare.  The illegal immigration issue will permanently change the electorate.  That's the second reason.

Also, with respect to my earlier post on the fall of the Roman Empire, my thinking is adjusting a bit on the personal character issue.  That doesn't look good for Gingrich.   I get a small inkling here of a personality cult around Gingrich.  But it is nothing like Obama becoming "the Messiah" in 2008.

I remain undecided.  Texas' primary in March.  Lots of time.

Kitco - Commentaries - Gold Might Have Already Hit Rock Bottom

Przemyslaw Radomski

quote:

The American economy has enjoyed ... low-hanging fruit since at least the 17th century...Yet during the last 40 years, that low-hanging fruit started disappearing, and we started pretending it was still there. We have failed to recognize that we are at a technological plateau

Comment:

There's some talk about American decline and so forth.  Yesterday, I spent a good deal of time reading about the decline of the Roman Empire.  Most of it wasn't new to me, but some of it was.  I was particularly struck by the story of Commodus, the son of the last "Good Emperor", Marcus Aurelius.

One theory I have is about leadership.  Clearly, Commodus was not a good leader.  Another example:  it doesn't take much looking, as far as a Texan is concerned, to know about Santa Ana.   There's another bad leader.  But then, you look at Sam Houston and see a good one.   A good leader can make a nation, a bad leader can break one.  To me, a lot of a nation's fate is dependent upon its leadership.

America has had some good leaders.  Fortunately, there has not been anything like Commodus nor Santa Ana.  Some presidents have been excellent, others have been quite mediocre.  There may be some argument, particularly on partisan grounds, about our most recent presidents.  I don't like Obama, but he is not in that really bad class.  Not yet.  I don't think his ideas of income redistribution will be successful in getting the economy moving forward again.  It looks like he will run on that theme in the upcoming election.  If he is successful with it, he just may preside over a collapse.  That collapse will be more on him than anyone else, even if he did inherit a bad situation.  Reagan inherited a bad situation-- it isn't an excuse for continued failure.

Barone: Voters want growth, not income redistribution

Washington Examiner

quotes:

• He cites a recent Gallup poll showing that while 82 percent of Americans think it's extremely or very important to "grow and expand the economy
• only 46 percent say it's important to "reduce the income and wealth gap between the rich and the poor" 
• Class warfare politics, as I have noted, hasn't produced a Democratic presidential victory in a long, long time
• Redistribution edges toward a zero-sum game.
• Lesson: If you want redistribution, you better first produce growth. Which the Obama Democrats' policies have failed to do.

Comment:  I see Obama's Kansas speech as a effort to shore up his base.  But it leaves him open to an attack for being an anti-growth, redistributionist.  It would be a fair attack and he would have no one to blame for it but himself.

American civilization could be next to collapse

By SILVIO LACCETTI | Special to The Tampa Tribune

Crying wolf?  You hear enough of this, and it doesn't happen, you have doubts.

But there's no doubt that there's a problem.  What to do about it?  Find out just exactly what is the problem and how to best solve it.

RON PAUL: TO THE LEFT OF OBAMA!

DICK MORRIS TV: LUNCH ALERT!

Beyond the pale, he says.  Paul simply isn't viable.  He's too far out of the mainstream.  Yes, the mainstream is conventional wisdom, but you have to pay some homage to it.  Not many are going to be convinced by some radical ideas.  They're going to be afraid of them.

Articles: Bachmann vs. the 'Fact-Checkers': Did Iran Threaten Nuclear Attack on U.S.?

American Thinker

Comment:

I categorize this one as morality because somebody here has got to be lying. When it comes to the left, I am suspicious. Very suspicious.

I recall that during the Bush administration, the Iranian president "invited" the US to convert to Islam. It was pointed out that this type of "invitation" has historically tended to precede an attack.

Scarcity and the way to overcome it

Law of scarcity and The Ultimate Resource chapter 28:  saying the same things, (in my opinion) but in a different way.

quote:

Either way,however, the concept of mineral resources as "finite" is unnecessary, confusing, and misleading. And the notion of our planet as "spaceship earth," launched with a countable amount of each resource and hence having less minerals per passenger as the number of passengers is greater, is dramatic but irrelevant.

I think he's basically saying that demand will always lead to more production.  What I'm saying is that abundance will just shift attention back to a different scarcity.  Once something is abundant, the thing itself is no longer important, but the process of getting it is.  That's because the process itself then becomes the scarce item that can be marketed, not its output, which no longer can be.  For example, a new process for obtaining fresh water from seawater is invented.  The fresh water becomes too abundant to market, but the device itself can still be marketed because it is now the scarce good in demand.

Townhall: 7 Reasons Why Mitt Romney's Electability Is A Myth

John Hawkins

Comment:  Didn't I question that myself recently?


John Hinderaker endorses Romney.  That's as positive an endorsement as I've seen for any candidate anywhere.  The trouble is that Romney hasn't done enough of that himself, or I would have a different opinion of him.

How To Make The World's Greatest Apple Crisp

Learn how to make the world's greatest apple crisp step by step.

What you need:

- 2/3 cup flour
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1/3 cup white sugar
-1/2 cup butter
- 2/3 oatmeal
- 2-3 pounds apples
- cinnamon

Fill 9 inch square pan 2/3 full of sliced apples, sprinkle with sugar. Cover with crumbly mixture and bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 30-45 minutes or until apples are tender.



How To Make The World's Greatest Apple Crisp from Jeremy Campbell on UnleashVideo

Annus Horribilis: Space in 2011

airspacemag.com/moon/

quotes:

• A long established year-end tradition – for good or ill – is a review and analysis of the preceding twelve months.
• few noticed or understood that without a replacement, the country’s capability for humans to access space had been discarded.
• In other exciting developments, the agency announced their new “mission statement”...a mission statement for an agency without a mission.

• NASA finally decided that they should probably go ahead and build a new launch vehicle...Perhaps even for less than its estimated $100 billion cost.
• Robotic science missions...had their own share of difficulties this year.  The Goddard-run James Webb Space Telescope... is coming in late with a price tag of more than $8.7 billion and counting
• all travel to destinations offering little scientific and exploratory benefit or variety; their main attraction seems to be the yet-to-be-explained agency imperative to cross them off some “been there” check-list.
• The year 2011 was an annus horribilis for the national space program. Here’s to the forthcoming year and hopes for a return of sanity to space policy.

Comments:

This story is about the government's role in space.  The private sector has not done quite so badly as that.   Besides a Paul Allen's new launch platform, there's a race on to mine the moon.  And if the government doesn't want to go back to the moon, they are acknowledging the strong possibility that someone else will.

E-Cat Weekly--- Source for E-cat news

My last post about the E-cat was on the 13th.   That's two weeks, my, how the time flies.  The last bunch of news came from the PESN site, so I went back there and found a weekly compilation of E-cat news.  It is dated on the 22nd of December, and the one before it was dated on the 15th.  That means the next should be dated in a couple days from today, which will be the 29th.

Looks like a good source of information.  I'll keep up with it.  Call it a New Year's Resolution.  Here's something interesting that I just found:

I do believe in basic science. I believe in participating in space. I believe in analysis of new sources of energy. I believe in laboratories, looking at ways to conduct electricity with -- with cold fusion, if we can come up with it. It was the University of Utah that solved that. We somehow can’t figure out how to duplicate it.  ---- Mitt Romney, Republican candidate for President   [ emphasis mine.  Comment: If he's talking about Fleischmann and Pons, he needs to catch up a little bit on the news.]

I scanned through all the stories and there's enough reading material to keep anyone busy for a long time.

Update:

Cold Fusion Now has the interview where Romney says  "cold fusion"--- note the time

"cold fusion, if we can come up with it"

Rigged game

Today is a big picture sort of day.  First, about the blog, and now about the general state of affairs with our politics.  In particular, I want to discuss something about these polls.  In very particular, about the approval rating for Congress.

You see, 90 per cent of them get reelected every time.  What incentive do they have to change?  So the poll they conduct about Congressional approval rating is a really stupid poll.  Nobody is likely to vote against their own representative because it is set up that way.  So what good does it do to have an approval rating which means absolutely nothing in terms of what can be done about it?

The congressional districts are gerrymandered in order to produce the desired outcome.  Therefore, the odds are that you will be in agreement with the general political leanings in your congressional district.  Supposedly, it is against the law, but they can wink at that pretty easily.

I have a theory about the parties.  I think that they have it set up so that the votes are always as close as possible so that there aren't any real differences between them.  On the occasions when there are really significant differences, the differences get smoothed over, or fixed so that there's no real accountability.

It is almost as if the system is rigged in order to produce an outcome that is pretty much in line with past outcomes.  It isn't any wonder then that no problem ever gets solved.

What to do about it?  Stop publishing stupid polls, for one.

NEWT’S NEGATIVES: TRUE OR FALSE?

DICK MORRIS TV: LUNCH ALERT!


Morris says about 1/3 correct. It is a fair and balanced fact check. Hope anybody interested will check it out.

Free SEO Report Card: Website Grader Software for SMBs

DIYSEO


How does this blog stack up to the competition? Rather poorly according to the above site.

In order to run the test on a site, you have to provide it with the following bits of information

• a keyword that can be searched in google.  I used "kardashev how to"  Note:  the site on top was Next Big Future
• So I put that web site in as a comparison

Then you run the test and this is what came out-- an "F".

When I put in "Karshevian", google returns "Kardashian", which is not what I'm trying to do.

Since "Kardashevian" is a unique word, which I think I coined myself, I should be on the top of the list.  But that is not available to me.

As I have noticed before, Being Right is Not Enough.  Although this may be a unique blog, which is putting out some good stuff, this report shows that it is not being noticed.  But being noticed does not confer upon anyone anything special or significant aside from that fact itself.  Getting noticed does not make you right, nor smarter, nor better, nor any more truthful, nor deserving.  But it is a fact of life.

I could use this service to improve my metrics, but I don't know if I will.  It hasn't really told me anything I didn't know already.  But I may consider it.  There may be something I can do without having to sell out in order to get noticed.

One thing that I noticed with my YouTube page.  People seem to go to what's popular.  This seems to get a life of its own once it starts happening.  There's plenty of other videos on my channel, but that top video seems to get all of the attention, even though I don't think that really makes it any better than the rest.  But how else are you going to know except by what the numbers say?  It makes sense, in a way, but seems rather shallow in another way.

By the way, I got the idea for that popular video from Next Big Future!  Doh!

Update:

This is off topic, but I'll put it up anyway.  I like this so much, I'm going to put up a link to it:  My favorite elevator music.

Painting Solar Cells with Nanoparticle Paste

h/t  Instapundit and Huffington Post

quote:

Unfortunately the paint is far from ready to be sold commercially, Kamat explained.
"The best light-to-energy conversion efficiency we've reached so far is 1 percent, which is well behind the usual 10 to 15 percent efficiency of commercial silicon solar cells," Kamat said. "But this paint can be made cheaply and in large quantities. If we can improve the efficiency somewhat, we may be able to make a real difference in meeting energy needs in the future."

Comment:

Depends on cost too.  Let's say 1% is the top number, but you can make a lot of it at low cost.  Then the sheer size of a house might be able to produce plenty of electricity.

Why the establishment fears Newt Gingrich

Washington Post via Behind the Black

quote:

Newt is a proven leader, someone with the background, understanding, vision and discipline to be our president; the establishment fears that he just might win.

Comment:

As I observed earlier today, they want to undermine the one guy who can win as opposed to the others who can't.  Makes you wonder what these people are really all about.

Light My Fire --- Jazz Improvisation

Nice.

Predictable

Politics 2011: “The Stench of Washington”

Consider this:

Because of the way negotiations between President Obama and Speaker Boehner were handled (or mishandled) the failure to hammer out a deal will be "permanently damaging" to Washington, says David Chalian, Washington bureau chief for Yahoo! News. 

It was predictable that they wouldn't agree.  Why should the Republicans grant Obama's wishes or vice versa?  This was all predictable and some people wished for it.  They wished for it because of what happened in the nineties when Clinton and the Republicans shared power.  But it didn't work out that way this time, did it?

The stench of Washington will continue to be a stench as long as there is no resolution of the matter in favor of one group or another.  The end of the stench requires that the Democrats must go, or the Republicans.  If the next election produces another stalemate, the stench will smell the same.

The Ultimate Resource II: People, Materials, and Environment

Julian L. Simon

Surprising resource to me, as it unravels much of what is considered conventional wisdom.  It is kinda out of date, but the information therein might as well have been written yesterday.  For example:

CAN THE SUPPLY OF NATURAL RESOURCES - ESPECIALLY ENERGY -

REALLY BE INFINITE? YES!

This does not even take into consideration the possibilities of outer space.  Also consider this:

The argument in this chapter is very counter-intuitive, as are most of the ideas in this book. Indeed,science is most useful when it is counter-intuitive. But when scientific ideas are sufficiently far from "common sense," people will be uncomfortable with science, and they will prefer other explanations,

It seems that this site is quite positive about conditions, but this was in the late nineties.  Since then, things have gotten a bit dour.  But look at this:

Now I'll restate this line of thought into a theory that will appear again and again in the book:  More people, and increased income, cause resources to become more scarce in the short run.

Yes, that is counter intuitive and very unconventional. We are told we must conserve because of limited resources, but this fella said just the opposite.

Here one more quote that struck me:

Energy is the most important of natural resources because

(a) the creation of other natural resources requires energy; and

(b) with enough energy all other resources can be created.

That's why I think we should conquer space.  But if you conquer energy, you can also conquer space.  So this  quote is definitely true.

Update:

I like this quote, so I'll add it:

More appropriate than the Eiffel Tower analogy is this joke: Sam falls from a building he is working on, but luckily has hold of a safety rope. Inexplicably he lets go of the rope and hits the ground with a thud. Upon regaining consciousness he is asked: "Why did you let go of the rope?" "Ah", he says, "it was going to break anyway." Analogously, letting go of all the ropes that support the advance of civilization - for example, turning our backs on the best potential sources of energy - is the advice we now receive from energy doomsters and conservationists.

They were wrong in 1990 and they are wrong now

William A. Jacobson

quote:

Call this whole story a parable of what is wrong with the Republican Party. People who cut deals which sell out our principles are deemed reasonable, while those refuse to cut deals are called bomb throwers.

Comment:

There seems to be a lot wrong with the party.  Those who can't or won't deliver victory tend to undermine those who can and will. 

LOXLEO, Part III

Speculation alert:  The first two posts

1. Power requirements in space
2. NASA is moving towards the Space Launch System

I wanted to revisit this, in order to explore the proposition I put forth, particularly with respect to putting a tandem system.  The lower satellite will collect the oxygen and the higher satellite will furnish power to it.  How to execute this?

I took a look around the web in order to see if such might be feasible.  You can lower and raise the orbit in space by the following procedure:

Future Spacecraft Propulsion Systems: Enabling Technologies for Space

A tandem system could follow this procedure in order to lower the collector module down to a lower orbit, while the upper satellite could stay above it and power the lower satellite system with a power beam.  The upper satellite may get its own power from yet another orbiting satellite at GSO, or even system of satellites  at GSO so as to keep it continually supplied with energy.  The power would come from solar panels, most likely installed on a satellite orbiting at GSO.

The upper satellite at LEO could also be a fuel depot and accept the contents of the lower satellite after it finishes filling up.  It would transfer its cargo to the upper satellite after rendezvous, and then return to lower orbit for more.  The process could be repeated many times.

The advantage is from reusability of not only the modules themselves, but of other spacecraft that it can refuel.

While there is no method of getting hydrogen this way, a separate system could lift it from the ground.  Since hydrogen is the lightest element in the periodic table, the mass penalty should be the least.  If you don't have to lift LOX, you save 7/8 ths of the mass needed for a LH/LOX propellant system.

Let say you could use a Stratolaunch system to deliver the hydrogen and a LOXLEO system for the hydrogen.  Even though the Stratolaunch would be limited in how much it could bring up at any one time, it could take advantage of the LOXLEO system in order to stretch the capabilities of the hydrogen thus delivered.  Thus, each system could complement each other for maximum efficiency by using the strengths of each system.

SANTORUM COMES ON STRONG!

DICK MORRIS TV: LUNCH ALERT!


Wait until the media gets hold of him, or maybe Bachmann will do it for them.

These are the times that try men's souls

That may have been the phrase that I was looking for, not Winter of Discontent. If so, then it is my own fault. Maybe it is a senior moment, who knows?

It looks like we are going to have a hard time making any real change to the current state of affairs. That possibility is worthy of either phrase. When I see the President's chances as not being so bad, at least according to some, I have to shake my head. But that was the case when he got elected in the first place. I never understood the attraction for the guy.

It is particularly galling for the left to blame the Republicans for what is happening now when they got something that no Republican president has gotten in my lifetime and well before. No Republican president had the kind of majority Obama had in his first two years. Whatever he wanted, he could have had. So, the lack of results should be judged that way. With no real opposition worth noting for two years, he should have been able to get what he wanted done. But what does he have to show for those two years? Instead, he got trounced in 2010 and that is hardly the reason to blame the Republicans for the difficulties that he brought upon himself.

For the Republicans part, they seem hellbent on losing whatever advantage they may have had. Gingrich and Perry get knocked off the ballot in Virginia-- why? Because they did what they didn't do before- check the signatures. They needed 10,000, but nobody really checked these before. Why now? Because of a lawsuit. That tells you a couple things 1) the candidates who were eliminated didn't take that into consideration and 2) the Party didn't make additional changes to the procedures so that they wouldn't inadvertently disqualify a candidate. The whole thing is just plain dumb. Why do they insist upon shooting themselves in the foot?

The rest is pretty distressing too. People are letting themselves be twisted into pretzels by all of the polls instead of just trusting their own judgment. If someone makes a move, they all start attacking the new front runner. Then the newbie gives way to another and the process repeats. What kind of way is that to pick your candidate? Why can't the candidates stop following the polls and just enunciate their own positions instead of knocking each other down?

The Cain business was pretty bad too. Why not wait for definite evidence before allowing one of the candidates to be taken out like that?

Romney's support is suspicious. I think the media is going easy on him because the left really wants him to be the candidate. They will turn on him on a dime if he gets the nomination. Why should anybody be impressed with his poll numbers? The electability factor may be just a big ruse. Why fall for it?

Winter of Discontent--- Victory or Death?

Somehow I was misled into thinking this meant George Washington at Valley Forge.  It must have come from some television program, which makes sense to me now.  I have learned to despise TV.  It could have been a medium of enlightenment, but has become the opposite.

But not to knock all video.  It can serve that purpose, but unfortunately, it is also abused ignobly.  I am thinking of the use of Gingrich's video about judges.  I don't know how the majority can watch the entire series of videos and not feel sympathy for the view that Gingrich is expressing.   Perhaps we are all too much in a hurry.  It would appear that collectively, we have the attention span of a two year old.  Consequently, it probably got sound bited into a distortion of what it really meant.  All for a political effect that was completely in opposition to the whole point he was attempting to make.  If you get manipulated into just watching the sound bite, shame on you.

People who decry the low level of our discourse should make it a point to watch those videos.  If you won't, you can't be serious about your words.

It seems to be the winter of discontent alright, in terms of our politics.  Not too many like the current state of affairs, nor does anybody seem to like the choices being put in front of us.  Yet if you won't go around the media's manipulation of the news, plus anybody else's who may have a "dog in the hunt", then why should you expect any better?

Something is being lost in the process.  Thus the use of the term "victory or death".  What is dying?  I think it must mean our freedom.  With freedom must come responsibility.  In a sense, Obama said it himself.  The Republicans want to leave you to yourselves.  As if that were a bad thing.   Of course we should be left to ourselves.  We are then free to make what we will of our own lives.  We will be responsible for ourselves, good or bad.  But if we give that up to the government, we lose not only that responsibility, but our freedom as well.  Hence the death of freedom.

Obama and his ilk want what they are pleased to call "positive" freedoms.  But we have all the freedom we need in the Constitution.  Let's review briefly a bit of the Constitution.  It is said to be about checks and balances.  By why do you need these checks and balances?  You need them to check and balance the ambitions of politicians.  Not only the ones you disagree with, but the ones you agree with.  Because at the heart of limited government is implied the need to limit the power of government, and hence the politicians who are drawn to it.  There's a Bill of Rights, which has an interesting amendment as follows:

The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

The left will view that as permission to expand the role of government.  But how does that jibe with checks and balances?  It doesn't.

Rick Perry likes to talk about the tenth, so what about it?

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Looks like more checks and balances, doesn't it?

If the government isn't going to take care of you, then you must do that for yourself.  The government can take of you, but should it?   What can be wrong with that?

Nothing if that is what you want.  But know this first: that everything comes at a price.  This may be the missing part of too many discussions.  Too many people seem to think there's something that can be gotten for nothing.  But if you allow the government to take responsibility for those things that you could do for yourself, you lose your right to object.  That will be the price to be paid for having the freedom to be irresponsible.  There's no such thing as a free lunch.  Somebody has to pay.  If you allow the government to put you on a leash, you can hardly complain about the leash when it starts to chafe.

Should they tell you what to think?  That may already be the case if you won't go and see things for yourself. But that would take some responsibility on your part to find out what the truth is about a subject.  If you allow the media to treat you as a two year old and sound bite everything, why should you expect any better from yourself?   Why should you expect any better from your government?  A two year old needs a good leash.

U.S. Air Force Plans Reusable Space Booster

AVIATION WEEK

Update: 12/26

I like "Birdzilla" better.

Hand feeding Hummingbirds

Ketchikan Alaska Tours

Jib-Jab: 2011, Buh-Bye!

Elon Musk: Why Is Making A Reusable Rocket So Difficult?

Uploaded by spacexchannel on Dec 20, 2011

The Thorium Molten-Salt Reactor: Why Didn't This Happen (and why is now the right time?)

Uploaded by GoogleTechTalks on Dec 22, 2011



Why didn’t it happen?

Short answer–because all of the political, technological, and financial focus was on the liquid-metal fast breeder reactor. Later on, due to fears about non-proliferation, the US cancelled plans to commercially reprocess spent nuclear fuel to extract plutonium, and the case for the fast breeder reactor was toast. Because there were no fast breeder reactors to take all the plutonium that had been generated from light-water reactors, in 1982 the US government passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and started collecting a tax that would be intended to pay for what would eventually become Yucca Mountain.[ emphasis mine]

Comment:

Even shorter answer:  the fast breeder reactor was chosen over the molten salt thorium reactor because of politics and  then forgotten after the fast breeder itself became politically infeasible because of proliferation fears.  Nobody thought of molten salt thorium reactors because they had forgotten about it.

The 7 most illuminating economic charts of 2011

The Enterprise Blog


Ronald Reagan famously asked "are you better off than you were four years ago"? You can argue about charts and stats all day long, but your own situation is the one that should trump all of them. If things are really good and getting better, why change? If things are not good, why not?

RON PAUL AS A THIRD PARTY?

DICK MORRIS TV: LUNCH ALERT!

Ron Paul is very, very questionable.  The only thing good thing about him is that his ideas to trim the government. Other than that, he might as well be a Democrat.

Update:

SANTORUM SURGES

The polls are following the latest front runner, not Santorum.  This tells me that people are looking for a bandwagon, but can't find one that will stay together long enough that its wheels won't come off before the vote.  You can stop paying attention to the polls and think for yourself and that will solve that problem.  But easier said than done.

Russia's Dark Horse Plan to Get to Mars (nice try)

Discover: published online May 21, 2009

excerpts:

• The same proximity to Mars that will one day doom Phobos makes it an extremely attractive staging post for human explorers. One side of Phobos always faces Mars, and on that “hemisphere” the planet dominates the sky. This makes Phobos a good place for monitoring most of the Martian surface. Moreover, any manned outpost on Phobos would be well shielded from space radiation—protected on one side by Mars and on the other by the satellite’s own bulk.
• The total delta-v required for a mission to land on Phobos and come back is startlingly low—only about 80 percent that of a round trip to the surface of Earth’s moon.
•  “Does Phobos contain any water, and if so, in what amount, form, and location? Answers to these questions will help determine how we will travel to Mars.”

Comment:

Logically, it would make sense to occupy Phobos for awhile before moving on to Mars.  If water could be found, that would come in quite handy for fuel and life support.

Delta V budgets for various destinations

Unfortunately, the unmanned Phobos-Grunt spacecraft became stranded in orbit in November.  Since that has failed, what might be tried next?  Anything?

From the chart above, it would seem that a mission from L4-L5 to Phobos would possibly be less delta v than from Earth to LEO.  Launching from EML-2 could be even less.  While looking at Quicklaunch's home page, I thought up a Lagrangian space port constructed from the moon by using multiple launches from a Quicklaunch gun on the lunar surface.

It is probably getting ahead of oneself to propose such a project, but it is interesting to speculate about.  Let's say that at the fat end of each of these was an inflatable habitat which could link with its two neighbors.

The long end would telescope out far enough to enable it to be spun up for 1g artificial gravity.  That would take about 224 meters from the center.

The masses shown here according to this illustration, as launched from Earth, are 1000 lbs each.  To launch from the moon would require much less power ( 14 times assuming that its equivalent), which would mean a much smaller gun.  So the gun would be smaller and the masses would be equivalent.  The question is how much of a habitat can you make with each 1000 lb payload?  Probably not much come to think of it.  But there would be plenty of modules.  I would guess over a 100 launches to complete the circle.

There are two circular modules shown below.  Let's say make one for supplies and the other for habitat.

QuickLaunch webpage

You would need to get to the moon first, of course.  You will need to mine the moon for water and build your space gun.  You will also need to make each of the inflatable modules--- somehow.   Then stuff it all in a gun and launch it to a Lagrange point.  Assemble at the Lagrange point.  Start sending people to man the station and begin preparing a launch vehicle to go to Phobos.

The trip back would go to the Lagrangian station instead of Earth.  That presumably would save a bit of delta v.  Not to mention not having to land and take off again from the Earth itself.  With one g of artificial gravity, a crew could rehabilitate and then go off on additional missions before coming home to stay.

Marcin Jakubowski on the Global Village Construction Set

TED Talk 2011 - Open Source Ecology


Comment:

I was just thinking a couple things

1. Elon Musk's idea of millions of people on Mars
2. 3D Printing

You see, if only you can put the blueprints on a CD, then take only that much to Mars and then use it to construct a civilization based upon the blueprints and locally obtained materials.

Update:

No more FARTS.

The Corruption of America

Published by Stansberry & Associates Investment Research
h/t PJMedia
excerpts:

• The numbers tell us America is in decline... if not outright collapse.
• So please... before you read this issue...understand I am only writing about the facts as I find them today.
• My conclusions will not be easy for most readers to accept.
• I am sharing these ideas with my subscribers because I know we have arrived at the moment of a long-brewing crisis.

Then he lays out the case... which isn't pretty.  Much recommended and appreciated.  Unfortunately, most people won't pay attention until the wolf is actually pounding on the door.  By that time, it will be too late.

By the way,  I've seen this video before.  Worth watching again.

Elon Musk says he will put millions of people on Mars

Next Big Future

quotes:

• Musk doesn't just want to stop at one human. In his Heinlein prize acceptance speech, he said he wants to put 10,000 people on Mars.
• Ultimately we don't really want 10,000 people on Mars," he says, after letting the pause linger a few seconds more. "We want millions."
• In September Musk announced the company's plans for developing a fully reusable space launch system. 
• Musk says that a reusable version of the rocket could deliver a payload of up to 15 tonnes to Mars at a cost of $100 to $200 per kilogram.
• The price tag for a Mars mission varies as widely as the concepts for achieving it, from $20 billion to $500 billion
• Would he consider going on that first trip? "If someone had solved the rapidly reusable launch system problem, then yes, I'd definitely go," he says. "But if it were simply a one-time flight, then no, because I'd need to stay and keep at the challenge with SpaceX.

Wernher von Braun's Mars Expedition (1952)

Das Marsprojekt was the first technically comprehensive design for a manned expedition to Mars. Von Braun envisioned not a simple preliminary voyage to Mars, but an enormous scientific expedition modeled on the Antarctic model.

Comment:

Musk believes that the window of opportunity to do this could close.  If it closes, the opportunity may not come again.  That should be a chilling thought, but there's all to many who don't seem to mind.  I guess if it doesn't affect someone personally, it doesn't matter to that person.  It's going to take someone like Musk to do this if it ever gets done.

Von Braun wanted to do it, but the cost was deemed to be too high.  Musk has gotten the price down, but there may still be too much resistance to the idea for the government to finance it.  That could mean further efforts must be undertaken in order to make it even more cost effective.

In addition to this, an economic rationale for doing it may be enough to push it over the finish line.  An economic rationale could be tourism and resource extraction.   Resource extraction can supply the basis for colonization, while colonization can encourage tourism.  A couple of side benefits would be science and planet defense.  If enough needs could be identified as being met by this endeavor, a case could be made for some government financing to support it.  The potential for profit could supply the rest.

Would you buy an electric car from this man?

TBO.com

quote:

In short, then, the president is using political power to reallocate economic resources to make people adopt an inferior technology nobody wants. So much for his stellar performance as captain of the economy.

Comment:

That's not the half of it.  He is also abusing political power in order to grant entitlements as opposed to not molesting profits gained from merit and accomplishment.

Occupy London Creates Kangaroo Court to Hold Trials of the 1%

Verum Serum

quote:

“The opening of Occupy London’s fourth occupation will see the movement conducting ‘trials of the 1%’ in the abandoned magistrates court building which has lain empty since 1996, despite its prime location and Grade II listing.”

Comment:

Do they really believe that the 1% steal from the 99%?  It can be a seductive argument.  One man gets rich from the many.  You can then blame the rich man and take his wealth and give it to the "99%".  This is claimed to be justice.  But, I'm not convinced that it is.  One man's success does not require another man's failure- as a matter of principle, it doesn't.  It could, in a particular case, but not in the general.  Not as a rule. For example, a thief profits from his victim.  But is everyone who has something a thief?  It does not follow. Something has to be created before it can be stolen.  The creator is not a thief.  The creation of wealth is not, by definition, a theft of anything from anybody.

Then you segue from the Occupy stuff to this payroll tax cut controversy.  Why only two months?  I think it is so that the Democrats can bring up the millionaires tax again in order to pay for it.  They tried this on this last go round, but it failed.  In order to try it again, especially in an election year, they needed a means to do it.  That means is by way of the 2 month extension as opposed to a yearly one.  The point is that it is the same as the Kangaroo Court.  The millionaires aren't paying their fair share, so it is said.  Their wealth is prima facie evidence of guilt, so they must pay.

The seductive argument is that, in order to get a tax cut, you take from someone else.  The premise is that this is justice.  The seduction is that is ruins the connection between something that is earned and replaces it with a corrupt practice which is hardly any different than theft.

When I was but 15 years old, my father became disabled, and got disability benefits from Social Security.  Less than a year later, he was dead.  But while he was alive, I gave my opinion that it was welfare.  He took offense at that because he said that he paid into that for all his working years.  Which was true.  I didn't understand it that way at the time, perhaps due to my youth.  But the connection seems undeniable to me now.  These days, with what the Democrats are doing with the payroll tax cut, they are severing that connection.  What has been earned up to now, is being financed not by earned income, but by stolen goods.  The theft is being justified upon the basis of justice which is not been established.  Just because somebody has something doesn't mean that they stole it!  They are reducing something from an earned benefit to something that is akin to welfare as I incorrectly understood it to be in my father's case.

One more thing, which I read this more in Barnhardt's site.  Something struck me there as well.  It is about the First Beatitude.  

Jesus isn’t saying that poor people are by definition morally superior to rich people. Not at all. What He is saying is that a person who is detached from their wealth and is willing to “push their chips all-in”, to use a poker metaphor, is truly blessed. So, given this, ANYONE within the wealth spectrum, rich or poor, can possess this virtue.

As I wrote before, money isn't the root of all evil.  It is only a medium of exchange.  It is what you do with the thing, not the thing itself, that makes it good or evil.

If the system is failing, it is because the people are being seduced by a false sense of injustice. Truth has to be at the core of justice, without it, it is impossible to achieve. Those who make such accusations so be required to prove them, then come up with a remedy. A 1% v 99% argument is indeed a kangaroo court, which means that it is unjust from the get go.

People are not to be judged guilty by virtue of being who they are. If that ain't prejudice and bias, there's no such thing.

Nothing is Sustainable

wattsupwiththat.com  h/t Ace of Spades HQ

quote:

Here’s the ugly truth. It’s simple, blunt, and bitter. Nothing is sustainable. Oh, like the sailors say, the wind is free. As is the sunshine. But everything else we mine or extract to make everything from shovels to cell phones will run out.

Comment:

Wasn't it Keynes who said: "in the long run, we are all dead"?   What did Keynes mean and what do these sustainable development advocates mean?  It seems from a certain point of view that it is okay to sacrifice something in the future in order to obtain something urgently needed in the present.

In the long run, the sun will burn itself out.  In the long run, the universe will die out.  One way or another, everything must come to an end.  Perhaps by careful management, we can extend the lifetime of what we have, but we can't perpetuate it forever.

The needs of the moment will trump the needs of the distant future.  If you aren't dead now, you will be eventually.  Nothing is sustainable after all.

Gingrich: Please Don't Turn America Into Massachusetts

Great talk.  Gingrich wants to debate Romney, while Mitt runs negative ads against Newt.

World's smallest frogs discovered in New Guinea

Science Daily h/t EGO OUT


ScienceDaily (Dec. 12, 2011) — Field work by researcher Fred Kraus from Bishop Museum, Honolulu has found the world's smallest frogs in southeastern New Guinea. This also makes them the world's smallest tetrapods (non-fish vertebrates). The frogs belong to the genus Paedophryne, all of whose species are extremely small, with adults of the two new species -- named Paedophryne dekot and Paedophryne verrucosa -- only 8-9 mm in length.


Comment:


I've seen some pretty small frogs in Houston, but that was many years ago. You don't see many frogs around here anymore, even the bigger ones.

Update:

One more from Science Daily via EGO OUT:

Beating superbugs with a high-tech cleanser

quote:

Now Dr. Udi Qimron of the Department of Clinical Microbiology and Immunology at Tel Aviv University's Sackler Faculty of Medicine has developed an efficient and cost-effective liquid solution that can help fight antibiotic-resistant bacteria and keep more patients safe from life-threatening infections.

Plowing the back 40

Yuk, yuk.

But this isn't so funny. Farming in the old days must have been hard work.  It also makes you realize that to end the use of fossil fuels prematurely just might get a lot of people killed.

Smoke Screening

Vanity Fair  h/t Behind the Black

quotes:

• As you stand in endless lines this holiday season, here’s a comforting thought: all those security measures accomplish nothing, at enormous cost. That’s the conclusion of Charles C. Mann, who put the T.S.A. to the test with the help of one of America’s top security experts.
• Since 9/11, the U.S. has spent more than $1.1 trillion on homeland security.
• “The only useful airport security measures since 9/11,” he says, “were locking and reinforcing the cockpit doors, so terrorists can’t break in, positive baggage matching”—ensuring that people can’t put luggage on planes, and then not board them —“and teaching the passengers to fight back. The rest is security theater.”
• Security theater, from this perspective, is an attempt to convey a message: “We are doing everything possible to protect you.”
• “We’re spending billions upon billions of dollars doing this—and it is almost entirely pointless. Not only is it not done right, but even if it was done right it would be the wrong thing to do.”

From an earlier post, I quote yours truly:

the government invents a problem, suggests solutions that aren't likely to work, and enacts a solution that is least likely to work and costs the most money.

At least Krugman should be happy.  It's like digging a hole and filling it up and then doing it again and again and again...  At least it is better than nothing.   We will have jobs!!!


Update:

Another story from Behind the Black, the video and a comment



Comment:

It is said that we don't have the money for this, but there's plenty of money to waste on ineffective and wasteful projects like security theater. Beam me up, Scotty!

Peter Schiff interviews Ann Barnhardt Dec 21, 2011

link via Barnhardt's site

The markets can't work without integrity.

HERMAN CAIN SPEAKS OUT

DICK MORRIS TV: LUNCH ALERT!

Moon Mines: Visionary or Senseless?

National Space Society Blog h/t Instapundit

quotes:

1. a vigorous lunar mining system could be part of a system to deliver energy to Earth, build large structures in space, and even provide radiation protection, water and oxygen to those who want to spend significant time in orbit.
2.  the evidence suggests that reorienting our space program to support commercialization and industrialization of space, as opposed to 100% government missions, may produce far greater results at much less cost.
3.  Lunar mining could be a major component of such space industrialization.

Comment:

I'd say this is just the beginning of what it could do.

Smalley Institutes' Grand Challenges

I wanted to write about War, well I found this link in the Wikipedia.  If I didn't know any better, this could have been written by me:

Top Ten Problems Facing Humanity Over the Next 50 Years

1. Energy
2. Water
3. Food
4. Environment
5. Poverty
6. Terrorism & War
7. Disease
8. Education
9. Democracy
10. Population

If the E-cat were to be effective, wouldn't it make sense to get it into mass production as soon as possible?  If it had a patent, wouldn't it be easier to determine if it is indeed effective?  This problem doesn't need a lot of money to solve, just somebody willing to take it on.

Morning Summary 12/22/2011

Time for an administrative post.  This morning, I've changed some of the category labels around and adding some new ones.  The idea of adding new labels was to set up a type of philosophical foundation for the blog.  The new major category is called Basic Concepts.    The sub categories are Morality, Humor, Scarcity v Abundance, and Solutions v Problems.  The intent was to bring a bit more organizational coherence to the blog.  Hopefully, this will help the blog "make sense"during those times when it may seem not to.

Sidebar entry category is been changed to Sidebar Entry Evolution of the blog.  This post will be one of those type of posts also.

I wanted to write something about War, but that has been put off for now.  There has to be some groundwork first, and that is what this post is about.  You see, the blog is supposed to be about peace, prosperity and freedom, as well as how to achieve those ends.  Perhaps the message is good, but the form is bad.  If this can improve the form, maybe the message can be better delivered.

An Englishman says: Football Is Better Than Soccer

Like a Chess Match—With Violence, he says.

quote:

In its energy and complexity, football captures the spirit of America better than any other cultural creation on this continent, and I don't mean because it features long breaks in which advertisers get to sell beer and treatments for erectile dysfunction. It sits at the intersection of pioneering aggression and impossibly complex strategic planning.

Comment:

Soccer is for wusses.

Dog eat Dog world

Sometimes you just can't win.  (But he does figure it out eventually.)

Spanish title means "most stupid dog in the world".

Imitation is the highest form of flattery

So whodunit?  I wrote this yesterday, and here's this today.

But Powerline didn't copy my line, Real Clear did it.  Or maybe they came up with it on their own and it is just a coincidence.

WHO WILL WIN IOWA?

DICK MORRIS TV: LUNCH ALERT!

Bad government

I wrote before that we are being herded like sheep.  The government is full of wolves and we, the people, are the sheep.  There's not a lot that protects us from the wolves anymore.  We, for the moment at least, still have freedom of speech, but the government may be working overtime in order to restrict that as much as they can.  Take away freedom of speech, start jailing people without due process, and disarm them, and pretty soon you are left with a totalitarian government.

If the government was faced with security threats and with no other means of securing itself, one may be willing to understanding about some of this.  But what if the government is just plain incompetent and corrupt?  It is only protecting itself from a justifiably angry populace that is sick and tired of the government's failures and dishonesty.

I've written constantly about solutions here because I think the solutions exists for our problems.  Yet there is so little interest it seems in actually doing anything constructive about the problems.  Hence the debt negotiations fiasco during the summer.  The recent failure to come to an agreement just cements that failure all the more. What we ended up with is a government that is growing just as fast as before and running up the debts just as fast as before.  Nothing useful has been accomplished.

I write about space, and about how this government insists upon spending billions on useless activities while ignoring and suppressing other ideas that may actually be helpful.  We will spend billions, for example, on a new rocket, which most likely never get off the ground.   But we won't spend peanuts on ideas that might be revolutionary.  The idea of getting liquid oxygen from the edge of space isn't even new, but it could work.  Any attempt to do this though will likely be blocked.  You got to have that heavy lift rocket even though refueling in space would make such rockets unnecessary.  Any government that suppresses the good and promotes the bad is itself not so good.

I write about energy, yet there could be a new form of energy which only needs to be recognized in order for it to start being used.  Even if the government granted a patent for the E-cat, and the E-cat was a fraud, what harm would be done?  Yet the government refuses even to consider cold fusion patents.  Meanwhile, the government also blocks the XL Keystone pipeline, which would employ thousands and make the country more energy secure.  The Congress gets a solution, but wait!  It stops in mid stream because of some political disagreement that hasn't got anything to do with anything.  But that isn't all.  We have all the energy we need from new ways to get natural gas, but a process called fracking, which has been used for decades, is now all of a sudden unacceptable.  What gives?  Does the government hate its own people?


Who protects the interests of the people?  And if the people aren't interested enough to protect themselves, what's to become of us?  I don't think you can trust the media.  They lie, to put it bluntly.  The government and the media just seem to work hand in hand in making sure nobody knows enough to do anything useful about anything.  People, according to the polls, are aware that something's wrong, but who do you believe and who do you trust to get things back on track?  The usual sources of moral authority have lost their credibility, so where do you go now?  It seems that we are all cut loose from our moorings.  How to get it back?

Power requirements in space

Speculation alert:

This is about the LOXLEO concept and how it might be made to work.  The main problem seems to be getting power to it.  Previously, I thought of beamed power.  There was a project that proposed to do this from the ground into space, but was deemed to be too expensive.

There may be another way to do this by way of fuel cells.  The idea is to generate enough electricity to provide thrust and to collect the oxygen from the edge of space.  The fuel cell would power a VASIMR, which would provide the thrust.

From the video in the fuel cell link above, it may well be that the size and mass of the fuel cell device will be too big.  So another thought came to me.  Put the fuel cell in a higher orbit, but synchronized with the LOXLEO satellite.  Then beam the power down to it from a relatively short distance in space.  That would allow a larger satellite in a relatively higher and stable orbit which would power the smaller satellite down below.  The smaller satellite would collect the oxygen and be powered by the VASIMR, which would be powered in turn from a higher orbit.

The fuel cell mentioned in the link is 1 MW.  The need is for up to 6 MW, so a much bigger device is needed.  I couldn't get the mass of the 1 MW plant, nor do I know if such would be feasible in space.  But if it were to be feasible, an array of six of these would be enough.  Then the power could be beamed down, possibly.

Perhaps you could break up the functions.  The collection of the oxygen seems to be the most intense use of energy.  You could put a smaller fuel cell on the lower orbiting satellite in order to power the VASIMR, and beam the higher power from above from the bigger satellite, in order to collect the oxygen.  That would enable you to make the lower satellite smaller and have less drag to overcome.

Update:

This is the second in a series of posts which are titled LOXLEO.  Another name for it is PROFAC.  There could be other names, but the one that sticks with me is LOXLEO.

By the way LOXLEO means Liquid Oxygen from Low Earth Orbit.  Profac is a similar acronym, but it eludes me for the moment.

I'm going to link the rest of the series from this post as follows:

Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

Note Part 6 and 7 are also on Kardashevian Aspirations blog.  You can reference them there.

There's another post that revisits the series.  I suppose that could be part 8.

Yet another revisit occurs a little later.  Call that Part 9.

Part 10 discusses how a reusable rocket can set up the refueling stations for extended trips to space.

Housing starts highest since April, 2010

American Thinker

Comment:

Dow is up 330 points, gold is higher, oil higher, dollar weaker.  What does it all mean?  The linked article above suggests a one time euphoria over short term improvement in certain numbers.  Overall, the housing market hasn't improved much at all.  This is just a momentary spike.

There has been large movements back and forth since the summer.  This isn't an indication of a healthy market.  It is probably better to err on the safe side and not be in this situation, but obviously some are in it.  For me, I don't trust the markets anymore.  It seems like a rigged game to me.

Maria Conchita Alonso: An Open Letter to Sean Penn

newsbusters.org: Maria Conchita Alonso

quote:

My intention isn't to convince you, but to let you know what is truly happening in this beautiful country of noble people, Venezuela. I would encourage you to investigate in depth the "inside story" and realize for yourself the dark side behind the person you choose to idolize.

and this video ( actually audio, no pics) :



Update:

You may learn a few things about Penn that you may not have know before. I did.

Legend in his own mind

Blogs bash Obama's historic claim

Dirty Harry may beg to differ with Obama.

You're a legend in your own mind.

Errant Bullet Travels 1.5 Miles, Kills Amish Girl

Cincinnati News Story - WLWT Cincinnati

Reminds me of the movie Witness, in which an Amish boy saw a murder in progress.