Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Frumple]

The new president-elect also has plans to abandon climate research, transfer Earth monitoring funding from NASA to NOAA, and strengthen the U.S. military’s stance in orbit.

I got excited for a second, but nevermind. This is fucking disgusting. Space exploration is a mission of peace and scientific advancement. Stop militarizing space, you bastard! Even the Cold War didn't manage that!

The amazing thing is that's not the worst part of what you just quoted. That earth monitoring stuff NASA is doing is, besides what it's does to help climate research, also just about the only thing that lets them do anything orbital or extra orbital.

You see, for those out there that don't know, there's this thing called "launch window". Finding and utilizing them requires, among other things, the sort of data that, well. Is also useful for climate change research. No earth monitoring? No space flight, because everything that tries to get out goes off course and/or ignites and/or misses what it was aiming for. Turns out hurling giant piles of mass into space is a somewhat delicate process that things like wind and rain can cause trouble for :V

I guess theoretically NOAA could do the same thing, but then... all you'd be doing is transferring the funding to another organization that's not currently set up for it to do the exact same thing, one that isn't as specialized or attentive (because they've got other things to do) to the needs of space flight.

... though if he manages to go through with it, I guess that could mean we're going to get more data on what happens to a launch that goes up through a thunderstorm. Which might do something for orbital launch engineering and whatnot? May they all be unmanned

OTOH, I do now have an image of the funding and duty getting transferred to NOAA, and them immediately turning around and contracting it out to NASA, because they're the ones with the infrastructure, experience, and expertise to do the job appropriately. That would be kinda' hilarious.

[Draignean]

To be quite fair, the US possibly wouldn't be the first one to breach the non starwars protocol. About a year ago there were reports of Russian satellites practicing satellite intercept maneuvers around US communications sattelites. Although it's not known if they are weaponized, the manuevers strongly suggested so.

Fun fact: Russia has no airforce. They have "Russian Aerospace forces". It is an official name of the branch of their armed forces. I think it tells something about Russian plans.

Hell, space is already getting militarized, with space laser weapons that are being developed under the veneer of "removal of space debris for protecting space telescopes". There's no going back at this point, really.

Uh, a lot of that isn't a veneer. As our individual satellites, like the replacement for hubble, become more and more expensive, we become more and more concerned that they're going to be fucked over for completely random reasons that were perfectly within a basic PDs ability to prevent.

Space lasers are not great weapons for doing anything but shooting other things in space, which, aside from potential usage in nuclear denial and communications sabotage, isn't really strategically viable. We have better ways of taking down sattelites.

Now, someone starts putting tungsten cylinders in space, then you can start calling whatever they hell reason they decided to launch tungsten into space a veneer.

[martinuzz]

Orbital kinetic bombardment using tungsten rods is legal. The Outer Space Treaty only forbids chemical, biological and nuclear weapons from being deployed from space.

[Criptfeind]

compare with the lefties, which are complaining only now that they lost.

I'm surprised everyone else let this pass, but this is bullshit. "Lefties" have been complaining about the electoral collage for decades. I am reminded of a moment, when I was sitting down to watch the election result pour in with some friends (recalling at this time literally everyone thought a Hillary win was likely) I commented to my foreign friends the electoral collage was evil as we talked about it.

Like, yeah, past that, certainly there's probably been an uptick in interest in it, a perfectly reasonable one considering we're getting the first reminder of it in 16 years and also revealing the constant comments of "It doesn't really matter, 2000 was a freak coincidence" as incorrect. But people, mostly on the left, have been aware and saying that the system is fucked for a while now.

Edit: As for Trump himself sticking too it (and actually pointing out a flaw rather then a vague "Maybe I won't accept the results"). Good for him. He's... Practically a professional conman. So I'm not going to hold my breath he's doing anything more then appearing 'reasonable' (so long as you don't care about the environment or any long term issues that crop up from his plans) because the system now heavily favors him. Not until his presidency actually starts, and maybe a few years in to see how complacent we all get under him.

[Reelya]

The states alone can reform the Electoral College system without a constitutional change. The problem is that there's no incentive for the winners in winner-take-all states to change how that works. After all, they are by definition the winners, and they're taking all, by what incentive would they give some of that up?

[Criptfeind]

Yeah, that's the problem. It's... Honestly not likely. Especially in the short term. However, that doesn't mean (as LoSboccacc says) that people are only whining about it now that they lost.

[Reelya]

The most workable strategy would be to get a coalition of the "safest" states, representing an equal amount of EC votes on both sides, to come together and all agree to have their EC vote via congressional district. That would attract more campaign money to those states so would be an economic win for both sets of states.

The problem would be the current "swing" states. They benefit immensely from being Purple and also "Winner Takes All", so each campaign sees an investment there as hugely profitable.

[Criptfeind]

Yeah, maybe... The issue is that it's hard for a Republicans safe state to really see that, maybe if a democrat gets in via loosing the popular vote, that could happen. As is though, red states don't want it because it's always the Republicans that benefit, and swing states don't want it because it makes them super special snowflakes.

[LoSboccacc]

Yeah, that's the problem. It's... Honestly not likely. Especially in the short term. However, that doesn't mean (as LoSboccacc says) that people are only whining about it now that they lost.

yeah that was the point. they weren't in the streets protesting when Obama won, weren't they? That's pretty much the definition of hypocrisy.

[Frumple]

... obama didn't lose the popular vote. Nor was he proposing things that very directly threaten the lives of a lot of people. Not really equivalent.

Or to put it another way, the protesting is only partially due to dislike of the EC. Without the other, notably more inflammatory bits, yes, there wasn't this sort of protesting. It's almost like things were different.

[Reelya]

Yeah, the problem with EC not matching the popular vote is only some you protest when it actually happens.

[smjjames]

When Obama took office, he told NASA to ditch the plan to revisit the moon and concentrate on sending humans to Mars in the 2030s, but Trump has set the space agency only one goal.

The president-elect wants NASA to explore the furthest reaches of the solar system by the end of the century, according to Space Policy Online.

“I will free NASA from the restriction of serving primarily as a logistics agency for low Earth orbit activity… Instead we will refocus its mission on space exploration.”

Then, shortly before Election Day, the new president-elect recruited former Republican congressman Robert Walker, who chaired the Science, Space, and Technology Committee in the 1990s, to help draft a plan for NASA.

Trump’s new space policy, heavily influenced by Walker, is designed to coordinate public and private efforts to maximize American efforts to explore the entire solar system. That includes mining valuable minerals from the asteroid belt and visiting Jupiter’s moon Europa, perhaps the best place to find alien life near Earth.

Trump plans to bring back the National Space Council, last in operation under George H.W. Bush, explore deep space, and encourage commercial partners to build a new economy in low Earth orbit, Walker told Mother Jones.

“If you’re looking at technology that looks for the solar system, you are then likely to move toward plasma rockets, toward nuclear-powered rockets, certainly toward solar sails.”

The space council, headed by the vice president, would be charged with making sure each partner, NASA, the military, and commercial partners, are all playing their proper role.

The new president-elect also has plans to abandon climate research, transfer Earth monitoring funding from NASA to NOAA, and strengthen the U.S. military’s stance in orbit.

Whaaaaaaaaaaat.

I can't decide whether he's being ambitious or being an idiot. Also, is inquisitr a tabloid or something? I see junk about aliens and UFOs on the side. Stopped reading once I spotted those.

[Criptfeind]

I don't think most protesters are protesting the electoral collage thing anyway (although certainly his lack of popularity, which lead to the electoral collage snafu in this election, is causing the protests, so tangentially related) they are protesting the fact that he ran on a platform of hate. And the electoral collage thing is more... A legitimacy for the protesters then anything else, probably.

Sure, there's other things in his platform, but the hate part. Is worth. You know. Standing up too. Making sure that people aren't complacent about it.

Yeah, the problem with EC not matching the popular vote is only some you protest when it actually happens.

That's how people work. Generally.

[smjjames]

The most workable strategy would be to get a coalition of the "safest" states, representing an equal amount of EC votes on both sides, to come together and all agree to have their EC vote via congressional district. That would attract more campaign money to those states so would be an economic win for both sets of states.

The problem would be the current "swing" states. They benefit immensely from being Purple and also "Winner Takes All", so each campaign sees an investment there as hugely profitable.

Yeah, maybe... The issue is that it's hard for a Republicans safe state to really see that, maybe if a democrat gets in via loosing the popular vote, that could happen. As is though, red states don't want it because it's always the Republicans that benefit, and swing states don't want it because it makes them super special snowflakes.

That's what National Popular Vote is trying to do. The 11 states that have already signed it into law are all blue states. 12 more states have had it pass at least one state legislature, including Arizona, Arkansas, NC, and Oklahoma. So, it's certainly attractive to some republicans.

@criptfeind: Yeah, a lot of them are protesting against the hatred that he peddled.

[Reelya]

Hmm, 165 votes are in the bag already for National Popular Vote. And the 12 states in which it's passed one house are worth 96 more votes. If those ratify it, you're looking at 261 out of the needed 270 to enforce National Popular Vote as the new election system. And then you just need a single Republican safe state with financial problems to be persuaded they'd get a boost from election spending if this goes through. e.g. Alabama is worth 9 votes and could use an economic boost.

Basically that would change the entire map on how elections work.