X-37B and the X-15 Space Plane. One is Much Older.

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This post is mostly about the X-15, but I notice this little fellow in the news as well today.  It's a short read with a picture.

Anyway, on to the X-15. First the good stuff which is this video. As you can see, this fabulously beautiful air/spacecraft was carried aloft by another fabulously beautiful aircraft, the B-52, which after 60 years still causes knees to knock all over the enemy-sphere.  The X-15 itself flew from 1959 to 1968 and would achieve a height of 67 miles and speed of Mach 6.7.



The X-15 presentation lasts 6:10 and the rest of the video goes on to talk about the contributions leading up to landing on the moon, which are interesting also.

Notice the chase planes are F-104 Starfighters. The X-15 work contributed to every exceptional high speed aircraft used since, as well as the space shuttle of course.

Here are some more pictures, these first two are from the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. They'll get bigger if you click on them.

The Pilots -  From Here

The 12 pilots of NASA, the Air Force, Navy, and North American Aviation who flew in the program are listed in the order of their first flights, along with their total flight numbers.
A. Scott Crossfleld, NAA, 14 flights 
Joseph A. Walker, NASA, 25 flights 
Robert M. White, USAF, 16 flights 
Forrest S. Petersen, USN, 5 flights 
John B. McKay, NASA, 29 flights 
Robert A. Rushworth, USAF, 34 flights 
Neil A. Armstrong, NASA, 7 flights 
Joe H. Engle, USAF, 16 flights 
Milton 0. Thompson, NASA, 14 flights 
William J. Knight, USAF, 16 flights 
William H. Dana, NASA, 16 flights 
Michael J. Adams, USAF, 7 flights

Notice Neil Armstrong, the man to land first on the moon at Tranquility base.

This site is NASA's photo collection

Here are a few but many more are on the site.
Being towed into service..

Hanging on the B52 prior to launch.  What a ride..

 The cockpit reminds me of my first go cart that I built...

Neil Armstrong posing with the beauty after a test flight...

After engine failure caused pilot Jack McKay to land at Mud Lake, Nevada.  A Prang as the British would say.

None of the pilots were ever hurt, but a couple got itchy butts apparently....

UPDATE: GO HERE for a sheet of thumbnails that you can click on and get high resolution images. Much Better Pictures.
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Another Potential Mass Murder in a Gun Free Zone

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What's this, 137 of them now since Columbine ?
Someone should have been in this school and have shot this kid dead by now.

UPDATE: 11/30/2010 - this link is no longer pointing to a valid page. Shocka !
(You know if it's actually "news", it shouldn't be legal to remove it once it's been presented. It could be updated, amended, and noted, but it should always be available in an archive. Otherwise it's little more than blabbering BS and should then be labeled as such, not as "news")


Oh, and in case they change the picture in the story, note the SWAT team guys hiding behind the fucking wall, totally Not ready to save anyone's life inside.

I'm really tired of this crap.  Gun Control. SIUYA.
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Stories That Make Men Weep

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As properly noted by one of the commentors at the bottom of this story. Blackfive had a similar story recently, but I'm afraid it was Whimpy Whombley and Whambley.

Notable, but not the kind of thing to put a lump in your throat and allow you to scream "I am America and We Are The Best !",  even though you, like I, had not a thing to do with the design or development of Kelly Johnson's SR-71 Blackbird.

Kelly Johnson also created the  feared P-38 Lightning of WWII and the F-104 Starfighter (dubbed The Man in the Missile), two of my most favorite fighters that hung from my bedroom ceiling in plastic form, as a pre-teenager.

Forget politics and economic systems; This is the excellence that is the spirit of America that is in the genes of people who came here on boats and carved out the greatest country on Earth, the founders of which gave their lives and those of their families in many cases to do so.  Before I get pissed off and go into some political rant, I'll stop here and just suggest your read The Thrill of Flying the SR-71 Blackbird

Embedded in the story is This Link to a shorter story of its prototype, also worth the read of you are an admirer of aircraft.
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What is Really Going On in North Korea ?

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This !

Oh Yea, This doesn't have Some Language.  It has All of it !


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Ideas for Holiday Air Travel, or Air Travel in General and Fun With the TSA

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We all know how fun loving the TSA is. Here are but a couple ideas to make your TSA molestation and/or X-ray bombardment scanning a treat for everyone.

• Go in a Bikini. They won't let you go naked, or else that would even be better. If you're over the age of 60, the smaller the bikini the better.  Well, forget the age and let's just go with the smaller the better.  Maybe a temporary tatoo that says "Scan This" so that there's no confusion.  Those TSA folks are awfully stupid you know.  They go through less training than the person working the hash brown and french fry bin at your local McDonald's...

• Make a cardboard cutout of a hand giving the finger, then glue aluminum foil to the cardboard and slip that mother in your back pocket(s).

• If you're creative and artistic, make your aluminum foil covered cardboard a profile of any of these images near the top of the page like this one and slip it into your favorite jeans pocket.

• Substitute a profile of Janet Napolitano, or your favorite Fascist in the Obama administration in your "giving the finger to the DHS/TSA Celebration".  Eric Holder perhaps, who is not only incompetent, he's freakin stupid and a racist besides.  (I'll spare us all and not include her image....)

• For those who are traveling for work or similar and can't take a chance on being delayed, substitute your favorite Nazi symbol.  The Swastika perhaps.

• Everyone go in a Burka and include all the stuff above !  Decorate yourself like a Christmas Tree !

And while we're talking, where in the hell is the ACLU on this mistreatment of Americans.   We know they love to get involved in that stuff right? Hello? knock knock?

Come On America, show those  filthy Muslim bastards and Fascists in the Obama administration that We have ideas too !

I'm sure many of you have even Better ideas.   We'd love to hear of them in the comments and the TSA folks would love to see them I'm sure !

Update: After a staggering number of requests, I've replaced the bikini picture with the current picture.
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Ok... You Have to Go See the Baby Sea Dragons

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Right Here
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The Pinnacle of Incompetence - LANGUAGE

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You know you can fly through Heathrow and not be treated like a criminal and the UK has had enhanced security requirements for a lot longer than we have.

The state of air travel in the USA has descended into absurdity if not cruel and inhumane practice . At the head of all this nonsense is Janet Napolitano She's a lawyer and probably not a good one since nothing is mentioned in regards to her legal career. No notable cases to bring to the surface.  She has no qualifications that lead to her position.  She is there because she is a tool for the Dems.

Governor of Arizona, Big Whup. Then appointed to head the DHS by the Racist Anti-American Imbecile Barak Obama.

Known for:

• Banning travel to Mexico for all of 5 minutes, because of the swine flu, after which time someone called her and told her to shut the hell up, since 1.) Not her job, and 2.) Totally wrong anyway.
• Proclaiming 'The System Worked', in regard to the idiot who had the bomb in his underwear that didn't go off.  What worked? He got on the plane And lit the thing.  The only thing that worked was the happenstance that the Muslim was incompetent.
• Issuing a memo to beware of patriotic conservative right wing domestic terrorists, in particular those who love America so much, many of them spent their all in some hell hole fighting for America. wtf?
• Every public statement she's made as head of DHS, someone had to call her and tell her to shut the fuck up.
• Now, she has banned Toner Cartridges because of the fake bomb attempt from Yemen.  How many  more thousands of items will she need to focus on and write a memo about as the Muslims go through every item in the fucking dictionary that can be used to contain some destructive device or substance.

You couldn't find someone  in the gutter more incompetent that she is for this position. A position and an agency that should have never been created in the first place.  Along with the TSA - Those Standing Around imposing ridiculous absurdities on the American flying public.
I see in the news today a cancer survivor was forced to remove her prosthetic breast.  I remember a story where a woman was given a pair of pliers and told to remove her nipple rings before she could fly. Like she's going to take over an airplane full of passenger who wouldn't let her get past their seat on the way to the cockpit anyway. WTF?  This nonsense goes on all day long.  Most of the people working for the TSA are there because they couldn't get jobs elsewhere.

Let's not forget that people testing 'the system' routinely beat the system by getting bombs, hand grenades, and all manner of destructive items or substances past Those Standing Around.  So it's all for Nothing anyway.
Janet you are so incompetent you should resign.  Seriously.  Take obama with you.

This is a glimpse into the state of the health care system by the way, if that shit doesn't get repealed, since that bill is chock full of clauses about how minorities must be brought into the system.  In other words, people who would be there already if they were actually qualified for the fucking position.


So here we are, Once the greatest country ever, reduced to a laughing stock by a pack of mass murdering 3rd century Muslims, most of which since 9-11-2001 are almost as incompetent as the head of DHS.

We could scan all the luggage back to the stone age and put 2 Air Marshall's on each and every flight and still spend less than probably 1% of what the DHS and TSA cost us.

If it was funny, it would be hilarious, and to many assholes around the world it is funny.

America cannot stand for this bullshit, or soon it will be strip searches, blasted to the internet real time as the TSA people stand around laughing at us.  It really is a level close to Nazism.

And Bush was Hitler ?  They said that because they knew what this asshole and his puppet masters were going to be doing.  All of the things they accused Bush of, obama is guilty of in spades.  Not a coincidence.

Ok, back to working around the house..
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A Little Pre-Election Campaigning and Fever Swamp Attack Music

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Actually, I'm not even going to talk election for another year and a half at least.
Enjoy.


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More Music to Enjoy Capitalism by..

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Working on and around the house again, probably most of the weekend, so here is some more Flamenco in the meantime. Ramon Montoya recorded sometime between 1923 and 1936. Soleares en Mi.

Sweet tune.


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Music to Ignore Propagana By

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Obama to Increase Exports to India

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That's what the news stories say anyway. Really ? I sure don't think so.

A company in India is making a $2,500.00 car. Strike autos off the list. And you can use that as a common denominator (price factor) into every other product that will be mass purchased in India. So, what the hell can the USA make to sell to India. Defense weapons maybe. Porn movies, but that's all illegal over there I believe and they've got their own Hollywood industry there anyway. It's called Bollywood.

Here's an idea. Since India has been used to outsource the vast majority of phone technical support and software generation for a multitude of American companies, maybe we will export more jobs to India. I'd say that's about the only thing where exports are going to increase.

I saw one story that said obama gave them 10 billion. For what?

What a joke. Are there really people that buy this BS out there. Of course.
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Seriously, Time to buy Gold, Or Anything in The Market For That Matter

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May I refer you back to this September post

Ben Bernanke has committed to raising inflation. He has said very clearly when announcing the "Quantitative Easing" Program Part II on Wednesday (QE2) that starts with the Fed buying 600 billion of essentially currently valueless mortgage related paper from the banks who are holding this toxic waste between now and June. In short, he is Printing Money. He will continue to print money to achieve the inflation goal he has set out. He said this. It's not some "try to figure out what Alan Greenspan actually said" game. He says this very clearly. He wants you to know that your cash is trash.

If you have money in a mattress, it will be worth less and less until the ship turns around and that can easily be 10 years, estimated by people a lot smarter than me and who get paid to think about such things 24 hrs a day.

The dollar devalues because of more $100 bills flying out of the sky, and the market and pretty much anything priced in dollars goes up because it takes more dollars to buy the same bar of gold bullion, barrel of oil, share of IBM, whatever.

This has some simple effects with regard to spurring the economy. People make more money in the market and therefore have more money to spend. They spend it on products and services which queues businesses to hire people to handle the increasing demand, which generates more demand as well as tax revenue btw because of more paychecks being handed out each week.. Very simple really, and Ben has laid this out very specifically in these very terms. He has recently made the case to people like China, Japan, and other countries who have bought our treasuries (devaluing dollars) that it is in their best interest to chill while their investment in dollars declines because eventually a hot US economy will once again be the perfect place for them to sell their wares. Quite true.

All of these countries are and have been buying Gold as a way to minimize the current losses.

If China gets mad and revalues their yuan to increase the value of the dollar, Ben Bernanke will simple play Whack-A-Mole with them. it appears to be a can't lose game as long as the economy stays weak and unemployment if high.

Personally, I take this action and these statements to mean that I am a moron if I am not invested in assets that will only increase in value and keep my dollars at least somewhat even with inflation.

The market could take a temporary dive Monday or next week or next month, but in the overall short term - next year, and for years following the market is going up because the Federal Reserve is 100% committed to causing inflation by printing money to rectify the state of the economy. And remember the Dems had jack to do with it as they try to take credit for it whenever it does get better.

For what it's worth.

Good luck to all. Live Long and Prosper and all that stuff.

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Alright, Who Got The Laurel and Hardy Handshake in the Subject Line of the Last Post?

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So, now the Republicans and Tea Party Members should pass bill after bill after bill that Improves the business environment, and everything that makes things better for people in their daily lives - from soup to nuts, and send it up to obama to veto.  By the time 2012 comes along, obama will be the Party of No.

I think I read they are going to send up a repeal of obamacare on a weekly basis.  Cool.

So, here's the Laurel and Hardy handshake reference.


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A Laurel, and Hearty Handshake to All the Non-Democrats Who Won in This Election

Nana ??

Now please get to work saving this country by pulling it back from the brink of the Abyss.

NO, we do Not want you reaching across the aisle !

NO, we do Not want you working with Democrats !

YES, we want you to repeal the HC bill and fix health care by throttling Frivolous Medical Lawsuits.  Make it so only Gross Negligence or Incompetence can result in monetary awards.

And Finally, will you Bug The Shit out of Obama, Reid, Frank, Pelosi, Boxer and the rest of the Gang of Evil Morons at every opportunity ? 

To the New Republican Governors, such as Governor Kasich of Ohio.  If you want to be successful, just do what Texas does.  They and Alaska are the only two states growing their economies.

Thank you. One of your 300 million Supervisors who love you and want you to succeed.

Update: 11/3 9:32 PM Allen West Acceptance Speech

Allen West Epitomizes what the Tea Party Should be about and hopefully Is.




Oh; and how does obama react to the election ? He's taking 5,000 people on a BILLION DOLLAR PLUS vacation through India and Indonesia. Are you ********* ******* *** ******* kidding me ?? Gee, I wonder what Keith Uber-Dork thinks about that..  Wait, don't tell me.


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LOL!!!!!!!!!!!! Joe Biden, Idiot To The last

In a radio interview Tuesday afternoon, Biden reportedly told a WENZ in Cleveland, OH "Don't vote, or vote Republican" but Biden's aide says the VP did not mean for people to stay home on election day.

Read more: http://politics.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/11/02/biden-says-don-t-vote-or-vote-republican-radio-interview-white-house-clarifies#ixzz14BCHKwKC

Legalize All Drugs

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Especially since Alcohol is more dangerous than all the commonly known 'hard drugs'.

• All drugs were legal prior to 1920.
• Portugal decriminalized all drugs 8 years ago and have fewer drug addicts.
• People who want to do drugs still do them anyway.
• After 40 years of the 'war on drugs' any 13 year old can get crystal meth or ecstasy 8 days a week.
• Drug trade fuels a huge crime industry.
• Illegal drugs are more dangerous.
• So what are we accomplishing ?

Btw - Is there an election going on ?
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