Some Vietnam Vets are wondering how John Kerry got one of his Purple Hearts.

Air America, the ultraleft alternative to Rush Limbaugh, et al, that premiered to great media acclaim just two weeks ago, is apparently already in a death spiral.

Dorothy Rabinowitz gives the back of her hand to a group of 9/11 widows who, upon close examination, are real pieces of work.

I wonder if calling for the summary execution of a government official is--well--a crime?

In it's zeal to bring down President Bush, the Hollywood Left is about the violate that old maxim of entertainment, "If you want to send a message, use Western Union." I predict that the effort will backfire.

Though he has some criticisms, some valid, some just snippy, Timothy Ferris seems to come dowm in favor of President Bush's space vision.

Things get slightly brighter, however, with Bush's third proposal: to re-open the moon to human exploration. Retrograde as it may seem—haven't we already been to the moon?—this actually may not be such a bad idea.

If we take a long view, the ultimate goal of manned space exploration is to establish permanent homes for humanity elsewhere in the solar system. Centuries from now we might expect to find exploratory and scientific outposts scattered all the way from here to Saturn, with substantial numbers of people living on Mars and perhaps even Venus—assuming that both planets can be transformed ("terraformed") to endow them with oceans, breathable atmospheres, and abundant indigenous life.

There are good reasons to want to do this. In addition to providing homo sapiens with an insurance policy—a pan-planetary human species could survive terrestrial disasters, such as global warming or an asteroid impact, that could otherwise doom us—it would open up vast frontiers for exploration, habitation, and exploitation. Some of the more intriguing strategies for establishing a foothold on Mars call for sending explorers who, from the start, go there to stay: the growing Mars colony always keeps enough spacecraft on hand to serve as lifeboats if all or some of the settlers have to bail out, but the idea is to manufacture rocket fuel, grow crops, put down roots, and make a go of it. The moon is an excellent place to develop the technologies and skills required for such an effort. It's a harsh, airless world, to be sure—tougher than Mars in many respects—but as big as Africa and a lot cheaper to get to than Mars is.

I'm not sure about terraforming Venus, but he gets the general idea. And in the New York Review of Books, no less.

Glenn Reynolds has linked to a study that suggests something I have always known in my heart. Guinness really is good for you.

Slainte!

Looks like Al Sadr is folding his hand. If we believe General Sanchez, it's too late.

Andy Rooney spits on soldiers fighting in Iraq.

The University of Arizona has created a computer program allowing one to calculate the effects of an impact of an Earth approaching object (asteroid, comet, etc). Just plug in the parameters and see what might happen.

Congressman David Crockett, frontier hero, martyre at the Alamo, and champion of limited government.

Rand Simberg pointed out this interesting space blog. I find the premise very charming. It is also an exercise in furility. Liberal Democrats, with some exceptions, are going to continue to oppose space exploration and development until they start losing votes for their opposition.

I get into a lot of trouble with liberal friends when I point out the left's total opposition to things space, starting with Proxmire and Mondale and proceeding with Mr. Kerry. "Yers, but I'm not opposed," I'm told with great indignation. "I'm a liberal and I'm pro space." Jolly good, I reply. So are you disposed to--say--vote against Mr. Kerry because he is not pro space? "Well, I'm not a single issue voter, after all."

I understand.

A few years ago, a story entitled Bill Mitchell's Overt Act was published. the premise was that Bill Mitchell was assigned to the Army Air Corps at Pearl Harbor and managed to catch the Japanese fleet and sink a great deal of it before it attacked. As a result, without the outrage of Pearl Harbor, the American people revolt against the huge casualties of the resulting Pacific War.

In the same vein, we offer two alternate history scenarios for 9/11. In this one the plot is uncovered and the hijackers are all arrested. As a result of this violation of civil rights, backed up by a ludicrous conspiracy theory about using planes to take down buildings, Bush and Cheney are impeached. Greg Easterbrook offers a similer scenario in which we invade Afghanistan in August, 2001 and inact the Patriot Act. The results are sadly about the same as the first scenario.

The text of the famous memo to the President that was sent in August, 2001. Despite the hyperventilating of the liberal black helicopter crowd, there is nothing in it that predicts that terrorists were going to hijack airplanes and crash them into buildings.

People have kept cats as pets as long as ten thousand years ago, it seems.

Looks like Burt Rutan's rocket plane went to Mach 2 at 105,000 feet.

Canada is the sick man of North America, mainly because of its huge, intrusive government.

I always thought that the whole Trent Lott pseudocontroversy was overblown with a lot of fake outrage. Did anyone really believe that Senator Lott supported the return of segregation, just because of his foolish praise of Strom Thurmond? In a similer vein, while I always support the idea of legitiment payback, I don't think for a moment that Chris Dodd supports the Confederate cause because of his intemperate remarks about formerly Klansman Robert Byrd and the Civil War. Dodd should leave the Senate, not because of some alleged nostalgia for Dixie, but because he's a radical liberal.

An atlas of the Earth's Moon, based upon the highly successful Clementine mission that flew ten years ago, will soon be available:

Burt Rutan has surmounted a major government paperwork hurdle in the race for the X Prize.