OAN joins YouTube tv --- Rumble video

 This reminds me that I have a Rumble Channel

Incidentally, OAN means One American Network ( I think ).

CTH: "Ilhan Omar Catches a Big Break - Republican Oversight Committee Drops Financial Review, Hands off to Ethics"

"Lucy pulls away the football yet again."

Yep, looks that way.

Comment:

Charlie just keeps letting Lucy fool him. Will Charlie Brown ever learn? Maybe not.

Instead of doing the same thing, the thing that is expected; Charlie should change his tactics. Don't stay home, and don't vote for somebody unless something changes. Even if it means that the lies have to become even more elaborate. One way or another, something has to change.

The point being, if you cannot change them; try changing yourself. Charlie doesn't HAVE to kick that football, you see.

Thoughts on a would be Moon base

 

Update, 2/9/26:

  Now he's talking.  That is, IF he's talking about doing this.   It is reported that SpaceX is moving towards establishing a moonbase, in order to support his Mars ambitions.

  The idea is even more credible given that Musk has found a way to make money in space.  While he is making money in space, he can mine the moon for resources, like oxygen.  All of this infrastructure has to be paid for, and an idea like the one Musk has for supporting AI datacenters in space; will go a long way in funding his Mars ambitions.

  The tweet is is included in the update, and begins directly below this scrollbox.

Elon Musk just announced a major strategic pivot for @SpaceX: the company is officially shifting its primary focus to building a "self-growing city" on the Moon.

The logic is centered on speed. While Mars missions are restricted by orbital alignments every 26 months, SpaceX can… pic.twitter.com/FVY4qBBKpH

— Mark Kretschmann (@mark_k) February 9, 2026

10/30/10:

I got an idea for this post this morning.   I was wondering if there's a way to quickly build a moon shelter and permanent base on the moon.  Not wanting to reinvent the wheel, I started to search for what was already out there on the web.  I came across this:  a pdf file on some proposed designs of a moon base.  It has occurred to me that NASA must have plans like these out the wazoo.   So, why haven't these plans ever been implemented?

A further search brought me to this a link about Gregg Easterbrook, who is a critic of manned space flight.  It would be wrong to blame him for the plans not being implemented.  I don't want to slam Easterbrook here.  Only to point out that the criticisms are too harsh.   It has to be balanced by something.  The manned space program needs a champion, like in the early days.   These days, the critics, like Easterbrook, have the upper hand.  To offset the critics, a there must be a champion of manned space flight.

Here's the article he wrote about the shuttle in 1980 ; it is fairly critical article and its tone turns out to be wrong in most respects, but it proved him to be prophetic in predicting failure as two shuttles were lost.  With the loss of two shuttles, his point of view gained ground.  But why did the Shuttles fail?  Was it design failure, or did some other explanation account for this?  To answer this question, it would take an extensive study the reports that came out of each disaster.  Basing it solely on memory, I suspect that a change in specifications led to both disasters.  If these specs weren't changed, perhaps both Shuttles could have survived.  The Shuttle wasn't an inherently unsafe design, if that is true.  To confirm that opinion would be out of the scope of this post.

In Easterbrook's 1980 article, he mentions that a permanent moon base was considered before deciding upon the shuttle program.  He says that a base would have been useless.  But the moon base would not be useless if it can solve the launch problem.  If men and materials can be launch into space at a reasonable cost and be done relatively safely, we can open up the solar system for business.  At one sixth the gravitational field of the Earth, getting to the near Earth asteroids would entail much less energy and consequently, much reduced cost for fuel.   Having a moon base that is self sufficient in terms of life support could mean multiple missions from the moon, before having to return to Earth- giving further savings.  And mining asteroids for fuel and metal ores could defray the costs of manned space flight.  They may even be able to turn a profit.

A Moon base needs a champion.  If the critics win, it may never be done.  At least, not by the USA.  Someone else could and probably will.  If that happens, American leadership in this field will go by the wayside.  Like many other things.  Isn't it time that this trend be turned around?

Update:  So, how much M type asteroid worth?  This question is answered in Mining the Sky:


"As an example of the magnitude and economic value of space resources, we shall assay
the smallest known M asteroid and account for its market value.  That distinction
belongs to the NEA known as 3554 Amun.  Amun is only 2 kilometers in diameter, the
size of a typical open-pit mine on Earth, with a mass of ... thirty billion tons.
... the total market value of Amun ... $20.000. billion" -John S. Lewis
Mining the Sky, pp. 111-112

more info here
According to this: the feasibility of mining asteroids is close with present day technology.
Here is a site that I just found with plenty of info.  It is called spacefuture.com

Those are late nineties numbers, as the book was written then.  Prices have gone up.

I ran the numbers and each ton of the asteroid would be worth $667 at that time.
This would not seem worth the time orthe expense to bring all back.  I suppose you
would need to pre-process the ore before you brought it back.  Platinum at todays
prices would be about fifty million per ton.  The Altair lunar lander which was to
land men on the moon was supposed to be able to handle (in unmanned versions)
up to 15 tons of cargo.

Quick take on the news, 2/9/26

  This will be a bunch of Instapundit posts.  Insty has a lot of 'red meat' type posts. Call it whatever you want, but words don't win this game.  Messaging doesn't hurt, mind you.  The thing that goes wrong in the midterms is that the Democrats put Trump on the ballot in their usual BS way; and the MAGA base doesn't give a flip about the GOP.

  Yep, and I'm with ya, dear MAGA folks.  If I've said it once, I've said it a hundred times on this here blog; that the GOP refuses to be an actual opposition party. They'd rather run against the base than to run against the Dems.   Anyway, if you don't acknowledge that the Democrats are going to run against Trump regardless of his being on the ballot or not; then it behooves you to go out there and vote in order to support Trump.

  But messaging is fine.   Insty's doing it here, and I appreciate it.  All the same though, there needs to be a strongly ramped up GOTV effort, or the Dems are going to walk away with the prizes in November.  If that happens, the GOP will probably lose in 2028 as well.   So get out there and vote, dammit.

  Now for the Insty links:

Pass the SAVE act. Get on their Congress-critter butts, and move this legislation forward.  Some RINOS in the Senate are holding it up.

Moon first. Yep, and I've said it here before.   Evidently, Musk sees the value of going to the Moon in order to support his efforts regarding Mars.

Filth media.  Once again, couldn't have said it better myself.

Scraping the Marianas Trench.  Ditto!

Good stuff at Insty today.  A smorgasbord of red meat.  Maybe the Swedish Chef can fix you up.

The Democrats really are evil. No doubt there are some evil ones on the GOP side, too.

  How many are evil on each side?  Enough to control things.  There are those who believe that violence is the only way out of this.  We'd better hope that that is not the case.

  If it goes as far as a war, or a general breakdown in order, the final outcome will be unpredictable.  At least, that is what I think.

  There are enough that's good enough to see the evil, PROVIDED that the message gets through to them.  The $64k question is how do you do that?

  I've been trying to do that for the last 14 years on this blog.  Since late 2010, to be exact.  The idea all along is that there are solutions to problems, but there has to be a will to find them, and implement them.

  But no solution will work if too many people are set in their ways, and in their minds.

  The future has perils and promise.  Thus it has always been.  The way people handle it will determine the outcome.  The Romans didn't handle it too well.  Their civilization was overthrown.  What happens to ours?

  There will be those who say that Western Civilization will survive, but are you really sure about that?

  Don't take it for granted.  It might not.  If it doesn't, then what comes after may be what we'd call evil.  For there's no guarantees that they "will live happily ever after".  Too many folks believe in fairy tales.  That's how they let themselves be deceived.  You may wake up some day to figure out that you've been had.  Then what?

  The aftermath of betrayal scene in the 90's movie "Braveheart".

Where does this defeatism come from?

  This idea of staying home so that your enemies can win, is exactly what I'm talking about.  No pun intended, but that attitude is like shooting yourself in the foot.  Why?  Who won the friggin' election in Texas?  Do you really think that electing a gun-grabber will protect your rights better than even an errant Republican?  I understand the frustration, but not the response.  The response is self-defeating.  Primary the suckers!  Get your own kind of people to run and win!

  By the way, this link was obtained from Instapundit. There are those who won't remember, but back before the 2006 elections that resulted in Nancy Pelosi being hoisted to the Speaker's Chair, one Glenn Reynolds said that the GOP should LOSE in order to "teach them (the GOP) a lesson".  Well????  How did that one turn out?  Not so good.

  What was true in 2006 is even more true now.  Nancy Pelosi will seem like a moderate compared to these wackadoodles coming up.  Staying home so that they can assume power is one strategy that should be avoided; that is, if recent experience is any guide.  But some folks never seem to learn.

Trump should channel Archie Bunker

With respect to this latest sham scandal, Trump should tell the Dems to go stick a sock in it.

People may not realize this, but the Dems are in high-attack mode, and the GOP is getting wobbly. But not everybody, fortunately. But there are SOME.

This stupid stuff has got to stop. There are those on the GOP side who think that Trump should rein it in.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

He should NOT rein it in. The Dems want the GOP to get panicky, and that is a big mistake.

It is probably regrettable that somebody did this, but having been done, there is no reason to allow this as an excuse to quit, and roll over for the Dems. That's precisely what they want. DON'T GIVE IT TO THEM.

Just do what Archie did.

Archie tells the meat head that he doesn't care. Well, I just don't care about the latest Democrat outrage fit.