Space Program

The Tea Party Out To Destroy All Progress Since 1900! Progressives MUST Fight To Retain Social Justice And Economic Advancements!

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America has changed so much in the past 114 years, from the time of the Progressive Era, through the New Deal, the Great Society, and the time of Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter. George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama!

America at the end of the Gilded Age was a selfish, greedy nation of the few elite wealthy victimizing the rest of American society.

But then came Theodore Roosevelt cracking down on big business; showing concern for labor; promoting the Food and Drug Administration; and vastly extending the concept of protection of the environment and conservation.

Then came Woodrow Wilson, who gave us the Federal Reserve Banking System; the Clayton Anti Trust Act; the Federal Trade Commission; and the first national labor laws.

Then came Franklin D. Roosevelt and his New Deal, changing our lives long term with Social Security; public works programs; bank deposit insurance; stock market regulations; the Tennessee Valley Authority; Federal Unemployment Compensation; and labor laws which gave workers and labor unions the right to collective bargaining.

Then came Harry Truman, who promoted integration of the armed forces and Washington, DC; advocated for national health care; and emphasized the need for national commitment to education.

Then came Dwight D. Eisenhower, who enforced civil rights enforcement; promoted federal aid to education; the development of an interstate highway system; and the development of a national space commitment.

Then came John F. Kennedy, who advanced civil rights; promoted the space program; started the Peace Corps; cracked down on the steel industry;  and advocated national health care for the elderly.

Then came Lyndon B. Johnson, who promoted massive civil rights laws; successfully passed Medicare and Medicaid; pursued a War on Poverty; massive increases in federal aid to education; began a national commitment to environmental and consumer legislation; and appointed the first African American to the cabinet and to the Supreme Court.

Then came Richard Nixon, who signed into law the Environmental Protection Agency; the Occupational Safety and Health Administration; the Consumer Product Safety Commission; and attempted wage and price controls to keep down the inflation level.

Then came Jimmy Carter, who further promoted civil rights; saw the need for an Energy Department; and became the third best environmental President after Theodore Roosevelt and Richard Nixon.

Then came George H. W. Bush, who signed into law civil rights legislation to promote disabled people.

Then came Bill Clinton, who promoted civil rights advancements; a greater commitment to education; and attempted a national health care program.

Finally came Barack Obama, who brought about ObamaCare; promoted great environmental expansion; advocated for equality of gays and lesbians including gay marriage; and started to take moves toward immigration reforms.

So much has been done by these twelve Presidents to advance social justice, and economic reform—eight Democrats and four Republicans.

But now, the 2014 Republican Party has been hijacked by the Tea Party extremists and the right wing radio talk shows and Fox News Channel and the Koch Brothers and Sheldon Adelson, and they have declared war on all humane, decent actions that have taken place in the past 114 years, including advocacy of destroying Social Security and Medicare and getting rid of national parks and all labor reforms and the rights of women and the poor!

This is all very shocking and unbelievable, but the battle for progressivism and the retention of the great work done from Theodore Roosevelt to Barack Obama must be forthright and the battle for the future has just begun.  The Republican Party needs to be smashed and reconstituted, if the nation is to grow in the 21st century, rather than move backwards to the 19th century!

The Republican Party 2014–Anti Immigrant, Anti Women, Anti Gay, Anti Labor, Anti Science

Ronald 2 Comments

The Republican Party of 2014 has put itself into a box it cannot get out of, and it is doomed to lose the nation short term and long term, as a result!

Yes, the Republicans can win gerrymandered Congressional districts in the “hinterland” of the nation, but they cannot win the African American vote, the Hispanic-Latino vote, the women’s vote, the gay and lesbian vote, the labor vote, or the science and environmental vote!

Without those, they cannot EVER become a serious threat to the Democrats for the White House or the US Senate long term, even if somehow they are able to gain six Senate seats and the majority in the Midterm Elections of 2014!

In 2016, with two thirds of the Senate seats being Republican seats, and with Tea Party activists leaving behind a record of total rejection of government, and total lack of concern for their fellow citizens, the Senate will have a major Democratic majority, and the House has a good chance of being take back by the Democrats!

And with the states of Texas, Georgia, and North Carolina turning “Purple” toward “Blue”, with growing numbers of Hispanics and Latinos, and also the growing Asian vote there and elsewhere; and with Florida and Virginia also more “Blue” than ever in Presidential races, the Republican Party will be “toast” as a serious political opposition!

There would have to be a major realignment of the GOP for this pessimistic assessment of its future to change, but the spokesmen for the party, and the candidates jockeying for position for 2016, shows otherwise.

The Republican Party is deaf, dumb, and blind at their own self destruction, and their reward will be total repudiation by all but the ignorant and biased of the “hinterland”, who want an America which is no longer there, the America of the 1950s, when we favored the traditional immigrant groups from Northern and Western Europe; when women “knew their place” as housewives and mothers, and not workers and educated; when those who were gay or lesbian “stayed in the closet”: when the labor movement offered tons of blue collar jobs that no longer exist, due to the greed and selfishness of American corporations looking for “cheap” labor overseas; and when we abused the environment, and yet woke up to the importance of science after the Soviet orbiting of the first space satellite, Sputnik I!

Those days are gone forever, but the GOP is like an ostrich with its “head in the sand”, denying reality, and for that, they are, and will be, punished and repudiated!

52nd Anniversary Of First American To Orbit The Earth: John Glenn!

Ronald 4 Comments

52 years ago, on this date, this author was a high school student, thrilled at the orbiting in space of the first American, John Glenn.

Glenn went on to serve as a US Senator from Ohio from 1975-1999, and go into space again at age 78 in 1998, in his last months as a US Senator.

Glenn, going on 93 in July, is the last surviving member of the Mercury Seven Astronauts crew of seven heroes!

In 1962, America had a much more optimistic outlook on the future, than it does now, and “Baby Boomers” were part of that idealism, those born after World War II.

Sadly, a substantial portion of those surviving “Baby Boomers” now are cynical, selfish, reactionary, hateful people, part of the Tea Party Movement, a shocking reversal of what they were a half century ago. They have forgotten the “American Dream”, and now only concern themselves with condemnation of the advancement of immigrants, African Americans, women and their rights, and oppose the rights of gays and lesbians.

This is a center of the turmoil we have now in this country, which should be proud of its social advancements, and yet has a large portion of senior citizens who are resentful of the advancement of those who are not like they were, heavily white middle class and wealthier kids who had opportunities that now, sadly, they wish to deny others who look differently than they do! And they forget the future is not them or myself, but the younger generation, and the nation is massively different than it was a half century ago, and it is time to accept that reality, and move on to the future!

Analyzing The Ten “Less Than One Term” Presidents: Kennedy And Ford Stand Out!

Ronald 3 Comments

America has had 43 men serve as President of the United States over the past 224 years since George Washington was inaugurated in 1789. Ten of those Presidents, however, served less than one full term in office.

Of those ten, two served less than a year each—William Henry Harrison, one month; and James A. Garfield, six and a half months.

Of those ten, five served between 16 months and 34 months in office—Zachary Taylor, 16 months; Warren G. Harding, 29 months; Gerald Ford, 29 and a half months; Millard Fillmore, 32 months; and John F. Kennedy, 34 months.

The remaining three Presidents served more than three years, but less than four, as successors to the Presidency during the term—Chester Alan Arthur, 41 and a half months; Andrew Johnson, 46 and a half months; and John Tyler, 47 months.

Five of these ten Presidents died in office—Harrison, Taylor, Garfield, Harding, and Kennedy, with Harrison, Taylor and Harding dying of natural causes, and Garfield and Kennedy being assassinated.

One President succeeded after the resignation of the sitting President, Ford after Richard Nixon left office facing an impeachment trial due to the Watergate Scandal.

Five of these Presidents finished the term of the previous President—Tyler, Fillmore, Johnson,. Arthur, and Ford, and none were elected to the White House.

Which of these Presidents made a difference?

John Tyler brought about the acquisition of Texas during his time in office, along with the Webster-Ashburton Treaty with Great Britain, dealing with Canadian boundary issues.

Millard Fillmore brought about the delay of the Civil War by his agreement to sign the Compromise of 1850, and sent Commodore Matthew Perry to open up Japan to the Western world, although by the time Perry made contact with Japan, Franklin Pierce had become President.

Chester Alan Arthur signed into law the first Civil Service Reform bill for the federal government, the Pendleton Act.

Warren G. Harding pardoned Socialist Party leader Eugene Debs from prison for having violated the Espionage and Sedition Acts during World War I; and an important treaty, the Washington Naval Agreements, was negotiated by his Secretary of State, Charles Evans Hughes, the future Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in the 1930s.

John F. Kennedy was the most accomplished, responsible for actions promoting civil rights; negotiating the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty; promoting the Peace Corps; advancing the US Space program to land a man on the moon; and avoiding nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon, which undermined his popularity, but is now seen as having been the correct action to move the country away from the Watergate Scandal; resolved the Magaguez Affair with Cambodia, with the successful return of the hostages of that US Navy ship by direct action of the US Marines; and appointed long time Associate Justice John Paul Stevens to the Supreme Court, a great influence on the Court for 35 years.

The three shortest term Presidents had little impact, with only Garfield regarded as a major loss, since his education and his accomplishments, both politically and intellectually, made him seem a person who might have had a dramatic effect on the Presidency, had he lived to serve a full term.

The leading tragedy of these ten “less than one term” Presidents clearly was Andrew Johnson, who pursued a confrontational policy with Congress, showed intense racism in his approach to the issue of how African Americans should be treated in the post Civil War South, and faced impeachment and trial (which was unjust), but was caused to a great extent by his horrible relationship with the Republican majority in both houses of Congress.

If one was to rank where these ten Presidents belong in ratings in history, one just needs to look at the C-Span poll of 42 Presidents by 64 scholars, conducted in 2009 as George W. Bush left office.

What we find is the following rankings:

Kennedy—-6
Ford—22
Garfield—28
Taylor—29
Arthur—32
Tyler—35
Fillmore—37
Harding—38
Harrison—39
Johnson—41

Of course, listing Harrison and even Garfield may seem silly to many, since their tenure in office was so short, but it is interesting that Garfield’s potential and promise as a possible full term President is the idea now being promoted by scholars, who see him as a particularly tragic loss.

In the long run, it is clear that Kennedy and Ford will always stand out as the two best “less than one term” Presidents, with Garfield’s potential also significant, and otherwise, Tyler, Fillmore and Arthur having the greatest impact in their times. Harrison and Taylor had little impact, mostly remembered for their military exploits as President. Harding is still regarded as the worst President of the 20th century, particularly because of the massive political scandals in his administration, and Johnson is just seen as a total disaster, only standing above hapless full term President James Buchanan, so Harding and Johnson are seen as “failures”!

So this is the analysis of our ten “less than one term” Presidents!

Presidents And Science: The Top 15 Chronologically

Ronald 10 Comments

A very important measurement of Presidential leadership is to evaluate their interest in the advancement of science, and their willingness to support scientific research as a major part of their administrative goals.

Sadly, many Presidents have shown a lack of interest in the advancement of science, and presently, we have a group of KNOW NOTHINGS in the Republican Party who would rather promote religion in government, and deny evolution and global warming, and are generally antagonistic to any suggestion of the advancement of science, such as Barack Obama newly suggesting an investment through the National Institutes of Health to fund $100 million to work on the mapping of the human brain, which could lead to research and advancement in the study of mental illness, and such other major problems as Alzheimers Disease and Parkinson Disease. But in the Sequester environment we are now in, and the push for austerity by the GOP, it will be difficult for the vision of the study of the brain to be understood as a worthwhile and significant investment!

In any case, the Presidents who can be seen as having advanced science include the following,

Thomas Jefferson–arguably the most science oriented of all Presidents, a true genius and intellectual, who sponsored the Lewis and Clark Expedition for its scientific value, as well as the exploration of a large part of the American continent.

John Quincy Adams—a promoter of federal support of the arts and sciences, and helped to promote astronomical studies, and helped to form the Smithsonian Institution, for which he laid the cornerstone in 1846, as well as the US Naval Observatory.

Abraham Lincoln—-promoted the scientific study of agriculture, and signed legislation establishing the National Academy of Sciences.

James A. Garfield—tragically killed early in his term, but a promoter of mathematical studies, devising a mathematical proof of the Pythagorean Theorem, and promoted funding for agricultural research. Garfield was a great intellectual, and in many ways, was a tragic loss of a President whose potential for greatness was lost so quickly!

Theodore Roosevelt—was a great promoter of nature and conservation of natural resources, quadrupling our national parks and national forest lands. He also set up the US Forestry Service, and went on a dangerous trip to map the Amazon River Basin and discover new species of animal and plant life.

Herbert Hoover—a brilliant mining engineer, and elected to membership in the National Academy of Sciences, and a great intellectual, who was sadly a disaster in the White House, despite his credentials.

Franklin D. Roosevelt—managed the challenge of the Dust Bowl during the Great Depression, in his promotion of forest conservation, watersheds, and agriculture, and also worked with Albert Einstein and others in development of the atomic bomb to help win World War II.

Harry Truman—signed legislation setting up the National Science Foundation, and saw the need for greater funding of scientific research.

Dwight D. Eisenhower—promoted the beginning of the space program and the creation of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, in response to the Russian putting of Sputnik I in space in 1957.

John F. Kennedy—promoted the space program goal of landing a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s, and was a great promoter of science in other ways as well.

Lyndon B. Johnson—promoted the completion of the moon landing, and encouraged more students to go into science through federal fellowships and grants.

Jimmy Carter—received a Bachelor of Science degree with specialty in nuclear physics from the US Naval Academy, and promoted energy conservation research, with creation of the Energy Department in the cabinet, and signed legislation for the original funding of the Hubble Space Telescope.

Ronald Reagan—promoted the Space Shuttle and a space station, and although flawed, wanted to encourage a system to stop nuclear attack, known as the Strategic Defense Initiative.

Bill Clinton—promoted the Human Genome Project and the International Space Station as important for the advancement of science.

Barack Obama—is now promoting human brain research, and has called for action against global warming, and the importance of the study of evolution in science classes.

John Glenn, National Hero 51 Years Ago Today!

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John Glenn became a national hero 51 years ago today as he soared into space as the first American astronaut to orbit the earth.

Glenn also was the oldest astronaut ever, when he went into space on the shuttle in 1998, when he was 77 years old, and retiring from a distinguished career as a Democratic Senator from Ohio.

Glenn was a true national hero, and became a leading figure in the Senate for 24 years from 1975-1999, after a truly great military career, leading to the rank of Colonel, before he entered the space program, and became one of the original seven astronauts.

Glenn, now 91, will have been married to his wife Annie for seventy years in April, and this is a day to salute his great contributions to our defense, our space program, and to American politics!

As Second Term Of Obama Commences, An Eisenhower Second Term Is Needed!

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As the second term of Barack Obama begins, and with the record of mostly troubled second terms of Presidents, one can hope for an Eisenhower second term performance.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower presided over a second term which included:

Avoidance of war, including a summit meeting at Camp David with the Soviet Union leader Nikita Khrushchev, something no one would have believed possible.

Promotion of human rights and social justice, with the intervention of the National Guard at Little Rock, Arkansas, advancing the Civil Rights Movement.

Advocacy of the advancement of science and education as a response to the Soviet Union orbiting Sputnik I in space.

Advancement of infrastructure by promotion of the interstate highway system, the greatest transportation advancement since the transcontinental railroad under Abraham Lincoln.

If these kinds of accomplishments are possible under Dwight D. Eisenhower, with an opposition Democratic Congress in both houses, it should be possible under Barack Obama, with a split Congress, a Republican House of Representatives and a Democratic Senate, working together for the public good!

94th Anniversary Of John F. Kennedy’s Birth And 50 Years Since Moon Landing Speech

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President John F. Kennedy was born on this day in 1917, and certainly, when the centennial of his birth occurs in 2017, it will be a time of national celebration that no President of the past 50 years can match except Ronald Reagan, who had his centennial in February!

But it is not just the anniversary of Kennedy’s birth that should be noted, but the fact that the week that he was about to turn 44, he announced in a speech to Congress his goal of landing a man on the moon before 1970!

Such a goal seemed impossible of achievement in just over eight years, but the miracle was that the United States had made a commitment and was going to achieve it with the drive of JFK and his successor, Lyndon B. Johnson!

With the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space programs, Americans landed on and walked on the moon on July 20, 1969, the most significant scientific achievement of the 1960s!

Kennedy and space will always be linked, even though, tragically, Kennedy was assassinated only two and a half years after giving that speech to Congress on May 25, 1961. His legacy in that regard will last for the ages!

A Momentous Early May Fifty Years Ago!

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In early May of 1961, two momentous events worthy of notice occurred, and it is now 50 years since those path breaking events!

On May 5, Alan Shepard was launched into space as the first American, astronaut, going up and down in a rocket in less than an hour, not as dramatic as Yuri Gagarin of the Soviet Union being launched into orbit 23 days earlier on April 12. Despite the Shepard launch being far less significant, it marked the beginning of the American manned space program, and later that month, on May 25, President John F. Kennedy would announce what seemed impossible at the time, the landing of Americans on the moon before 1970!

On May 9, the first Freedom Ride of black and white civil rights pioneers took place, the attempt to integrate interstate transportation on buses throughout Dixie, a daring and dangerous set of circumstances, which led to bloodshed and violence in Southern bus terminals and on the interstate highways, as Ku Klux Klan activists assaulted civil rights demonstrators and set buses on fire, along with other types of violence. But this reality led the US government to order federal marshals to enforce integration on interstate transportion, and also resulted later in 1961 in the issuance by the Interstate Commerce Commission of an integration order on all transportation within the United States!

The kind of pioneering spirit of Alan Shepard and other astronauts, and of civil rights activists who put their lives at risk to enforce equality, is worthy of notice and recognition and praise 50 years later!

The Need To Build And Reconstruct Infrastructure For The Future Of America

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America is at a crossroads, and it is essential that America understand the need to rebuild much of our infrastructure, as well as expand our technology to meet the demands of the future, and compete with other world nations, including China, India and Brazil, all emerging powers.

Our highways, tunnels, bridges, train systems, power grid, energy supply, internet networks, and all other infrastructure need a commitment equivalent to the building of the transcontinental railroad system during and after the Civil War; the urgency to the building of the atomic bomb during World War II; the building of the interstate highway system beginning in the 1950s; and the competition with the Soviet Union in the space program to go to the moon in the 1960s.

Millions of jobs could be created in these infrastructure projects, and could help America to compete in the world economy and keep the excellence that America is noted for. But instead, there seems to be no imagination or creativity to look to the long term future in the midst of the present economic crisis.

This requires strong presidential leadership, to move beyond the pettiness and the politics of the minute, and think long range!