> From: What's New <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: 9/23/2005 1:32:55 PM Subject: [BOBPARKS-WHATSNEW] What's New Friday September 23, 2005
WHAT'S NEW Robert L. Park Friday, 23 Sep 05 Washington, DC 1. THE POISON PILL: MOON/MARS PUT ON THE KATRINA-RELIEF HIT LIST. Last week, WN characterized NASA's plan to return to the moon in 2018 as an impossibly expensive and pointless program that some future administration would find it necessary to cancel, thus sparing the Bush administration the blame for ending human space exploration. Yesterday, the NY Times printed an expanded version as an op-ed http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/22/opinion/22park.html . Meanwhile, the Republican Study Committee, a group of fiscal hawks in the House,launched Operation Offset to strip unnecessary spending from the national budget to offset the cost of rebuilding after Katrina. Moon/Mars is high on their list of things to cut, but the list is 23 pages long. Terminating the ISS, for example, is not on the list, which includes things like delaying Medicare drug benefits, eliminating increases to the global AIDS initiative, cutting off federal money for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and numerous other soft fuzzy programs. 2. NASA: GRIFFIN SAYS NEXT SHUTTLE LAUNCH WON'T BE BEFORE MAY. Just a month ago the NASA Administrator was saying the shuttle would not fly before March 4. But the Stennis Space Center, which is responsible for testing the engines, is just 45 miles East of New Orleans, and many of the employees are without homes. 3. NORTH KOREAN NUKES: IS THIS BLACKMAIL, OR IS IT CONFUSION? On Monday, it was announced that six-nation talks in Beijing had reached an agreement under which North Korea would scrap its nuclear arms program in return for something to feed its citizens and perhaps a little respect. By Tuesday, North Korea said it would start to dismantle when the U.S. gave it a light-water reactor. The U.S. said it wasn't sending any reactors until the weapons program was gone. On Wednesday, Secretary of State Rice said everybody had to stick to what had been agreed to, but no one agrees on what that was. Today, North Korea said it will "simultaneously" pursue peaceful nuclear power, while the U.N. inspects its weapons program. Tomorrow? Who knows. 4. NATURAL HISTORY: MUSEUMS DEAL WITH CREATIONIST CONFRONTATIONS. With the first court test of whether intelligent design theory belongs in science class beginning on Monday, visitors to natural history museums complain that exhibits disagree with biblical accounts. Meanwhile, the Discovery Institute issued a statement dissociating itself from the Dover School Board's "misguided" approach in treating the trial as a test of the "establishment clause" of the First Amendment, rather than the "free speech clause," as the Discovery Institute would prefer. 5. FUEL ECONOMY: DO INCREASED STANDARDS FOR SUVS HAVE A CHANCE? Maybe, with another hurricane tearing up the Gulf. Boelert and Markey are leading the effort, selling it as a way to combat high gas prices. They didn't have many sponsors a week ago, but that was before Rita took aim at the Texas refineries. THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND. Opinions are the author's and not necessarily shared by the University of Maryland, but they should be. --- Archives of What's New can be found at http://www.bobpark.org What's New is moving to a different listserver and our subscription process has changed. To change your subscription status please visit this link: http://listserv.umd.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=bobparks-whatsnew&A=1
