Thursday, July 21, 2011

Welcome home, Atlantis. Now what?

You're looking at a NASA photograph of Shuttle Atlantis returning to Florida's Kennedy Space Center early this morning after successfully concluding the final Shuttle mission, STS-135.

Is this the end of manned American space exploration?

There are still plans to keep American astronauts on board the International Space Station. However, for the foreseeable future, in order to get to and from, Americans will have to hitch a ride on board a Russian Soyuz spacecraft. Indeed, NASA astronaut Mike Fossum just joined the space station crew (currently denominated Expedition 28) after a July 8 launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

But that's not exactly boldly going where no one has gone before. It amounts to taking a cab.

Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, the Director of the Rose Center for Earth and Space of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, tweeted earlier today, "Lament not the shuttle's end, but the absence of rockets to supplant it. Who shed a tear when Gemini ended? Apollo awaited us."

Dr. Tyson hits the nail exactly on the head. Not only does America lack a plan for further space exploration, it lacks the will to execute any plan. There's some vague notion that, some day, maybe, we might think about mounting an expedition to Mars. Maybe we'll go to an asteroid first....

Tyson's tweets note that President Kennedy's original target date for the lunar landing would have been during his second term. (As it happened, the landing was pushed back to 1969 because of the Apollo 1 fire.) Dr. Tyson notes, "One US President can never [actually] commit the nation to a goal that requires fulfillment by a President 'to be named later.'" Case in point: President Bush proposed returning to the Moon as a stepping stone toward Mars. President Obama killed that.

Are we ceding leadership in the exploration of the cosmos because it is too costly?

Again, I look to Dr. Tyson for some perspective (from his July 8 tweets):
  • The entire half-century budget of NASA equals the current two year budget of the US military.
  • The US bank bailout exceeded the half-century lifetime budget of NASA.
  • The US military spends as much in 23 days as NASA spends in a year - and that's when we're not fighting a war.
The United States can afford space exploration; what we can't afford is to stop.

Meanwhile, the private sector is expected to step up and take over flights to low Earth orbits -- but there's some question as to whether private enterprise can rise to the challenge.

In an AP report carried this morning by HuffPost AOL News, Marcia Dunn reports that the STS-135 crew left an American flag on board the space station. This was a flag that was flown on the very first Shuttle flight in 1981. It was left behind as a prize for the first private company that can fly up and claim it in person. Dunn's article continues:
SpaceX maintains it can get people to the space station within three years of getting the all-clear from NASA. Station managers expect it to be more like five years. Some skeptics say it could be 10 years before Americans are launched again from U.S. soil.
Let's hope the skeptics are wrong.

------------------------------------------------------------
For Further Reading:

Why America Needs to Explore Space, by Neil deGrasse Tyson (from Parade Magazine, August 5, 2007.

Now is not the time to quit, by Storer H. Rowley, Chicago Tribune, July 21, 2011.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Comics on trial

Legal problems are a staple of the funny pages. We don't have car pool lanes in the Chicago area, but the concept is not unfamiliar. Most locals, therefore, would not have needed an explanation for this F Minus strip from July 9:


This Bliss panel from July 4 presents a patriotic legal problem:


But lately I've noticed a lot of comics are actually looking for humor in the courts themselves.

Candorville, for example, has been dropping in and out of a custody trial for several weeks now. The protagonist, Lemont Brown, is represented by a six-year old kid pretending to be a lawyer. The real lawyer, the kid's uncle, may have been kidnapped and imprisoned by the 400-year old vampire who gave birth to Lemont's son. This installment, from June 29, features the vampire's lawyer. Yes, he does look suspiciously like John Edwards:


One of my favorite strips, Brewster Rockit, recently featured an alien's negligence suit against the Earth. The alien, it seems, crashed his saucer into Jupiter. Earth was responsible, according to the alien's lawyer, because of NASA's spacecraft Dawn, now (for real) in orbit around the asteroid Vesta. The Earth ship didn't get in the alien's way; he was simply texting about it when he crashed. This strip, from July 13, illustrates one of the high points of the trial:


A new strip, Dustin, usually focuses on the slacker 20-something for which the strip is named. But Dustin's father is a lawyer -- and last week the strip took us inside his practice. Here's the July 15 entry:


Meanwhile, on July 19, the comic pages' real lawyer, former San Francisco lawyer Stephan Pastis, provided a rather cockeyed lesson on the limits of free speech:



------------------------------------------------------------
Comics obtained from Yahoo! Comics and the Chicago Tribune Comics Kingdom.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

In which the blogger tries to figure out what Google+ is supposed to be

The Tribune's Eric Zorn wrote Sunday that the sudden growth in Google+ is "making it increasingly likely that those of us who try to stay current with social media will have One More Darn Thing To Do Every Day."

And what is Google+ you ask?

A Georgia blawger says "Google+ seems to be attempting to combine Facebook (Stream), Twitter (Following and Inbox), Skype (Hangout), and pick your own flavor of photo sharing (Photos) and instant messaging (Huddle), with its own RSS/news feed thrown in (Sparks)." If you know what all that means, you and Eric Zorn are probably already traveling in the same circles. (Yes, that's an actual attempt at a Google+ joke.)

For my part, I only know what I read in the comics. I'm pretty sure that this episode of the webcomic Scenes from a Multiverse is talking about Google+:



And this episode of the webcomic xkcd provides an explanation of Google+ that even a Luddite like me can understand:



The explanation makes even more sense when you read Mr. Munroe's embedded rollover comment: "On the one hand, you'll never be able to convince your parents to switch. On the other hand, you'll never be able to convince your parents to switch!"

Sunday, July 10, 2011

How SB1586 became P.A. 97-81

Otto von Bismarck said, "Laws are like sausages. It's better not to see them being made."

And, in Illinois, if you insist on trying to see how laws are made, sometimes you have to look very quickly.

The General Assembly website tracks how a bill that was originally drafted to take the Secretary of State out of the business of registering voters became a bill that, inter alia, substantially changes how judges are elected in Illinois. The following table shows the actions taken on the bill. Keep in mind that May 31 was the very last day of the regular legislative session.

The final amendment of the bill, House passage, and Senate concurrence in the dramatically revised bill all happened in a single day, on June 22, the very next day the Senate was in session. (The State House had a "perfunctory session" on June 21.)


Actions

DateChamber Action
2/9/2011SenateFiled with Secretary by Sen. M. Maggie Crotty
2/9/2011SenateFirst Reading
2/9/2011SenateReferred to Assignments
2/23/2011SenateAssigned to Executive
3/3/2011SenateTo Executive Subcommittee on State Government Operations
3/14/2011SenateReported Back To Executive; 002-001-000
3/17/2011SenateDo Pass Executive; 014-000-000
3/17/2011SenatePlaced on Calendar Order of 2nd Reading March 17, 2011
4/8/2011SenateSecond Reading
4/8/2011SenatePlaced on Calendar Order of 3rd Reading April 11, 2011
4/14/2011SenateThird Reading - Passed; 055-000-000
4/14/2011HouseArrived in House
4/27/2011HousePlaced on Calendar Order of First Reading
4/27/2011HouseChief House Sponsor Rep. Michael J. Zalewski
4/27/2011HouseFirst Reading
4/27/2011HouseReferred to Rules Committee
4/28/2011HouseAssigned to Elections & Campaign Reform Committee
5/10/2011HouseDo Pass / Standard Debate Elections & Campaign Reform Committee; 004-003-000
5/10/2011HousePlaced on Calendar 2nd Reading - Standard Debate
5/26/2011HouseSecond Reading - Standard Debate
5/26/2011HouseHeld on Calendar Order of Second Reading - Standard Debate
5/27/2011HouseFinal Action Deadline Extended-9(b) May 31, 2011
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Filed with Clerk by Rep. Michael J. Zalewski
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Referred to Rules Committee
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Rules Refers to Elections & Campaign Reform Committee
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Recommends Be Adopted Elections & Campaign Reform Committee; 004-003-000
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Adopted by Voice Vote
5/31/2011HouseHeld on Calendar Order of Second Reading - Standard Debate
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Fiscal Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 State Mandates Fiscal Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Balanced Budget Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Correctional Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Home Rule Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Housing Affordability Impact Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Judicial Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Land Conveyance Appraisal Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Pension Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 State Debt Impact Note Requested as Amended by Rep. Ron Stephens
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 2 Filed with Clerk by Rep. Michael J. Zalewski
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 2 Referred to Rules Committee
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Land Conveyance Appraisal Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Correctional Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 2 Recommends Be Adopted Rules Committee; 003-001-000
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Home Rule Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Judicial Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 State Mandates Fiscal Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 State Debt Impact Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Housing Affordability Impact Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Fiscal Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Pension Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011SenateChief Sponsor Changed to Sen. Don Harmon
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Balanced Budget Note Filed as Amended
5/31/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 2 Adopted by Voice Vote
5/31/2011HouseHeld on Calendar Order of Second Reading - Standard Debate
5/31/2011HousePlaced on Calendar Order of 3rd Reading - Short Debate
5/31/2011HouseRule 19(a) / Re-referred to Rules Committee
6/21/2011HouseFinal Action Deadline Extended-9(b) June 24, 2011
6/21/2011HouseApproved for Consideration Rules Committee; 003-000-000
6/21/2011HousePlaced on Calendar Order of 3rd Reading - Short Debate
6/21/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 3 Filed with Clerk by Rep. Michael J. Zalewski
6/21/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 3 Referred to Rules Committee
6/21/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 3 Recommends Be Adopted Rules Committee; 003-000-000
6/22/2011HouseRecalled to Second Reading - Short Debate
6/22/2011HouseHouse Floor Amendment No. 3 Adopted by Voice Vote
6/22/2011HousePlaced on Calendar Order of 3rd Reading - Short Debate
6/22/2011House3/5 Vote Required
6/22/2011HouseThird Reading - Short Debate - Passed 082-022-000
6/22/2011SenateSecretary's Desk - Concurrence House Amendment(s) 1, 2, 3
6/22/2011SenatePlaced on Calendar Order of Concurrence House Amendment(s) 1, 2, 3 - June 22, 2011
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Motion to Concur Filed with Secretary Sen. Don Harmon
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Motion to Concur Referred to Assignments
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 2 Motion to Concur Filed with Secretary Sen. Don Harmon
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 2 Motion to Concur Referred to Assignments
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 3 Motion to Concur Filed with Secretary Sen. Don Harmon
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 3 Motion to Concur Referred to Assignments
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Motion to Concur Be Approved for Consideration Assignments;
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 2 Motion to Concur Be Approved for Consideration Assignments;
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 3 Motion to Concur Be Approved for Consideration Assignments;
6/22/2011Senate3/5 Vote Required
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 1 Senate Concurs 053-000-000
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 2 Senate Concurs 053-000-000
6/22/2011SenateHouse Floor Amendment No. 3 Senate Concurs 053-000-000
6/22/2011SenatePassed Both Houses
6/22/2011SenateSent to the Governor
7/5/2011SenateGovernor Approved
7/5/2011SenateEffective Date July 5, 2011; Generally Effective;Some parts effective on the Effective Date of Senate Bill 63 of the 97th General Assembly.
7/5/2011SenatePublic Act . . . . . . . . . 97-0081