Starship’s successful launch to low Earth orbit is a big deal

Test 14 of the SpaceX Starship concluded recently with several milestones achieved that are important not only for the Artemis program but for the long-term fortunes of the company.

No pressure: How Isaacman could get the US back to the moon before China

With his renomination by President Trump, billionaire private space traveler Jared Isaacman has won the space Game of Thrones. All he has to do is go through the confirmation process again before he assumes the Iron Throne of NASA. Let that process be done with all due speed, since Isaacman has a lot to do when he becomes head of the space agency.

The latest target in the war against space billionaires

President Donald Trump has renominated billionaire private space traveler Jared Isaacman to be NASA administrator. While Isaacman is expected to sail through confirmation, not everyone is enamored with the man. The same people who disdain space-faring billionaires Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos dislike Isaacman, too.

Trump clears the way for a commercial space revolution

Recently, President Trump issued an executive order entitled “Enabling Competition in the Commercial Space Industry.” Its text suggests that the real title should be “Making commercial space great again.”

NASA funding is an ugly casualty of the ‘big, beautiful bill’

The “big, beautiful bill” recently signed into law enacted a number of tax, spending and regulatory measures. President Trump and his supporters regard the new law as a triumph. Trump’s enemies not so much.

NASA spending measures are tucked inside the bill that can best be described as ugly, or at the very least ill-advised.

After the Trump-Musk dustup, NASA has much to consider

The social media-driven feud between President Donald Trump and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk may have simmered down a bit, with the rhetoric cooling and Musk even deleting some of his ill-considered posts about Trump from X and then apologizing for them.

But the shockwaves generated by the tit-for-tat insults and threats still reverberate through NASA and the commercial space sector.

Failure is more than an option in rocket science — it’s a necessity

Recently, two events — the second attempt by Intuitive Machines to land on the moon and the eighth test of the SpaceX Starship — proved an old adage: Rocket science is really hard.

Both of these examples took place on the same day, March 6.

A few helpful suggestions for President Trump on NASA space policy

The 2024 presidential election is finally over. Donald Trump has been reelected by the voters.

This calls for a fresh look at space policy. Here are some hopefully helpful suggestions.

Starship’s live-streamed Test 4 is a giant leap toward our lunar future

If Test 3 of the SpaceX Starship was “awesome,” Test 4 of Elon Musk’s super rocket, which took place on June 5, was on another level that looked like something from science fiction happening in the real world. For the most part, the fourth test met the objectives for the launch vehicle that promises to take humans back to the moon, on to Mars, and beyond.

Biden's wealth tax would undermine his space and environmental goals

The Biden administration seems not to have thought things through when it ventured into "soak-the-rich" territory. The proposal is obviously a sop to Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont, and members of "the Squad" who have targeted wealthy, successful taxpayers as enemies of the people. However, the more money that people such as Musk, Bezos, and Gates must pay to the government, the less they will have to invest in innovative technologies that will address the problems of space travel and climate change.