Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

After roe, women are no longer free.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

The republican caucus is already covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

You can’t love your country only when you win.

Come on, man.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Americans barely caring about Afghanistan is so last month.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

Schmidt just says fuck it, opens a tea shop.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

Let there be snark.

The willow is too close to the house.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Weekend Leftovers Open Thread: Space, the Final Frontier of Bad Takes

Weekend Leftovers Open Thread: Space, the Final Frontier of Bad Takes

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This post is in: , ,

FTFNYT, with the Hottest Take:

America’s Premier Leftist Publication: Hold our Tang!…

A very *American* hero…


Also, Alan Shepherd was a very stoic hero:

More on that NSFW topic:

Reader Interactions

161Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    How Armstrong’s “giant leap for mankind” helped perpetuate inequality—on Earth and beyond.

    Given that it’s the Nation, I bet Seth Rich figures into it.

  2. 2.

    different-church-lady

    FUCK ALL “TAKES”.

    FUCK EVERY LAST ONE OF THEM.

    (DCL +3 ROUGHLy…)

  3. 3.

    different-church-lady

    THEY COULDN’T SEND WOMEN TO THE MOON BECAUSE IT. WAS THE 60S AND WOKEDNESS HADN’T BEEN IVENTED FUCK YOU HOT TAKE ASSHOLES!!1!

    (DCL +I DONT GIVE A SHIT AT THIS POINT…)

  4. 4.

    Ruckus

    I have to say, that as a very young kid, I wanted, in the worst, or is it best, way to be an astronaut. There was no space program at the time, it was all SF writing, some of it reasonably close to what has since taken place. And no one discussed pee. Probably should have of course, but if they thought about it they sure didn’t talk about it.

  7. 7.

    West of the Rockies

    It’s kind of silly to judge every damn historical person and accomplishment based upon our social and cultural perceptions of today, especially when we deny any act of bravery, ingenuity, talent, or creativity in the past because the participants don’t measure up to today’s standards.

  9. 9.

    germy

    Some weird little factoids that stayed in my brain. I remembered them today during a conversation with my wife (who was too young to witness the moon landing):

    The flag had to be propped up with wires. With no atmosphere and wind, it would have simply hung down.

    The famous quote “One small step for man…” etc. is wrong. He actually said “One small step for a man” but a transmission glitch muffled the word “a”.

  10. 10.

    Cheryl Rofer

    @West of the Rockies: At the time, when I recognized that all the astronauts were of a certain type that was nothing like me, I was horrendously disappointed. I had been reading science fiction and envisioning me in those rockets. To this day, I have little to no interest in the space program.

  11. 11.

    WhatsMyNym

    I think they were all ex-test pilots, which limited the pool of eligible candidates considerably.

  12. 12.

    germy

    I remember watching the moon landing (age eleven) and being disappointed by the poor video quality. For some reason, I was expecting high-definition coverage.

    But then I saw the full-color photos in Life Magazine and was thrilled. I remember staring closely at the pictures for a long time, the way only an obsessive eleven year old can.

    I always wondered why stars weren’t visible in the hi-res color photos taken on the moon. The sky was pitch black. I expected to see constellations. I assume that’s what the astronauts saw when they looked up at the lunar sky, but that the camera exposures couldn’t capture it.

  13. 13.

    Jay

    @West of the Rockies:

    It’s kind of silly to judge every damn current person and accomplishment based upon our social and cultural perceptions of yesterday, especially when we deny any act of bravery, ingenuity, talent, or creativity in the past because the participants don’t measure up to yesterdays standards.

    //

  14. 14.

    germy

    Bob Schooley is starting to panic:

    Have to say, if this election is decided on the Democrats’ adeptness at fending off stupid but sticky bad faith attacks, I’m getting worried.
    — Schooley (@Rschooley) July 21, 2019

  17. 17.

    Mohagan

    @germy: I remember learning about the missing “a” and being relieved since the quote as it stands sounds good but doesn’t make a lot of sense, since without the “a”, man means the same thing as mankind.

  18. 18.

    Juice Box

    @Cheryl Rofer: I never wanted to be an astronaut, but I did want to be a NASA or JPL engineer. There weren’t very many people in engineering school who looked like me, either.

  21. 21.

    Jay

    America may have put the first man on the moon, but the Soviet Union sent the first woman, the first Asian man, and the first black man into orbit — all years before the U.S. would follow suit https://t.co/DrTZYxvbD7— The New York Times (@nytimes) July 18, 2019

    Large aspects of both the US and Soviet space programs were used as propaganda. The Soviet Union’s propaganda often had a much different audience.

  22. 22.

    debbie

    @germy:

    Rats, I can’t find it now. I think they didn’t know about the wires and insisted the flag’s being unfurled was proof it wasn’t photographed on the moon.

  23. 23.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @germy:

    I always wondered why stars weren’t visible in the hi-res color photos taken on the moon. The sky was pitch black. I expected to see constellations. I assume that’s what the astronauts saw when they looked up at the lunar sky, but that the camera exposures couldn’t capture it.

    They may have not been able to see any stars, they’re pretty dim and they were shooting during “daytime”. If they could see stars from the lunar surface, the only way they’d be able to capture that on film would be to exposure bracket(taking a set of exposures at different shutter speeds) and that might require using a tripod.

  24. 24.

    Jay

    @germy:

    A thread of some importance,

    Tim Wise
    @timjacobwise

    1/ If the Dems blow this election it will not be because they were “too far left on policy” or because they “weren’t left enough.” It will have little to do with policy at all. They are making a mistake caused by traditional consultant theory that does not apply here…

    2/ And by listening to influential pundits in liberal media who also don’t get the unique nature of Trumpism, relative to normal political movements & campaigns…this election is NOT going to be won by talking about all your “great plans” for health care, jobs, education, etc..

    3/ And the reasons are several…Let me begin by saying that I have experience confronting the kind of phenomenon we see in Trumpism, and far more than most. Any of us who were involved in the fight against David Duke in LA in 90/91 know what this is and how it must be fought…

    Storified at Digby,

    https://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2019/07/they-love-him-because-he-hates-who-they.html?m=1

  25. 25.

    Lumpy

    Why are you signal-boosting “Reflets de Tocqueville @BobbyRayIN63” who is a Tea Party/Trumper douche bro…?

  30. 30.

    David Evans

    @germy:

    I always wondered why stars weren’t visible in the hi-res color photos taken on the moon.

    The Moon’s surface was in bright sunlight. On Earth we don’t go straight from bright sunlight to starry sky, so our eyes have time to adapt.

    The camera settings for the Moon’s surface would have been something like 1/500 second at f/11 with ISO 200 film. If you go outside on a starry night and take a picture with those settings your picture won’t show any stars. The exposure time you need to capture the brightest stars is ten seconds or more, at which setting the lunar landscape and everything on it would be horribly overexposed.

  33. 33.

    BR

    Has The Nation written anything worthwhile in years? I used to find them interesting a decade ago, but it’s been a very long time.

  34. 34.

    germy

    @David Evans:

    The Moon’s surface was in bright sunlight.

    It must be interesting to experience sunset on the lunar surface. I don’t remember any astronauts describing it.

  35. 35.

    Mike J

    re:

    How Armstrong’s “giant leap for mankind” helped perpetuate inequality

    Didn’t Pete Conrad’s first words on Apollo 12 fix it?

  38. 38.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @germy: It would be, but to properly expose the surface of the moon and the astronauts, meant the exposure would be too short to gather enough light from the stars to show against the black sky. Any exposure long enough for the stars would leave the surface overexposed.

  40. 40.

    moonbat

    @Jay: Having the plans to solve the systemic problems that make white, middle America “anxious” IS addressing the racism because what else does Trump have? What other fig leaf does the media have? Forcing the plan issue means you have to acknowledge that is the racism that animates him and his voters — nothing else.

  41. 41.

    Another Scott

    @germy: IIRC, they were never on the moon after sunset. It gets far too cold there in the dark (-280F). (Another problem that needs to be addressed if we (or anyone else) wants to put a base up there.)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  42. 42.

    germy

    A reminder that, when JFK made the commitment to go to the moon, the top tax rate was 91 percent. When Apollo 11 landed, it was 77 percent.

    Now we “can’t afford” to pay for anything.

    — Charles P. Pierce (@CharlesPPierce) July 20, 2019

  43. 43.

    Brachiator

    @Ruckus:

    I have to say, that as a very young kid, I wanted, in the worst, or is it best, way to be an astronaut

    I just wanted to travel into space. Still do. I may miss out on going to the Marriott Lunar Motel, but I still think it will happen fairly soon.

    ETA. I saw a bit of the Nation hot take. Supremely stupid.

  44. 44.

    JPL

    @Jay: I saw that earlier and sent to a friend. Hillary ran a wonky campaign and the MSM said she didn’t talk about policy enough, so although it’s important to highlight policy difference make main stream republicans stay home.

  45. 45.

    DIFFERENT-CHURCH-LADY

    @Jay:

    If the Dems blow this election it will…

    …BE BECAUSE HALF THE POPULATION OF THIS COUNTRY IS FUCKED UP BEYOND ALL REDEMPTION FULL STOP.

  47. 47.

    B.B.A.

    50 years later, Gil Scott-Heron’s “Whitey on the Moon” remains the correct take.

    Also: RIP Mark Kleiman, without whom I’d never have found Balloon Juice. So it’s his fault you’re stuck with me.

  48. 48.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @debbie: I’ve seen it many places. There are two things the deniers point to as “look, you can see the flag flapping in the breeze”
    1. It actually is moving in video shot while they’re setting it up BECAUSE THE FLIPPING POLE IS BEING MOVED AROUND!
    2. The astronauts didn’t like the unnatural look of the flag sticking straight out from the pole so they wrinkled it a little to give it that “blowing in the breeze” look in the still photos. Which are STILL PHOTOS! NOTHING IS “FLAPPING”!

  49. 49.

    Immanentize

    I was three days shy of my 10th birthday when we watched the landing and moon walk. We had a big map of the moon — 3′ by 3′ — spread on the floor in front of the Admiral TV. It was late at night when the walk occured — I was in my pajamas. I saved all the local newspapers from the next day and the New York Times magazine section from that Sunday. I still have them in the attic somewhere…. I was space obsessed.

  50. 50.

    germy

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: I sometimes wonder if the moon landing deniers (and also the flat earth people) know their claims are bullshit, but are just intent on compiling a mailing list of gullible followers to fleece.

  51. 51.

    Brachiator

    @Juice Box:

    I never wanted to be an astronaut, but I did want to be a NASA or JPL engineer. There weren’t very many people in engineering school who looked like me, either.

    I was in awe of astronauts. I still am in awe of some of the people who work at JPL. On my commute, I used to take a bus that went from JPL to Cal Tech. Some of the young men and women on that bus seemed to be amazing people. And a fairly diverse bunch.

    And even though I was far older than all of them, I kinda felt like a little kid sitting with them. I would always connect back to following the Mercury 7 astronauts.

  52. 52.

    J R in WV

    Just looked up Buzz Aldrin’s bio.

    West Point, 3rd in his class BS in Mechanical Engineering, flew fighters in Korea, got a Distinguished Flying Cross, then MIT for a ScD… “His thesis subject “Line-of-sight guidance techniques for manned orbital rendezvous” was the study of bringing piloted spacecraft into close proximity with each other.“

    I don’t see how that topic could ever be practical in real life, do you??

    Then on the Gemini 12 mission, the radar failed, and he needed to make use of his thesis topic in real life!! Pretty cool!

    I can see why his heartbeat was 88/second waiting for that Saturn V to touch off beneath their spacecraft. Or perhaps torch off beneath them.

    Cool dude!

  53. 53.

    Brachiator

    @opiejeanne:
    From a Wikipedia article on the Mercury 13, a group of women who should have been astronaut candidates.

    In 1962, women were still barred from Air Force training schools, so no American women could become test pilots of military jets. Despite the fact that several of the Mercury 13 had been employed as civilian test pilots, and many had considerably more propeller aircraft flying time than the male astronaut candidates (although not in high-performance jets, like the men), NASA refused to consider granting an equivalency for their hours in propeller airplanes.

    This exclusion, along with the exclusion of non-white candidates was stupid and profoundly unfair.

  54. 54.

    bjacques

    @David Evans: NASA timed the landing for when the moon was full, so there would be plenty of landing room, just like the DPRK landed an astronaut on the sun made sure to do so at night. Timing is key.

  58. 58.

    Brachiator

    How Armstrong’s “giant leap for mankind” helped perpetuate inequality—on Earth and beyond

    Beyond?? Yeah, I remember reading about the food riots on Alpha Centauri. Helped spark the Eugenics Wars.

  59. 59.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    If it wasn’t for the space program, none of us would be enjoying a hearty breakfast of Tang and Soylent Green

  61. 61.

    Brachiator

    @Jay:

    1/ If the Dems blow this election it will not be because they were “too far left on policy” or because they “weren’t left enough.” It will have little to do with policy at all. They are making a mistake caused by traditional consultant theory that does not apply here…

    2/ And by listening to influential pundits in liberal media who also don’t get the unique nature of Trumpism, relative to normal political movements & campaigns…this election is NOT going to be won by talking about all your “great plans” for health care, jobs, education, etc..

    I will look at this later, but it starts off Interesting.

    However, I immediately reject the idea that the Democrats are automatically or naturally “supposed to” win the election.

    But I agree that most punditry and a lot of political strategy is bullshit.

  64. 64.

    Jay

    @moonbat:

    @JPL:

    Madame Secretary Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had plans, good plans,

    It didn’t cut through the “Lock Her Up” and “Butter Emailz” in the MSM,

    And as the survey’s have since said, “economically anxious” like “racially flavoured” was and is just a “polite” gutless MSM word salad for “BugNutz Nazi”.

    According to the Holocaust Museum’s chart of the 10!steps to facism, the US is at #8.

    When the US MSM is euphamizing chants of “Send Her Back” as “racially tinted”, you arn’t cutting through that with plans on regulating payday lenders.

  66. 66.

    Baud

    @Jay:

    1/ If the Dems blow this election 

    I’d like to see an analysis of what it means if progressives blow this election.

  67. 67.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Bernie Sanders makes my skin crawl. I see him as a non pro woman candidate.

    ~ Mimi Rocah

    That’s a BINGO

  69. 69.

    Amir Khalid

    I’m watching Liverpool play Sevilla in a friendly in Boston — at Fenway Park? Liverpool have been on the back foot for these first 20 minutes.

  70. 70.

    Baud

    @Brachiator:

    However, I immediately reject the idea that the Democrats are automatically or naturally “supposed to” win the election.

    Agreed.

  77. 77.

    Baud

    @Jay:

    I got turned off with the first line. I’m not wasting my time reading Moby Dick if the first line is “Call Me Brad.”

  78. 78.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    @DIFFERENT-CHURCH-LADY:
    COMMERCIAL: “It’s what the astronuts drank!”

    ME: THE ASTRONAUTS WERE ALSO DRINKING THEIR OWN PURIFIED URINE YOU WANNA DO THAT TOO??2?

    Dump: only if it’s Russian.

  80. 80.

    JR

    @Jay: one big mistake is “gotcha” attacks on Trump. People need to realize that the mistakes and fuckups don’t faze him. People relate to mistakes, they make them all the time. When you go needling after them with “gotcha!” It annoys folks.

    Go after trump for being a piece of shit, not because he misspells shit on Twitter.

  86. 86.

    Chyron HR

    @Baud:

    Maybe they should plan what kind of damage control they’re going to do after the fifth time angry grandpa snarlingly addresses Sen. Warren as “Hillary”.

  89. 89.

    ljdramone

    @Amir Khalid: not really. Get one of those fitness doodads that measures your heart rate, and you should find your resting heart rate is somewhere around 60-75 beats per minute.

    In Michael Collins’ excellent 1974 autobiography “Carrying the Fire” he mentions that mission control could tell when the astronauts were asleep — their heart rates went down to about 40 bpm or so.

  92. 92.

    Doug R

    @Another Scott:

    IIRC, they were never on the moon after sunset. It gets far too cold there in the dark (-280F). (Another problem that needs to be addressed if we (or anyone else) wants to put a base up there.)

    Underground domes, dug by explosives, possibly nuclear.

  94. 94.

    Amir Khalid

    Sevilla get the goal they’ve been threatening throughout the first half. 1-0. It’s been a scrappy match so far: three yellow cards already.
    And Divock scores! 1-1!

  95. 95.

    moonbat

    @Jay: You need to pay closer attention to what our candidates are offering because you are mischaracterizing what Warren in particular is saying. Look up her YouTube video on redlining and tell me she s not addressing the race issue.

  96. 96.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Ruckus: I wanted to be a rocket pilot – because neither astronaut nor cosmonaut was in common use until 1958 and 1961, respectively. By that time I’d gotten my first pair of coke-bottle-bottom specs, which kind of put the kibosh on the whole idea.

    And FTR, piss on the fucking imbeciles at The (Uri)Nation.

  98. 98.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Baud: That Twitter thread is actually very good. Worth a few minutes of your time in my opinion.

    I ran across it in Karoli’s tweet feed as well as LGF’s Charles Johnson’s.

  99. 99.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @germy:

    The famous quote “One small step for man…” etc. is wrong. He actually said “One small step for a man” but a transmission glitch muffled the word “a”.

    Bangalore! You can hear the “a” if you listen closely to the tape. Fuck the morons who say otherwise.

  101. 101.

    ljdramone

    With respect to the New York Times’ hot take, the Soviet Union also put the first man in space, flew the first spacecraft with more than one person in it, and flew the first Vietnamese and Bulgarian astronauts. We flew the first Israeli, though, so AMERICA F*CK YEAH.

    I have a sneaking suspicion that the promotion of equality may not have been a major motivation for Soviet space planners. Valentina Tereshkova was the *only* female cosmonaut for 19 years, from 1963 until Svetlana Savitskaya flew on Soyuz T-7 in 1982, coincidentally (no doubt) the year before Sally Ride flew on the Space Shuttle.

    Maybe the NYT has never heard of something called “propaganda”. Some say the Soviets were pretty good at it.

  103. 103.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Jay:

    It’s -457.87F in space, so the problem of residing at night on the moon has already been solved.

    Heavy blankets and spooning on the Moon?

  107. 107.

    Amir Khalid

    @ljdramone:
    My bad — I got up early for the football. Speaking of which, Sevilla have been somewhat intemperate today, perhaps beause of the summer heat. A player already on a yellow elbowed Liverpool’s Harry Wilson in the face quite unnecessarily, and somehow escaped his second yellow.

  110. 110.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Immanentize: The Soviets tended to be more focused on getting into space than on getting home again. Laika (the first dog in space), as I recall, had no return mission. Was left to die up there when the mission was ended. And there were a number of incidents where cosmonauts died on re-entry that somehow didn’t make the Soviet propaganda.

  115. 115.

    Another Scott

    @Jay: Wikipedia:

    The long lunar night would impede reliance on solar power and require that a colony exposed to the sunlit equatorial surface be designed to withstand large temperature extremes (about 95 K (−178.2 °C) to about 400 K (127 °C)). An exception to this restriction are the so-called “peaks of eternal light” located at the lunar north pole that are constantly bathed in sunlight. The rim of Shackleton Crater, towards the lunar south pole, also has a near-constant solar illumination. Other areas near the poles that get light most of the time could be linked in a power grid. The temperature 1 meter below the surface of the Moon is estimated to be near constant over the period of a month varying with latitude from near 220 K (−53 °C) at the equator to near 150 K (−123 °C) at the poles.[71]

    […]

    HTH.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  118. 118.

    Tony Jay

    @Amir Khalid:

    Get in Divock!

    I like this whole “Friendlies? Whatever.” vibe the Reds have about them now. We’re not chasing any victory we can get anymore. Getting the Champions League at the second attempt seems to have instilled a sense of destiny in the players. Lost out to Citeh by a single point last season? We’ll just go one better this season. Sorted.

    It’s a good time to be a Liverpool fan.

  119. 119.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    It’s been a long road
    Getting from there to here
    It’s been a long time
    But my time is finally near
    And I can feel the change in the wind right now

    Nothing’s in my way
    And they’re not gonna hold me down no more
    No, they’re not gonna hold me down

    ‘Cause I’ve got faith of the heart
    I’m going where my heart will take me
    I’ve got faith to believe
    I can do anything
    I’ve got strength of the soul
    And no one’s gonna bend or break me
    I can reach any star
    I’ve got faith
    I’ve got faith, faith of the heart

    It’s been a long night
    Trying to find my way
    Been through the darkness
    Now I finally have my day
    And I will see my dream come alive at last
    I will touch the sky
    And they’re not gonna hold me down no more
    No, they’re not gonna change my mind

    ‘Cause I’ve got faith of the heart
    I’m going where my heart will take me
    I’ve got faith to believe
    I can do anything
    I’ve got strength of the soul
    And no one’s gonna bend or break me
    I can reach any star
    I’ve got faith, faith of the heart

    I’ve known the wind so cold, I’ve seen the darkest days
    But now the winds I feel, are only winds of change
    I’ve been through the fire and I’ve been through the rain
    But I’ll be fine

    ‘Cause I’ve got faith of the heart
    I’m going where my heart will take me
    I’ve got faith to believe
    I can do anything
    I’ve got strength of the soul
    And no one’s gonna bend or break me
    I can reach any star

    ‘Cause I’ve got faith of the heart
    I’m going where my heart will take me
    I’ve got strength of the soul
    No one’s gonna bend or break me
    I can reach any star
    I’ve got faith
    I’ve got faith, faith of the heart
    It’s been a long road

  120. 120.

    caphilldcne

    @B.B.A.: oh no! Sad to hear this. I’m pretty sure that I found Balloon juice (or maybe Sullivan). he was always a welcoming, smart, decent person and made me think twice even though I was a lot farther out on drug legalization than he was. I weirdly went over to his blog not long before reading your comment but there’s no notice and only found out from your comment so thank you. RIP

  121. 121.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Jay: Don’t need the conspiracy theories. There was more than one known accident.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spaceflight-related_accidents_and_incidents
    LOL, just realized you included the same link to make the opposite (?) point.

    https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2011/05/02/134597833/cosmonaut-crashed-into-earth-crying-in-rage

    Just, as I said, not publicized.

    Also I know Cold War stories of soviet Air Force capabilities which were possible only because they were not survivable for the pilot.

    My point is that I think the US was arguably more concerned about survivability. I’m sure that’s in no small part because it means more bells and whistles and profits for the aerospace companies.

  124. 124.

    Ruckus

    @germy:
    I think a lot of the flat earthers and every other half baked bullshit theory are afraid of the world being bigger than they can see because then it’s also bigger than they can think.

  126. 126.

    mrmoshpotato

    @germy: People aren’t that stupid. *starts a Build The Wall GoFundMe with goal of $1 trillion* Off to rake in the interest payments.

  129. 129.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:
    Maybe. But then the US government had to worry about bad publicity among there citizens. After all, those involved and in elected oversight positions could lose their jobs as a result of callous disregard for astronauts’ lives. The Sovieg Union never had that problem

  132. 132.

    ThresherK

    @ljdramone:

    Maybe the NYT has never heard of something called “propaganda”.

    I dunno, that doesn’ t sound like any NYT I’ve heard of!

  133. 133.

    Ruckus

    @Amir Khalid:
    @ljdramone:
    18 yrs ago I was in great shape. My sitting heart rate was 50-52. My normal walking HR was around 75 but I also walked at 5 mph.
    I’d love to be anywhere near there again.
    As I sit here typing my HR is 63. I have a portable BP monitor – we won’t discuss BP

  134. 134.

    ljdramone

    @redoubt: Alan Shepard’s unheroic urinary tract is also mentioned in Tom Wolfe’s “The Right Stuff”, published in 1979. In that account, Mission Control was concerned that the urine would run up the back of his suit (he was lying on his back when Freedom 7 was on the pad) and short out some electrical wiring.

  135. 135.

    Jay

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    And yet the vast majority who died on missions were on US Missions, 24/29.

    And the Soviets/Russians have way more sucessful manned missions under their belts.

    So “designed for survivability” does not seem to be valid.

    The vast differences between technology, industry, engineering and design culture, and environmental conditions often leads to prejudicial assumptions.

    My Inuit ulu was dissed constantly by Westerners as primitive technology, and yet, it’s one of the easiest to use and most versitile knives in my kitchen and I always carry one in the woods.

    For the tasks that it is used for, nothing beats it other than having someone else do the chore.

  138. 138.

    Ben Cisco

    My first realization that I was “different” from what was considered the norm occurred when my brother and I went to a Holloween party in astronaut costumes and couldn’t figure out why everyone instantly knew who we were without even speaking.

    The costumes had no gloves.

    But I had already seen LT Uhura, and I knew my future was in science. So those astronauts inspired me even if the powers that be were lacking in vision.

    One of the promises of America is rising above expectations. Even and ESPECIALLY our own. May it continue to be so, for all our sakes.

  142. 142.

    2liberal

    @germy:

    It must be interesting to experience sunset on the lunar surface. I don’t remember any astronauts describing it.

    the lunar “day” is two weeks.

  143. 143.

    ljdramone

    @Jay:

    And yet the vast majority who died on missions were on US Missions, 24/29.
    And the Soviets/Russians have way more sucessful manned missions under their belts.

    Isn’t it 4 Soviet cosmonauts dead on missions vs 14 (2x Space Shuttle crews of 7 each)?
    On the other hand, the Saturn V never blew up on the launch pad, killing a bunch of rocket scientists and high-ranking military officers. Can’t exactly say that about the Soviet N-1.

  149. 149.

    Another Scott

    OT – I know Seth has occasionally been cited here, so this may be of interest.

    There’s a bit of a dustup between Popehat and NonWhiteHat (and his followers) on one side and Seth Abramson (and his followers) on the other. About whether Seth is a grifter, and whether calling Seth a grifter is libel.

    Popehat:

    1000/24thHat @Popehat

    I’ve now been blocked by that Fox Danny Bingo Bongo guy what hates lemons, and Michael Avenatti (pre-indictment), and now Seth Abramson, so if I can just get Queen Rico von McSupremeCourtMarshal of Crazyville to block me, I’d have a satisfactory set.

    4:37 PM – 21 Jul 2019

    The Seth thread is here.

    I’m thinking back to Kay’s story about lawyers and that they’re happy if they enjoy interacting with 2 out of 3 groups: 1) clients, 2) judges, 3) other lawyers. Was Popehat a happy lawyer?? ;-)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  150. 150.

    Jay

    @ljdramone:

    Training and missions, not just missions.

    And yet, if you want to go to space in the last 8 years, you ride in a Soyuz.

    0 N-1 Fatalities,

    And you are running out of RD-180 Soviett/Russian rocket motors with the planned replacements falling further and further behind schedule.

    The Soviet Space Program had a completely different engineering culture, technology base, industrial base and geographic/strategic environment that the US Space Program.

    Trying to compare the two is like comparing apples and oranges.

    The Soviets/Russians have had 146 sucessful manned missions to space despite complete collapse in 1991 and not even a partial economic recovery until 2000 . The US has 138, sucessful manned missions.

  152. 152.

    Peale

    @Jay: meh. Look, I get the urgency. And if the Democrats aren’t having voting registration drives in the states they need to win now, I don’t know what to say. But we are having a primary now. With lots of candidates. That is going out of its way to be seen as fair. We also need to shore up what our policies are in this process. So it’s frustrating, but “who can say the most frightening things about trump” and who can say the most heartwarming things about us, isn’t what we’re doing right now. Lots of voters complained last time that the democratic primary wasn’t fair. And if I recall, when Obama won in 2008, lots of democratic voters were shocked that they hadn’t elected their policy choices and promptly stayed home. Should we ignore that bit of history?

    There is no “the most anti trump candidate” running. It’s impossible standard.

  153. 153.

    Brachiator

    @Jay:

    A thread of some importance

    Finally got a chance to read the entire thing. It’s interesting, but ultimately I don’t think it’s applicable to where we are now.

    I also disagree with this variation of “Trump supporters have cooties so we can never deal with them.”

    Also, this stood out as being especially wrongheaded.

    What the left never understands is: we need to stop approaching elections like the goddamned debate team, and start approaching it like the right does, like the cheerleading squad…

    Is the writer advocating blind, stupid devotion to our chosen leaders? And blind empty headed support for whatever a Democrat proposes? Not gonna happen.

    Also, don’t you have to change minds or at least suppress GOP voter turnout in swing states?

    Also, Duke was running for office. Trump is already president. Different context demands a different strategy. Appeal to morality alone won’t get the job done.

  154. 154.

    Peale

    @Brachiator: I assume I wasn’t the audience, as I was enthusiastic about my candidate last time. It wasn’t my section of the party that showed up to the convention to Pooh Pooh the candidate that was selected.just sayin…

  157. 157.

    PJ

    @DIFFERENT-CHURCH-LADY: Komarov knew the mission was doomed, but he wouldn’t let Gagarin, the backup pilot (and the first man in space) die in his place, and the Party demanded that they proceed despite the known flaws in the vehicle. So in exchange for going up, he demanded that they have an open casket funeral so that the Party members would have to see what they had wrought.

  159. 159.

    Matt McIrvin

    @PJ: but Gagarin got killed anyway in an entirely avoidable plane crash.

    Overall, though, the Soviet/Russian program has a far better safety record than ours just because we lost two whole shuttle crews.

  160. 160.

    Matt McIrvin

    (There was that “Mars probe” that exploded on the pad and killed a huge number of people, but last I heard that wasn’t really a Mars probe at all, it was an ICBM test, so not sure it should count.)

  161. 161.

    Death Panel Truck

    A rat done bit my sister Nell.
    (with Whitey on the moon)
    Her face and arms began to swell.
    (and Whitey’s on the moon)
    I can’t pay no doctor bill.
    (but Whitey’s on the moon)
    Ten years from now I’ll be payin’ still.
    (while Whitey’s on the moon)
    The man jus’ upped my rent las’ night.
    (’cause Whitey’s on the moon)
    No hot water, no toilets, no lights.
    (but Whitey’s on the moon)
    I wonder why he’s uppi’ me?
    (’cause Whitey’s on the moon?)
    I was already payin’ ‘im fifty a week.
    (with Whitey on the moon)
    Taxes takin’ my whole damn check,
    Junkies makin’ me a nervous wreck,
    The price of food is goin’ up,
    An’ as if all that shit wasn’t enough
    A rat done bit my sister Nell.
    (with Whitey on the moon)
    Her face an’ arm began to swell.
    (but Whitey’s on the moon)
    Was all that money I made las’ year
    (for Whitey on the moon?)
    How come there ain’t no money here?
    (Hm! Whitey’s on the moon)
    Y’know I jus’ ’bout had my fill
    (of Whitey on the moon)
    I think I’ll sen’ these doctor bills,
    Airmail special
    (to Whitey on the moon)

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