Space is hard

Over the last week, we had some space news of note.

SpaceX tried (and failed again!) to launch starship.  The result was similar to the last launch in that they lost control of the upper stage and it pitched uncontrollably and they had to destroy it. 

In this case, the view of the craft and its problem were visible from the east coast of Florida (in spite of the launch from the Texas coastline, it flew eastward).  The reason for the visual was the time of day (sunlight was reflecting at the right angle), the altitude, and the typical trail from the rockets themselves as it pitched.

It was another learning experience for the company, because failure is always an option.  

But it caused problems for airports up and down Florida's coast and triggered a response from the FAA - which undoubtedly will prove "complicated" since Musk dictates what the FAA does and also owns SpaceX (conflict of interest anyone?)

Next up was Intelligent Machines second attempt at a lunar landing.  They launched a few weeks ago, and everything seemed to be going well.  Then when it came time for landing, they had some unexpected thrust from an engine; it landed, but like their last launch, it appears to be not quite upright.  They are getting data back and did deploy the solar panels, so they may be able to salvage some of the mission and meet major objectives.

And finally, we had the other lunar lander that was launched as part of the ride share with Intuitive Machines.  Blue Ghost, from Firefly aerospace, landed successfully and thus becomes the first *successful* moon landing for the US since the Apollo program ended 50 years ago,

  

In their case, I would argue space was hard - but achievable.  We'll learn a lot as they work through their mission objectives.

The good place and its message

I've been watching "The Good Place" which came out a decade ago.  I had never gotten around to it, but I finally decided to give it a go.  Its a lot of fun and deals with some intriguing topics, and includes a Florida-man for some terrific comedy relief.

Anyway, this is worthy of a mention because the underlying premise is that (spoiler if you haven't seen it) the scoring system that sends people to the good place hasn't kept up with our overly complicated world.  You may buy something from a company that doesn't treat its workers fairly, or you don't think about where your product comes from... and that winds up being negative points.

But, there's good from this learning: a theme that emerges is what we do next is more important than what we've done before. We can grow and become better people.

Its uplifting and feels good.  I know the show is from a while ago but there is a lesson in there that becomes even more relevant today.

And that reminds me that the general notion of religion is a bit of nonsense.  Look, if religious belief helps you achieve a form of enlightenment and feels good to you, then I say have at it. 

What I'm talking about is the broad part of religion and a god who wants humanity to succeed. 

How is it that someone like a T-rump (or any of the past "evil doers") can rise to power and make things miserable for the masses, while smart and decent people wind up dying young, having serious diseases, or otherwise have no ability to be that same kind of leader?

There's a flaw in the logic. 

And this is among the reasons that we can’t have nice things

On tariffs

Just a reminder from the university of Nebraska — While the U.S. Constitution grants to Congress the power to levy tariffs on goods, Congress has delegated some of that power to the Executive Branch over time. The U.S. Constitution states in Article I, Section 8 that "The Congress shall have the Power to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises." Congress passed general tariff legislation until the early 1930s. However, in a move to grant more flexibility to the President to revitalize global trade in the midst of the Great Depression, Congress gave the Executive Branch the power to negotiate tariff reductions within levels pre-approved by Congress through the Reciprocal Trade Agreement Act of 1934. President Franklin D. Roosevelt became the first President to have the authority to levy tariffs and negotiate bilateral trade agreements without the approval of Congress. The Executive Branch has continued to exercise a level of authority over tariffs over the past few decades. In 1962 President Kennedy signed into law the Trade Expansion Act, which allows the President to adjust tariffs based on threats to national security under section 232.3 This is the authority under which President Trump imposed tariffs on steel and aluminum, which have a vast impact on some of the United States' biggest trading partners and many U.S. industries. Since the beginning of the year, there have been bipartisan efforts in Congress to try to regain some of the power that was delegated to the Executive branch to regulate trade.— 

Our elected officials can't simply allow the sitting president take that responsibility upon himself, hurting relations and impacting everyday Americans

A good synopsis of why CEOs do what they do

This tweet from an Amazon co-founder says it all

That's on brand in this day and age.

Sergey Brin - one of Googles cofounders - waxed poetic a few days ago. 

Oh wait. It's not poetic. It's idiotic. 

 "I recommend being in the office at least every weekday," 

Which I think means people can and should work weekends?

 "60 hours a week is the sweet spot of productivity,  [A] number of folks work less than 60 hours and a small number put in the bare minimum to get by... This last group is not only unproductive but also can be highly demoralizing to everyone else."

So he wants to be a leader in AI and to get there, he'll abuse his employees.  Who maybe will get an attaboy for their work?  And he'll make billions. 

Those academy awards

Its billed as celebration of the movies.  But it really boils down to self-promotion and an ability to draw attention to overlooked films and for people that win to have greater asking prices.

But the whole system of selecting movies and ultimately deciding who wins is just a bunch of nonsense.  Around a decade or so ago, you had the discussion about it being about the Oscars being white, since people of various origins and colors were generally overlooked.

And then last night, you saw the pendulum swing a different way.  

There's a movie called Emilia Perez that was nominated for many awards.  Ostensibly, its a musical about a Mexican drug lord who undergoes surgery to become a woman to protect his family and leave his old life behind.  Only.... it fails on every level.  As a musical it includes songs like this one https://youtube.com/shorts/N3w2Lq-jMZQ?si=cpgGqwen-JNA0Yje which is ... wow.

It also fails in the notion of being about transgender.  Yes it does star a trans woman in the lead role.  The problem has to do with the transition happening to escape a past, and how the tropes play out surrounding the storyline.

But mostly it fails at being a Mexican story.  The person behind it is French, and it was filmed entirely in France.  He has little (or as far as I can tell, no) connection to Mexico.  He only presented things he saw in headlines. It tells a story that has no basis in reality and paints a picture of cartels that is one dimensional (and perhaps stereotypical and racist to a point).  And the actors...well, there is one Mexican person in the film. And you could argue that Selena Gomez is of Mexican heritage.  But, most people wouldn't say she's Mexican - and her Spanish is just okay and she has a very American accent.  The lead actress is Spanish (from Spain), and Zoe Saldana is Dominican.  In summary, it was a bit of a miss here too.

The academy apparently nominated it because it ticked boxes of Mexican and transgener and pithy.

And there was also the matter of Best Actor.  Ralph Fiennes turned in a fine performance.  But two members of the academy (the voters) decided not to vote for him.  The reason they gave was that he had won previously... except that he had not.  They proudly said they'd vote for Adrien Brody, who had, in fact, won a best actor award previously (and of course he won again).

The absurdity of that was out on full display. I didn't see either film (yet!), so I can't really comment on the merits of either.  This is simply about how dumb the voting is.