Norman Borlaug, RIP

Norman Borlaug, the agricultural scientist who won the Nobel Peace Prize for starting the "Green Revolution" that spared many in the world from death by famine, died on Saturday at age 95. His success countered the dismal predictions of some of a catastrophic global famine.

We the People Came by the Many Thousands

The First Amendment, shown here posted on the wall of the Newseum, was well exercised today in DC.

Just an intimate little tea party that turned out so many people in Washington DC today that I've heard crowd counts all over the range. Any way, I was there and I can say that the crowd size was at least comparable to recent years of the March for Life, where crowd estimates seem to range from 100,000 to at least 200,000.

The issues that drove today's rally included the raging debate over what kind of health care reform to enact. taxing and spending, and the influence of outside agenda-driven organizations such as ACORN, where an undercover media team busted ACORN employees in Baltimore and in DC all too willing to enable criminal activity as in prostitution involving underage girls. (Whoever thought that providing "housing services" includes being willing to provide cover for whore houses?). The common theme among these issues is the sense of a government out of control pursuing policies based on utopian fantasies with no grounding in real life.

Some have tried to marginalize these protests as the harsh expression of a vocal minority. Maybe they're upset that the rest of us have caught on to this "community organizing" thing. While I don't necessarily endorse every sign or slogan I've seen at this or any rally, I feel this kind of outpouring is a healthy form of debate in a free society. What will be interesting is how this conflict between differing powerful forces in our society will play out.




Some of the more interesting signs/buttons on display at the rally today

Discovery's Return Wraps a Busy Space Week

Space Shuttle Discovery landed Friday evening, a day late and in California instead of Florida, but after a successful mission to carry supplies, including valuable scientific equipment to the International Space Station (ISS) and to implement an ISS crewmember swap.

Meanwhile, Thursday saw the launch of Japan,s first HTV cargo ship to the ISS and the static test in Utah of a 5-segment booster designed for the Ares rockets planned for future exploration.

All this on top of the release of spectacular post-servicing Hubble images and the release of the Augustine Committee summary report on future human spaceflight options earlier in the week.

In Remembrance of September 11, 2001

U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 1st Class Michael W. Pendergrass

Eight years ago tomorrow morning, I overheard a coworker down the hall from my office telling someone else about planes hitting the World Trade Center. I checked in on the Internet and on news radio for reports on what would develop into the the modern era's day of infamy. We know of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, but there was also the attack that did not occur because of the heroic actions of the passengers on United Flight 93.

Eight years of daily living, along with increasing domestic rancor, may have dimmed the feelings of shock, horror, and outrage and the response of prayer, compassion, and resolve that united the people of America and most of the world. However, terrorist activity around the world should serve to remind us that the threat is still real.

This audio/visual Internet presentation developed by a New Yorker shortly after the attacks recaptures all of those experiences. The sequence is ~15 minutes long and some of the images and sounds are quite disturbing, others are inspirational. (I've also added the link to this video to my sidebar.)

It is important that we remember, not only to honor those who died and those who acted heroically that day, but to remain constantly aware of the ongoing dangers, of the presence of real evil in the hearts of some men, and to maintain constant vigilance and a determination to defeat this evil. Finally, we must always remember to trust in God and his mercy during trying times.

The Fruits of Our Labor

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope snapped this panoramic view of a colorful assortment of 100,000 stars residing in the crowded core of Star Cluster Omega Centauri
Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble SM4 ERO Team

The first pictures and science data were released today from the Hubble Space Telescope after two new instruments were installed and two others repaired during the STS-125 servicing mission back in May. More links here. This is a great day for all of us who participated in preparing for and executing this historic mission.

Augustine Committee Summary Plus My Document

The Augustine Committee studying the future of human spaceflight issued a summary of its report yesterday. (The full report to be issued later.) While I haven't had time to read it, the summary reportedly lays out several options as paths for future exploration and points out the need for additional NASA funding and more engagement of the commercial space industry.

Meanwhile, the committee has a web page containing many documents both produced by the committee and those presenting at its public sessions plus many submitted by members of the public. Recently, the paper I submitted in June was posted on the site. Here it is. (PDF)

Obama's Health Care Speech

I was out at a gathering tonight so I did not see or hear President Obama's speech to Congress tonight on health care. Here are the texts of the President's speech and the response by Dr. Charles Boustany (R-LA).

Robert Schindler, RIP

Robert Schindler, who fought to protect the life of his daughter Terri Schindler Schiavo in the case that resulted in her court imposed death in 2005, passed away Saturday at age 71. Mr. Schindler and his family founded the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation to protect other vulnerable people whose lives may be endangered.

Discovery Enroute to ISS

Photo credit: NASA/Tony Gray-Tom Farrar

Space Shuttle Discovery launched just before midnight Friday night on the STS-128 mission to the International Space Station (ISS). The ship will deliver scientific research equipment and a treadmill named COLBERT to the ISS. Three EVAs (spacewalks) will be performed to service the station.

Astronaut Jose Hernandez is making his first flight on this mission. His wife Adela runs a restaurant near the Johnson Space Center called Tierra Luna Grill, which is Spanish for Earth Moon Grill, that I ate at several times while visiting Houston preparing for the Hubble servicing mission that flew in May.

Edward Kennedy, RIP

The passing of Senator Ted Kennedy Tuesday evening at age 77 after a year long struggle with a brain tumor marks the passing of a life intertwined with decades of history. Mark Stricherz provides a balanced assessment of Ted Kennedy's political activities and personal life.

While he pushed for policies he felt advanced the cause of the poor and vulnerable, Ted Kennedy's attachment to pro-abortion policies that disregarded the lives of the unborn betrayed those ideals and cost him the moral credibility to be persuasive to many on those other issues.

May God have mercy on his soul and provide comfort to his family who have suffered so much tragedy.

Commercial Space Adventure Taking Off

A commercial venture using old Soviet military space hardware (with systems upgrades) expects to be carrying researchers into orbit for up to a week within a few years. Excalibur Almaz Limited (EA) made its announcement today at the annual Moscow Air Show in Russia. The company has enlisted some well respected NASA and corporate veterans plus other space companies in its venture.

This is an exciting development as each serious commercial venture adds credibility to the growing commercial space industry as a whole.

Robert Novak, RIP

Famed writer and columnist Robert Novak, who was close to many of the historic political events of recent decades and a strong conservative voice, died today at age 78. He was known for, among other things, taking a strong prolife position.

Conservatives Organizing Online

The Right Online conference occurring in Pittsburgh this weekend, featuring prominent political and media leaders and grassroots bloggers has been covered on C-SPAN. The event is designed to encouraged conservative citizens to strengthen online efforts to promote conservative ideas in politics.

Woodstock Anniversary

This weekend, there much reminiscing and commentary on the fortieth anniversary of the Woodstock music festival in upstate New York in 1969. (Commemorative web sites here , here and here) The festival has become known as the iconic cultural event of an era, though it probably more reflected the (good and bad) trends of that time, some of which still affect society today.

One thing I find interesting is that an event that totally broke down logistically, leaving many thousands stuck in rain and mud for three days, was and is celebrated as an experience of peace and community. It's hard to imagine such an organizational calamity would occur today without flaring tempers, massive lawsuits, and numerous postmortems on TV and radio news and talk shows.

Final Public Meeting

The "Augustine Committee" reviewing US plans for human spaceflight held its final scheduled public meeting this afternoon in DC, which I attended. While past meetings featured guest speakers highlighting various concepts and proposals, the committee used today's meeting to focus on narrowing a complex set of options for the direction and architecture of the human spaceflight program that can be sustained in difficult budget circumstances. Dr. Edward Crawly presented the Integrated Options (PPT) under consideration. Former astronaut Dr. Sally Ride presented an eye-opening presentation (PPT) on how the current plans and some of the proposed options fit into a realistic budget profile (or not, which may drive significant changes to the space plans, as explained in these articles linked by NASA Watch). Dr. Wanda Austin then presented Evaluation Measures and Criteria (PPT) which were used by the committee in an extensive and informative deliberation on the options under consideration.

I left before the meeting concluded, after Committee Chairman Norm Augustine explained to the audience that this process was required by law to be carried out in public and not be agreed upon ahead of time behind closed doors. He said that the committee would stay 'til midnight if necessary to complete their deliberations, though the audience was not required to stay (though I think they were actually going to be able to wrap up long before midnight). I think there may have been more public transparency shown today by Mr. Augustine's committee than we've seen all year from the White House and Congress as they try to push a massive health plan, stimulus package, etc.

Eunice Kennedy Shriver, RIP

Eunice Kennedy Shriver, sister of President John F. Kennedy and Sens. Robert F. Kennedy and Edward M. Kennedy, passed away on Tuesday at age 88. Here is the extensive Washington Post obituary, which describes how Mrs. Shriver's faith and family experience inspired her role in founding the Special Olympics and her other initiatives on behalf of society's most vulnerable members.

Consistent with those efforts, Eunice Kennedy Shriver remained a stalwart defender of the dignity of every human life at every stage and condition.

Shriver, a lifelong pro-life Democrat, was the sister of President John F. Kennedy, Senator Robert Kennedy, and Senator Edward Kennedy.

But she was honored by Feminists for Life of America in 1998 as a "Remarkable Pro-Life Woman."

When she received the award, FFLA president Serrin Foster tells LifeNews.com, "her husband phoned the office and asked us to send over a stack of copies for his family and friends. He was delighted that we recognized her in this meaningful way."

"Her legacy will live on in our work and especially in the work of Special Olympics," Foster says.

Shriver was a member of the advisory committee of the Susan B. Anthony List, a women's group dedicated to electing pro-life women to Congress

Unfortunately, Mrs. Shriver's concern for the dignity of every human life was not shared by the powerful leaders of the Democratic Party, including some in her own family. I see this is the underlying reason why they now find themselves lacking moral credibility as they try to sell a massive health plan to the American people.

Free Speech and Health Care (or 'Community Organizing' for the Rest of Us)

What happens when those who think they are so 'enlightened' that they think they should impose their utopian fantasies on the rest of us are challenged by a peaceful popular uprising in communities around the country? Well, citizens who oppose the thousand plus page 'health care' plan that threatens the lives of the unborn and the elderly and the quality of care for everyone in between have been labeled an "angry mob" by the powers that be. So far, it seems violence has only occurred when goon squads show up to counter the citizen protesters.

Peggy Noonan writes that suddenly President Obama and Democratic congressional leaders are looking "desperate".

We have entered uncharted territory in the fight over national health care. There’s a new tone in the debate, and it’s ugly. At the moment the Democrats are looking like something they haven’t looked like in years, and that is: desperate.

.....

What the town-hall meetings represent is a feeling of rebellion, an uprising against change they do not believe in. And the Democratic response has been stunningly crude and aggressive. It has been to attack. Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the United States House of Representatives, accused the people at the meetings of "carrying swastikas and symbols like that." (Apparently one protester held a hand-lettered sign with a "no" slash over a swastika.) But they are not Nazis, they’re Americans. Some of them looked like they’d actually spent some time fighting Nazis.

.....

All of this is unnecessarily and unhelpfully divisive and provocative. They are mocking and menacing concerned citizens. This only makes a hot situation hotter. Is this what the president wants? It couldn’t be. But then in an odd way he sometimes seems not to have fully absorbed the awesome stature of his office. You really, if you’re president, can’t call an individual American stupid, if for no other reason than that you’re too big. You cannot allow your allies to call people protesting a health-care plan "extremists" and "right wing," or bought, or Nazi-like, either. They’re citizens. They’re concerned. They deserve respect.

Robert Hahn, writing at RedState, points out the disconnect between those in power and those they are trying to marginalize.

Many Democrats, including many editors and reporters, have come to believe that hundreds of middle-aged and older people - people with incomes and lives, and plenty else to do - have taken part-time jobs as rent-a-mobs to shill for insurance companies, or the RNC, or somebody. They think this because that is how Democrats create similar events: they pay college students or homeless people to show up at a certain place at a certain time to wave signs and put on a display for their fellow Democrats in the media, who dutifully report that the citizenry is outraged at whatever the Democrats paid them to be outraged about.

Causing the same sort of outcome among conservatives is more like herding cats. Few conservatives need your money, at least not the sort of pittance that would motivate a student or a street person. Most of them would be insulted if you offered. Having tried to organize many of these things myself, I can tell you that if conservatives care about a cause, they will show up in their own car with their own sign ready to give ‘em Hell. If they don’t care about the cause, nothing is going to get them away from their quite rewarding lives.

Let's pray that cooler heads prevail and that these confrontations don't result in a new wave of violence in our nation.

Speaking of health care, one good way to counter the dangerous fantasy that they're trying to impose on us is to present a sensible alternative like that proposed by Charles Krauthammer.

The plan is so simple it doesn't even have the requisite three parts. Just two: radical tort reform and radically severing the link between health insurance and employment.

Another way is through humor, like this ditty that borrows from a popular holiday favorite. (Hint: this time what grandma gets hit by is not a reindeer.) (Hat tip to Hugh Hewitt.)

Moon: the Movie

I went to see the movie Moon tonight in Bethesda, apparently one of only two theaters in the DC area where it is playing. Set at a future moon base mining Helium 3 for energy production, the film takes on a surreal plot.

Endeavour Lands As Space Future Considered

A lot happening on the space front this week. For one, the STS-127 Endeavour crew returned today from their busy 16 day mission to the International Space Station.

Meanwhile, the Augustine committee considering the US human spaceflight program held public meetings this week across the South, in Houston, TX, Huntsville, AL & Cocoa Beach, FL (all near NASA centers). The events included reports from its subcommittees laying out options ranging from extending the Space Shuttle Program to in-space fuel depots and various exploration strategies (including Moon, Mars, Near Earth Objects, and deep space surveys of any or all of those). Also, a recommendation to state the obvious as to what our ultimate objective in space should be.

Here's how MIT aerospace professor Edward Crawley answered the "why" question during Thursday's hearing:

"Our ultimate objective should be viewed as the exploration and eventual extension of human civilization within the solar system. We have to keep our eye on the big prize. This will take a long time, but the time has come. The political alignment is here to allow this to be a goal for our nation, and it's a goal worthy of a great nation."

XCOR's Greason added a kicker to that comment, according to Irene Klotz's account for Discovery.com: "I know this sounds terribly ambitious and dramatic, but if that is not the point of human spaceflight ... then what the hell are we doing?" Greason asked.

Finally, I'm attending this year's Mars Society convention this weekend, which is being held close by at the University of Maryland in College Park.

Heading Home Saturday

It's shortly before midnight PDT, Friday night, my last night in California for this trip. After the conference and the gala completed on Monday, Tuesday I headed up to stay in Mineral near Lassen National Park. Hiking and driving around the park were Wednesday's highlights along with a couple of nights under really starry skies to get reacquainted with the Milky Way and some of the well known (but some seldom seen in light-polluted areas) constellations. Thursday I returned to stay in Mountain View (a couple of blocks from where I lived for 17 years) for the final two nights in California for this trip.

Today, Friday, I made the pilgrimage I last made at least 14 years ago to the mother-of-all food festivals, the Gilroy Garlic Festival. As in those previous visits years ago, I tried a number of garlic-laden delicacies. By the time I got to the garlic-vanilla ice cream, my garlic-numbed tongue could only detect a hint of garlic.