Daily Archives: November 28, 2021

Trump: ‘The border is a bigger problem than inflation’ – Business Insider

Posted: November 28, 2021 at 10:35 pm

We are so sorry! We bumped into a system failure and couldnt take your email this time.

Thank you for signing up!

Former President Donald Trump said in a Fox Business interview on Friday morning that immigration is a bigger economic threat to the US than inflation.

"The border is a bigger problem than inflation," Trump said during a lengthy call to guest host David Asman.

Trump's immigration policies cut off 2 million of the 3 million workers the US economy needs, Insider's Jason Lalljee and Andy Kiersz reported last week. Still, he floated this claim with no evidence or specificity on undocumented immigrants harming the job market.

Trump's downplaying of inflation also runs counter to the Republican Party's recent messaging, which has sought to hammer President Joe Biden on rising prices.

Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio tweeted: "Biden is eating lobster in Nantucket for Thanksgiving, while you struggle to afford groceries at home." And GOP Sen. Rick Scott of Florida recently called inflation "a gold mine for us" when it comes to attacking Biden.

Mounting economic discontent has become a serious problem for Biden's presidency and the Democratic Party as his approval ratings have hit historic lows.

As he often does in interviews and at his rallies, Trump mentioned that he studied at Pennsylvania University's Wharton School of Finance after allegedly cheating on his SATs to transfer from Fordham University to Penn to claim authority on a speculative opinion on inflation.

"So I graduated from Wharton, and I guarantee you they're right," Trump said, referring to the Congressional Budget Office's findings on Biden's Build Back Better Act. The agency said the bill won't bring in enough revenue to be "paid for" and avoid running a deficit.

"They're talking about it's actually $5 trillion," Trump said shortly afterwards about the CBO score, which clocked the total cost of the social spending billat $1.7 trillion, not $5 trillion.

"That will make inflation, bring inflation to a level nobody's seen before," Trump continued even though the report does not make any assessments about inflation.

While firing off other economic takes, Trump also claimed that "within a year I would have been bigger than Saudi Arabia and Russia combined" in oil production.

At another point, Trump called on Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to resign over voting for Biden's infrastructure bill and allowing it to pass. He also repeated his lie about winning the 2020 election, with no pushback from Asman,and falsely claimed that Biden's vaccine mandates are causing supply chain issues, most of which originate overseas where the US president has no jurisdiction.

Although Trump wanted to continue speaking past the half-hour mark of the show, Asman had to cut him off before moving on to a segment about the markets being down over concerns surrounding another COVID-19 variant.

Read more:

Trump: 'The border is a bigger problem than inflation' - Business Insider

Posted in Donald Trump | Comments Off on Trump: ‘The border is a bigger problem than inflation’ – Business Insider

James Austin Johnson is already the best SNL Trump, according to you [POLL RESULTS] – Goldderby

Posted: at 10:35 pm

James Austin Johnson only just joined the cast of Saturday Night Live this fall, but hes already made a big impression. The comedian not only played President Joe Biden in the opening sketch of the season but hes also portrayed the former president, Donald Trump, to rave reviews. After decades of Trump impersonations on the late-night sketch series, fans have voiced their overwhelming support for the most recent one.

Johnson collected the vast majority of votes in our best SNL Trump poll results, with a whopping 61% of the vote. The actor has only played him twice on SNL, though he has cultivated his impression of Trump for many years through viral videos. In a distant second place, Alec Baldwin collected 22% of the vote. Baldwin played Trump through his turbulent presidency and even won an Emmy for his performance in 2017, with additional nominations in 2018 and 2021.

Darrell Hammond came in third place at 10%, despite playing him for the longest period of time. Phil Hartman, the original Trump impressionist for SNL, placed in fourth at 3% of the vote. Johnson, Baldwin, Hammond and Hartman are the best-known Trump portrayers on the show, with all others playing the businessman in an episode or two.

Among that smaller group, Jason Sudeikis received 1% of the vote (though he won our best SNL Biden poll), followed by Leslie Jones and Vanessa Bayer at 0.5%. Taran Killam, who actually played him in three episodes, and John Cena failed to collect a single vote in the poll.

Considering Trump has left office, it is likely that we will see less of Johnsons impression on SNL, though they have already found a way to integrate him into multiple Judge Jeanine Pirro (Cecily Strong) cold opens.

Read the original here:

James Austin Johnson is already the best SNL Trump, according to you [POLL RESULTS] - Goldderby

Posted in Donald Trump | Comments Off on James Austin Johnson is already the best SNL Trump, according to you [POLL RESULTS] – Goldderby

Former WH advisor: Trump would already have new vaccines for Omicron – Business Insider

Posted: at 10:35 pm

Former White House advisor Stephen Miller claimed that there would already be updated COVID-19 vaccines to deal with the Omicron variant if Donald Trump were still president today.

"If President Trump was still in office, by the way, we'd already have modified vaccines to deal with the new variant," Miller said, speaking to Sean Hannity on Friday night.

Scientists first detected the new Omicron variant in South Africa. It has since spread to several other countries, including Israel and Belgium, prompting a spate of travel restrictionsacross Europe, Asia, andNorth America, Insider's Aria Bendixreported. A health official said on Saturday that two cases of the variant have beendetected in the UK.

The variant itself has multiple mutations that might make it easier for it to evade antibodies that developed in the body after receiving a COVID-19 vaccine. The mutations might also cause the variant to spread easily even among vaccinated people. Because of the numerous mutations, the World Health Organization has labeled Omicron a "variant of concern," a distinction given to the most threatening coronavirus variants. Delta, the variant that surged all throughout the summer in the US, was the last one to receive the label.

It's not clear yet whether existing COVID-19 vaccines will protect against the variant. But vaccine manufacturers in the US already considering their options.

Pfizer, for example, said it will be able to manufacture and distribute an updated version of its COVID-19 vaccine within 100 days if Omicron is found to be resistant to its current vaccine.The company expects to know within two weeks whether the variant is resistant to its current vaccine, a company spokesperson told Reuters.

In his interview, Miller did not specify how Trump would have sped up the timelines proposed by Pfizer and other vaccine manufacturers like Moderna.

The vaccines against COVID-19 were developed under the Trump administration. It took 11 months to get themout to the public after the first confirmed coronavirus case in January 2020.

It's also unclear what effect Trump specifically would have on the updated vaccine progress that President Joe Biden wouldn't have. Both Pfizer and Moderna indicated they would know whether the Omicron variant is resistant to their current vaccines within the next couple weeks. Johnson & Johnson is also conducting testing.

Originally posted here:

Former WH advisor: Trump would already have new vaccines for Omicron - Business Insider

Posted in Donald Trump | Comments Off on Former WH advisor: Trump would already have new vaccines for Omicron – Business Insider

Donald Trump is publishing the photo book "of all books" – Digital Camera World

Posted: at 10:35 pm

Former US President Donald J Trump has announced that he will be publishing a photo book covering the four years of his presidency, titled Our Journey Together. The book is said to feature over 300 images captioned by Trump himself.

His first official book since leaving the White House, all images have been hand-chosen by the former President and we can expect to see the documented journey of his (controversial) successes achieved during his perplexing political reign.

Read More: Trump's photography legacy

The book is available for preorder now directly via Trump's website 45books and from retailers such as Amazon. According to a statement from his office, the photo book will be released on 07 December with preorders expected to ship out in early December.

The book is priced at $74.99 (approximately 56.35 / AU$104.95), or you can expect to pay $229.99 (172.84 / AU$321.94) for an assured to be genuine signed copy. Trump's website does state, however, that any requests for signed personal messages will not be accepted.

Our Journey Together is published by Winning Team Publishing, a company co-founded by Sergio Gor and Donald Trump Jr after they worked together on his father's re-election campaign last year. The photo compilation of 320 pages will show a glimpse of Trump's most pivotal moments from his historic presidency.

The New York Times has reported that numerous industry executives and traditional publishers had no knowledge of the photo book prior to its announcement, with further rumors suggesting the photo book is not in any shape a broad reflection on Trump's presidency but an exhaustive memoir at best.

Trump was quoted back in June stating that he was "writing like crazy" and that when the time comes, we'll see "the book of all books".

Read More:

Joe Biden's photographer shoots with Sony kitBest books on photographyBest coffee table books on photographyBest Black Friday camera deals

See the rest here:

Donald Trump is publishing the photo book "of all books" - Digital Camera World

Posted in Donald Trump | Comments Off on Donald Trump is publishing the photo book "of all books" – Digital Camera World

Inside the Misinformation Wars – The New York Times

Posted: at 10:35 pm

This hints at a weakness of the new focus on misinformation: Its a technocratic solution to a problem thats as much about politics as technology. The new social media-fueled right-wing populists lie a lot, and stretch the truth more. But as American reporters quizzing Donald Trumps fans on camera discovered, his audience was often in on the joke. And many of the most offensive things he said werent necessarily lies they were just deeply ugly to half the country, including most of the people running news organizations and universities.

Its more comfortable to reckon with an information crisis if theres anything were good at, its information than a political one. If only responsible journalists and technologists could explain how misguided Mr. Trumps statements were, surely the citizenry would come around. But these well-meaning communications experts never quite understood that the people who liked him knew what was going on, laughed about it and voted for him despite, or perhaps even because of, the times he went too far.

Harpers Magazine recently published a broadside against Big Disinfo, contending that the think tanks raising money to focus on the topic were offering a simple solution to a political crisis that defies easy explanation and exaggerating the power of Facebook in a way that, ultimately, served Facebook most of all. The author, Joseph Bernstein, argued that the journalists and academics who specialize in exposing instances of disinformation seem to believe they have a particular claim on truth. However well-intentioned these professionals are, they dont have special access to the fabric of reality, he wrote.

In fact, Ive found many of the people worrying about our information diets are reassuringly modest about how far the new field of misinformation studies is going to take us. Ms. Donovan calls it a new field of data journalism, but said she agreed that this part of the field needs to get better at figuring out whats true or false. The Aspen report acknowledged that in a free society there are no arbiters of truth. Theyre putting healthy new pressure on tech platforms to be transparent in how claims true and false spread.

The editor in chief of The Texas Tribune, Sewell Chan, one of the Harvard courses participants, said he didnt think the program had a political slant, adding that it helped me understand the new forms of mischief making and lie peddling that have emerged.

That said, like the term fake news, misinformation is a loaded and somewhat subjective term, he said. Im more comfortable with precise descriptions.

I also feel the push and pull of the information ecosystem in my own journalism, as well as the temptation to evaluate a claim by its formal qualities who is saying it and why rather than its substance. Last April, for instance, I tweeted about what I saw as the sneaky way that anti-China Republicans around Donald Trump were pushing the idea that Covid-19 had leaked from a lab. There were informational red flags galore. But media criticism (and Im sorry youve gotten this far into a media column to read this) is skin-deep. Below the partisan shouting match was a more interesting scientific shouting match (which also made liberal use of the word misinformation). And the state of that story now is that scientists understanding of the origins of Covid-19 is evolving and hotly debated, and were not going to be able to resolve it on Twitter.

Here is the original post:

Inside the Misinformation Wars - The New York Times

Posted in Donald Trump | Comments Off on Inside the Misinformation Wars – The New York Times

Sean Hannity Corrected Donald Trump Live On Air. Here’s Why – The List

Posted: at 10:35 pm

During a November 23 Fox News interview, former President Donald Trump was sharply corrected by frenemy Sean Hannity live on air. Newsweek reports that the duo was discussing the FBI's infamous Russia probe.

Investigator John Durham, who was appointed to look into the initial treatment of alleged ties between the U.S. and Russia, has come highly recommended by Trump and his allies. They also heavily criticized the FBI probe, particularly when it came to the bureau's reliance on the infamous Steele dossier. "The Durham report you know, it's come out. It could have been a little earlier, but it's unbelievably completed. I would imagine..." Trump began, only for Hannity to cut across him to clarify, "It's not even out yet, though."

Trump then doubled down on "the foundations" of Durham's report while Hannity attempted to clarify matters. Durham has yet to issue any findings, and the probe is still ongoing. Russian analyst Igor Danchenko was indicted by a grand jury on five counts of making false statements to FBI agents, during 2017 interviews surrounding the Steele dossier, on which he was a researcher, per Newsweek. Trump, meanwhile, maintains there was no collusion with Russia in the 2016 election. Trump swerved the conversation to Durham's report after Hannity asked him about his intentions for 2024, about which the former president has remained vague.

See the rest here:

Sean Hannity Corrected Donald Trump Live On Air. Here's Why - The List

Posted in Donald Trump | Comments Off on Sean Hannity Corrected Donald Trump Live On Air. Here’s Why – The List

Nearly a year later, panel rethinking Massachusetts state seal is behind schedule and still shorthanded – The Boston Globe

Posted: at 10:33 pm

Established by the Legislature on Jan. 6 and approved by Governor Charlie Baker days later the commissions focus is Massachusetts 19th-century seal, which depicts a colonists arm holding a sword above the image of an Algonquian warrior. Its draped by a Latin motto that roughly translates to: By the sword we seek peace, but peace only under liberty.

The current iteration of the imagery was established by the Legislature in 1885, but has long been criticized by Native Americans and others as a racist depiction of oppression and a memorialization of the slaughter and attempted genocide of indigenous people.

When lawmakers adopted language creating the commission during the waning hours of their last two-year session, they realized a proposal former state Representative Byron Rushing had first pushed in the 1980s.

Our nations history has been pretty one-sided for a pretty long time. Thats the whole point of why were here. We have been overlooked for over 400 years, Brian Weeden, chairman of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, told his fellow commission members during a meeting Nov. 18.

It has left the commissions members with a high-profile task: to study features of the 136-year-old seal that may be unwittingly harmful and make recommendations for a new or revised design.

The panels goal is to ensure the motto and seal emblazoned across everything from the state flag to countless reams of state government stationery faithfully reflect and embody the historic and contemporary commitments of the commonwealth to peace, justice, liberty and equality, according to the language.

Thats a mouthful. Thats a lot to do, said Melissa (Harding) Ferretti, chairwoman and president of the Herring Pond Wampanoag Tribe and a commission member. I dont think were totally clear ourselves what well see in the end. We dont want to erase our vision from the seal or the flag, and further erase us from that picture. At the same time, it would be wonderful to see something more respectful.

The shorthanded commission has yet to dig into its charge in earnest. Despite a March deadline to make selections for the commission, Baker didnt submit the last of his five choices until late August. State Senator Bruce E. Tarr, the chambers minority leader, has yet to name his only appointee to whats supposed to be a 19-person panel. (A spokesman for the Gloucester Republican said he hopes to have his pick wrapped up very soon.)

There have been other logistical challenges, spurred in part by the lingering COVID-19 pandemic. The commissions meeting on Nov. 18 was its first since mid-July, the only other time its convened. And while members voted to establish co-chairpersons including one from a tribal community the commission has yet to select who theyll be.

In the interim, the panel missed an Oct. 1 deadline to produce its recommendations. The state Senate passed language resetting it for July 31, but lawmakers tucked the change into a sweeping $3.8 billion spending package that remains tied up in closed-door negotiations.

That means getting a new date has, too, been delayed.

State Representative Nika C. Elugardo, a Jamaica Plain Democrat who co-sponsored a bill to create the commission, said she believes a strong end result is still more important than the commissions speed, though she acknowledged slow progress can be frustrating and should be frustrating.

If it is a tortoise and hare situation, the tortoise wins the race, said Elugardo, who doesnt sit on the panel but has tracked its progress. What we dont want is a mule that comes to a dead stop.

Setbacks have been common, if not the rule, for legislatively created commissions. A panel created to weigh expanding the public records law, for example, disbanded at the end of 2018 after two years and one extension without an agreement. A separate commission created under last years police accountability law to study Massachusetts civil service statute didnt hold its first meeting on time.

Ive never sat on a commission thats met a deadline, said state Representative David T. Vieira, a Falmouth Republican and a state seal commission member.

Still, he questioned whether an extension to July 31 even will provide enough time. If its going to be done right, we need to engage the public, Vieira said. I also dont think its something that can be done in a handful of months.

Commission members, all volunteers, also are grappling with what their actual charge involves: to recommend elements for a new seal and motto, or to design a new version for lawmakers and the governor to consider. Some doubt the latter is possible.

We dont have the expertise to do that, Leonid Kondratiuk, director of historical services and militia affairs for the Massachusetts National Guard and a gubernatorial appointee, said at the Nov. 18 meeting.

State Representative Antonio F. D. Cabral, a New Bedford Democrat, has informally convened the commissions first two meetings as the House chairman of the Committee on State Administration and Regulatory Oversight. But he said its unfair to expect the committee staff to also do all the legwork the commission would need.

If were going to do this in a very professional way . . . then its going to require staff support. Its going to require, probably, some kind of budget to accommodate what needs to be done, Cabral said at the meeting, suggesting Bakers appointees could appeal directly to him.

A spokeswoman for Bakers office declined to comment.

Cabral, who is also a commission member, said in a statement that his committee would continue to offer support and resources to help the panel. The task of examining the state seal and motto might not be easy and might require facing some unpleasant truths of our history and, at times, that may be uncomfortable, he said. But I feel this conversation is important.

Matt Stout can be reached at matt.stout@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @mattpstout.

Go here to see the original:

Nearly a year later, panel rethinking Massachusetts state seal is behind schedule and still shorthanded - The Boston Globe

Posted in Sealand | Comments Off on Nearly a year later, panel rethinking Massachusetts state seal is behind schedule and still shorthanded – The Boston Globe

The case against Mars colonisation | Mars | The Guardian

Posted: at 10:33 pm

Earlier this month, a group of 60 prominent scientists and engineers met behind closed doors at the University of Colorado Boulder. Their agenda: Mars colonisation.

Organised by Elon Musks SpaceX and attended by members of Nasas Mars exploration programme, the goal of this inaugural Mars workshop was to begin formulating concrete plans for landing, building and sustaining a human colony on Mars within the next 40 to 100 years.

This workshop signals the growing momentum and reality behind plans to actually send humans to Mars. But while SpaceX and partners ask whether we could live there, others still ask whether we should.

A Pew Research Centre survey carried out in June asked US adults to rank the relative importance of nine of Nasas current primary missions. Sending humans to Mars was ranked eighth (ahead only of returning to the Moon) with only 18% of those surveyed believing it should be a high priority.

We have known for some time that the journey to Mars for humans would be hard. Its expensive. It's dangerous. It's boring. However, like so many advocates of Mars exploration, I've always thought the sacrifice was worth it.

But to test this belief I wanted to look at the case against Mars; three reasons humans should leave the red planet alone.

It is hard to forget the images six months ago of Elon Musk's midnight cherry Tesla floating through space. Launched atop the Falcon Heavy, SpaceX hoped to shoot the Tesla into orbit with Mars. A stunt, for sure but also a marvellous demonstration of technical competence.

But not everyone was happy. Unlike every previous craft sent to Mars, this car and the mannequin called Starman sitting behind the wheel had not been sterilised. And for this reason, some scientists described it as the largest load of earthly bacteria to ever enter space.

As it happens, the Tesla overshot its orbit. At the time of writing, it is 88 million miles from Mars, drifting through the darkness of space with Bowie on an infinite loop. But the episode illustrates the first argument against human travel to Mars: contamination.

If humans do eventually land on Mars, they would not arrive alone. They would carry with them their earthly microbes. Trillions of them.

There is a real risk that some of these microbes could find their way onto the surface of Mars and, in doing so, confuse perhaps irreversibly so the search for Martian life. This is because we wouldn't be able to distinguish indigenous life from the microbes we'd brought with us. Our presence on Mars could jeopardise one of our main reasons for being there the search for life.

Furthermore, there is no one way of knowing how our microbes may react with the vulnerable Martian ecosystem. In Cosmos, the late Carl Sagan wrote, If there is life on Mars, I believe we should do nothing with Mars. Mars then belongs to the Martians, even if the Martians are only microbes the preservation of that life must, I think, supersede any other possible use of Mars.

Of course, one easy way to minimise the risk of contamination is to send robots to Mars instead of humans the second argument against a manned trip to Mars.

Robots have several inherent advantages. They are much cheaper than humans because they don't require a vast support infrastructure to provide things like water, food and breathable air. They are immune to the risks of cosmic radiation and other dangers inherent to space travel. And they won't get bored.

Over the last 40 years, the international space community has an extraordinary legacy of robotic missions to Mars.

A few weeks ago, the European Space agency's Mars Express identified liquid water buried in the south polar region of Mars.

The Curiosity Rover recently celebrated its sixth birthday with the discovery of organic molecules and methane variations in the atmosphere both positive signals of life.

And while most of its targets are chosen by humans, Curiosity also uses artificial intelligence to autonomously analyse images and choose targets for its laser detection system.

With the rapid pace of progress in robotics and AI, it is likely that the effectiveness of these non-human explorers will only increase. Robots on Mars will be to able to carry out increasingly complex scientific research, accessing craters and canyons that humans might find too difficult to reach and perhaps even drilling for Martian microbes.

The most polarising issue in the Mars debate is arguably the tension between those dreaming of a second home and those prioritising the one we have now.

Before his death, Stephen Hawking made the bleak prediction that humanity only had 100 years left on Earth.

Faced with a growing list of threats climate change, overpopulation, nuclear war Hawking believed that we had reached "the point of no return" and had no choice as a species but to become multi-planetary starting with the colonisation of Mars.

Elon Musk has also said on numerous occasions that we need a backup planet should something apocalyptic like an asteroid collision destroy Earth.

However, not everyone agrees. In the Pew survey mentioned earlier, a majority of US adults believed that Nasas number one priority should be fixing problems on Earth. The billions if not trillions of dollars needed to colonise Mars could, for example, be better spent investing in renewable forms of energy to address climate change or strengthening our planetary defences against asteroid collisions.

And of course, if we have not figured out how to deal with problems of our own making here on Earth, there is no guarantee that the same fate would not befall Mars colonists.

Furthermore, if something truly horrible were to happen on Earth, its not clear Mars would actually be an effective salvation. Giant underground bunkers on Earth, for example, could protect more people, more easily than a colony on Mars.

And in the event of apocalyptic scenario, it is possible that the conditions on Earth however horrific may still be more hospitable than the Martian wasteland. Let's not forget that Mars has next to no atmosphere, only one third gravity and is exposed to surface radiation approximately 100 times greater than on Earth.

The arguments above show that we are perhaps not ready to go to Mars at least, not today.

We need to first update our policies on planetary protection and apply them fairly to both public and private sector entities. We need to understand humans' unique role in exploration, beyond robots. And we can't lose sight of challenges on Earth, nor use the promise of Mars as an opportunity to deflect responsibility from Earth.

But for me, the issue comes down to timing. The technology will not be ready to send a human to Mars for at least another 10, perhaps even 15 years. This is a good thing. We should use this time carefully to make sure that, by the time we can go to Mars, we really should.

Go here to read the rest:
The case against Mars colonisation | Mars | The Guardian

Posted in Mars Colonization | Comments Off on The case against Mars colonisation | Mars | The Guardian

NASA puts out call to U.S. industry partners to design a nuclear reactor to run on the Moon – National Post

Posted: at 10:33 pm

Breadcrumb Trail Links

Companies have until February 19 of next year to come up with a concept that can sustain life support systems, conduct research and support exploration and colonization on Mars

Author of the article:

Publishing date:

There hasnt been a man on the moon in almost 50 years but NASA has revealed a new plan that, if successful, could see human beings live on the Moon long-term in the near future.

Along with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), the space agency put out a request on Friday, November 19 to American companies to pitch concept designs of a fission surface power system as part of its Artemis programme to put people back on the Moon, and eventually, Mars.

The hope is to design a reactor that could be launched and running on the Moons surface within the decade. And, if all goes well, astronauts could eventually spend up to two months at a time living on the Moon, using it as a jumping-off point for missions further into the solar system..

Fission surface power in conjunction with solar cells, batteries, and fuel cells can provide the power to operate rovers, conduct experiments, and use the Moons resources to produce water, propellant, and other supplies for life support, NASA said.

The agencys call for proposals includes some ideas of what a potential reactor could look like. For now, the system would have to be small and lightweight, easily transportable, and be able to generate up to 10 kilowatts of electrical power, enough to cater to the electricity demands of several average households.

The power would be used to run life support systems, charge lunar rovers, landers and conduct research.

On top of it all, the reactor would have to be fully autonomous. It cannot rely on any external power or robotic support, nor astronaut involvement for system startup, shutdown, operation, or maintenance, NASA stated .

In the future, the systems would need to be able to produce at least 40 kilowatts of energy, enough to power approximately 30 households for up to 10 years, according to NASA.

As a result, the produced energy should be able to sustain a lunar presence and also support exploration and potential colonization of Mars.

Companies interested in submitting a pitch have until February 19, 2022, the brief states, after which NASA and DOE will select the ones that look most promising and help develop them over the next year.

The feedback and enthusiasm we continue to see for space nuclear power systems has been very exciting, and understandably so,says senior engineer Sebastian Corbisiero, the Fission Surface Power Project lead at the DOEs Idaho National Laboratory in the press brief.

Providing a reliable, high-power system on the Moon is a vital next step in human space exploration, and achieving it is within our grasp.

The announcement comes after NASA to launch DART, a SpaceX rocket that will crash into an asteroid at high speed to deflect it away from Earth, as its first-of-its-kind planetary defence, Tuesday night.

For tonights test, DART will target an asteroid whose size is a tiny fraction of the cataclysmic Chicxulub asteroid that slammed into Earth about 66 million years ago, wiping out the dinosaurs and most of the planets animal species. It is not on a path that will cause it to hit Earth in the foreseeable future.

Go here to see the original:
NASA puts out call to U.S. industry partners to design a nuclear reactor to run on the Moon - National Post

Posted in Mars Colonization | Comments Off on NASA puts out call to U.S. industry partners to design a nuclear reactor to run on the Moon – National Post

Republican McCarthy risks party split by courting extremists amid Omar spat – The Guardian

Posted: at 10:32 pm

The House Republican leader, Kevin McCarthy, said on Saturday he had reached out to Democrats over Islamophobic comments made by one of his party, Lauren Boebert of Colorado, about the Minnesota Democrat Ilhan Omar.

Boebert apologised for the remarks, in which she likened one of the first Muslim women elected to Congress to a suicide bomber, on Friday, saying she wanted to meet Omar in person. Omar responded by condemning the remarks and calling for action from party leaders.

In a statement to CNN, McCarthy said: I spoke with Leader [Steny] Hoyer today to help facilitate that meeting so that Congress can get back to talking to each other and working on the challenges facing the American people.

McCarthy did not condemn Boeberts remarks. He also faced criticism from within his own ranks, after another pro-Trump extremist, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, tweeted that she had a good call with McCarthy and liked what he has planned ahead.

Greene had criticised McCarthy, seeking to cast doubt on his ambitions to be speaker should as seems likely Republicans take back the House next year.

A Republican who spoke anonymously to CNN and was described as a moderate said McCarthy was taking the middle of the conference for granted. McCarthy could have a bigger math problem [in the election for speaker] with the moderates.

The anonymous moderate said his wing of the party more of a rump, perhaps, given Donald Trumps dominance was upset about McCarthys embrace of extremists.

One such extremist, Paul Gosar of Arizona, was this month censured for tweeting a video which depicted him killing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York like Omar a leading progressive and woman of colour in Congress and threatening Joe Biden.

Gosar lost committee assignments. McCarthy said he would get them back under a Republican speakership and held out the same prospect to Greene, who was stripped of her committees in February for racist, antisemitic and generally incendiary behaviour.

McCarthy has faced calls from the right to punish Republicans who voted for the bipartisan infrastructure bill, as well as the 10 who voted to impeach Trump over the deadly Capitol riot.

Two who voted to impeach, Adam Kinzinger of Illinois and Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio, will retire next year. Primary challengers await the rest including Liz Cheney of Wyoming, a stringent conservative nonetheless split from the Trumpists over the Capitol attack.

On Saturday, Kinzinger criticised the minority leaders call with Greene, writing: Here is real strength, when Kevin McCarthy has to call a freshman begging for permission to stay in power. What has Kevin promised? The people deserve to know.

He also said it had been a while since most normal members last talked to Kevin.

The anonymous moderate who spoke to CNN said the party was on a collision course with itself, as their side isnt going to take this much longer.

On Sunday, Asa Hutchinson, the governor of Arkansas who is seen by some as a possible presidential nominee from the more moderate side of the party, told CNNs State of the Union McCarthy should have condemned Boebert.

Even in our own caucus, our own members, if they go the wrong direction, I mean, it has to be called out, Hutchinson said. It has to be dealt with particularly whenever it is breaching the civility, whenever it is crossing the line in terms of violence or increasing divides in our country.

Earlier this week, Jackie Speier, a senior Democrat from California, told the Guardian McCarthy had a number of radical extremists in his caucus that are very effective communicators to the right fringe, and he cant really rein them in because reining them in means they will attack him.

So they have become the face of the House Republicans. You might as well put a brass ring in Kevin McCarthys nose because theyre pulling him around.

See the original post:

Republican McCarthy risks party split by courting extremists amid Omar spat - The Guardian

Posted in Republican | Comments Off on Republican McCarthy risks party split by courting extremists amid Omar spat – The Guardian