I also share McCain’s wish … “focus on putting a man or a woman on Mars”

I’ve been reading a lot of different perspectives of the Apollo program. One quote jumped out at me:

“We got away from the old fogies. We got down there and created a whole new thing with a bunch of twenty- and thirty-year-olds. Holy smokes, that move to Houston is what made the program.”

Cox, Catherine Bly; Charles Murray (2004-07-29). Apollo (Kindle Locations 2075-2077). South Mountain Books. Kindle Edition.

“There’s no danger of a collision. “Goodness, no,” says Yeomans. “The closest fragment will be about six million miles away–or twenty-five times farther than the Moon.” That’s close without actually being scary.”

It seems to me that AW’s comment still stands.

He also wants Americans to get off his lawn.

This wretched, tortured soul, who’s poor judgement has ranged from selecting Sarah Palin as a running mate to hot-dogging it and getting himself shot down (a lousy aviator, McCain crashed five aircraft over his career) has never held a private sector job and has been living off the government ALL his life- never even had a paper rout as a kid. Now he babbles about sending men or women– (preferably men AND women, Mr. McCain- sheesh!) to Mars. But first, he wants to quench his vindictiveness and send our kids to every frigging war while he and chickenhawks Graham and Lieberman wave goodbye. No sir. The last person on Earth to be talking about humans leaving it is John McCain.

Yeah I had not had time to read Sununu’s statement until now. What a shame. What a bunch of low-life assholes.

I still have a lot of problems with Powell’s act at the UN though regardless of my previous admiration for the man. I think what he did was inexcusable and still is. But the other GOPers just want us to go back living in caves.

“That’s nuts. The threat is low. NASA already tracks the threat. How much larger to you propose the effort be? I am all for funding characterization of the threat, if only to identify more targets for a manned NEO mission. But it is far from the nations top space priority.”

Actually, AW, it may look nuts to you, and you may claim that the threat is low, and you can claim the NASA has everything under control, but you speak of which you know not.

I wrote a book”Man and Impact in the Americas”, which is the best summary available of what has hit here and when for the last 13,000 years. Within the impact research community, it is considered to be pretty good; you might consider borrowing a copy via interlibrary loan and reading it.

The threat is present: Comet Schwassmann Wachmann 3 in 2022. Unless SW3 turns into magic comet dust, which is a problem in and of itself.

As far as threat characterization goes, I can tell you that the Earth crater research budget is near zero.

As far as NASA goes, you probably want to consider their own estimates of what they have not found yet, which is available over at planetarydefense.blogspot.com

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/25/powell-gives-obama-his-endorsement-for-a-second-time/

“Senator John McCain said Thursday that Mr. Powell had “harmed” his legacy by endorsing Mr. Obama a second time. Appearing on Brian Kilmeade’s radio program, Mr. McCain said “General Powell, you disappoint us and you have harmed your legacy even further by defending what is clearly the most feckless foreign policy in my lifetime.””

Kilmeade is about as dumb as they come or at least he panders that way (as does his cohost on Fox and Friends) but you can see where all this is going. John Sununu came out tonight and said Powell endorsed the President again in fact because they are both black.

(ignore the fact that he is the four star who knows more about the military then Sununu/McCain and Kilmeade combined…

it is like Ryans remarks on space or Romney’s on the military designed to pander to people who really are just either dumb or goofy RGO

But it is interesting to see them, including Romney, say how they oppose the President’s plans yet they would do (Mars mission) or actually did (healthcare) the same things.

So in essence they are endorsing the President.

Hmm. Interesting.

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/25/powell-gives-obama-his-endorsement-for-a-second-time/

“Senator John McCain said Thursday that Mr. Powell had “harmed” his legacy by endorsing Mr. Obama a second time. Appearing on Brian Kilmeade’s radio program, Mr. McCain said “General Powell, you disappoint us and you have harmed your legacy even further by defending what is clearly the most feckless foreign policy in my lifetime.””