Headlines

These headlines are real ... they have all been discovered on Internet news sites.

Suspect in Quebec mosque attack quickly identified as Moroccan. He is a white nationalist

DeBlasio calls Trump's exec order affront to religious liberty, but called for Ciick-Fil-A boycott

Flashback: Democrats tried to block thousands of Vietnam war refugees, including orphans

MAG: Hollywood as we know it is already over ...

Hollywood SAG show turns into a Trump-bashing fest ...

Andrew Sullivan: America is still the future ...

Nearly 300 shootings so far this year [in Chicagoland] ...

Podesta Group loses Google parent company as client

Emboldened by Trump, police unions look to overhaul Obama reforms

Another media fail: 57% uphold temporary ban on refugees from terror exporting countries

Flashback: Obama stranded legal Cuban travelers in airports in his last week in office

James Cameron criticizes Trump administration: 'These people are insane'

Think Big

In the late 1960's, Norman Cousins, then Editor of The Saturday Review and later the World magazine, was on the Board of Directors of a company I had started, Meta-Language Products, Inc.  He was, needless to say an uber-Liberal, but held a view that was strangely orthogonal to this orthodoxy ... he was for the private ownership of space exploration.  I then thought that this idea was a little loony, given the enormous expense that was associated with such a venture -- launch pads, communications networks, recovery armadas, control rooms, R and D expenses, hoards of technicians, etc.  But, nevertheless, he raised a significant amount of money to push forward this chimera ... all to no avail.

Now, over forty years later, this same dream is being resurrected.  James Cameron, director of Avatar and the Titanic films, and two Google poobahs are launching a company to explore and exploit opportunities in space ... see Wall Street Journal Article.  This company, Planetary Resources, Inc. is not lacking in big thinking.  It wants to send missions to asteroids and mine their resources ... with the intent to "overlay two critical sectors — space exploration and natural resources — to add trillions of dollars to the global GDP [and] help ensure humanity's prosperity."  I have written in the past about the private sector's ambitions in space .  see: Beam Me Up Scotty.  Although I admire visionaries who dream and think big (perhaps because I have been accused of being one), I do believe that realism must prevail ... particularly when there are monetary amounts of these magnitudes involved.

I will make a tongue-in-cheek prediction ... Secretary of Energy Chu, before he leaves office (hopefully next January) will write a very large check to these Planetary Resources brainaics.

Associative Illogic

The Obama administration has tapped James Cameron (the Director of Avatar) as a consultant on how to solve the Gulf oil-spill crisis. This is because he has had some experience with submersibles, presumably during the filming of Titanic. Now this seems to me to be the ultimate in thinking outside the box on the part of the White House. As a consequence, I have the following suggestions for future administration appointments:

- George Lucas (creator and director of Star Wars fame) to help us plan for NASA’s future after our last space shuttle flight this fall.

- George Lopez (Mexican-American comedian and star of The George Lopez Show) to opine on how to solve our illegal immigrant problem.

- Homer Simpson (star of The Simpsons) to help us plan on how to expand the number of our domestic nuclear power plants … and get rid of our nuclear waste.

- Ray Croc (deceased McDonald’s founder) on solving our unemployment problem.

- Suze Orman (financial consultant and host of The Suze Orman Show) on solving the U.S. national debt crisis.

- Kevin Costner (of The Untouchables fame) to help us wipe out organized crime.

- George Soros (billionaire monetary speculator and former Nazi collaborator) on unwinding the world’s monetary crises.

- Kiefer Sutherland (of 24 fame) on preventing future domestic terrorist attacks.

- Peter Shin (Korean-American and director of The Family Guy) on how to pacify North Korea’s nuclear belligerency.

- Christiana Amanpour (Iranian-American, CNN newsreader and future anchor of NBC’s This Week) on convincing Iran to give up their nuclear ambitions.

- Barbara Streisand (star of Yentl) to help us solve the Palestinian/Israeli conflict.