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9/12/05 Mitchell Daily Republic:America is succeeding in the fight against terrorism, and South Dakotans have played a strong role in that fight, said U.S. Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., while speaking during Sunday?s Sept. 11 Memorial Service in Mitchell. The memorial...

Tom Oliphant writes in the Boston Globe:Roberts will have no trouble passing the litmus test. But his passing of it will mask the long record of his fealty to the true purpose of conservatism in civil rights for well over...

CSPAN's In Depth program from Book TV has now video archived the Harvey Mansfield show from this past weekend. Sure it's three hours long, but while the interview starts slowly (my kingdom for Brian Lamb!) you soon find out why...

Former Representative Tim Roemer is suggesting Jimmy Carter take over the New Orleans rebuilding effort. Judging by how ol' President Goofy Tooth operated as president, I am not so sure this is a good idea, unless this is a clever...

This is from The Hill: White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove is planning to travel to North Dakota later this month to rally GOP activists and, Republicans hope, persuade Gov. John Hoeven (R) to challenge Sen. Kent Conrad...

Start-up Firm Building New Space Capsule System

No links to this YET - but the October issue of Popular Science reports on a firm called T/Space which is developing, with NASA backing, and some project collaboration with Rutan's Scaled Composites, a capsule system called the CXV or Crew Transfer Vehicle capable of carrying three or four astronauts to low Earth orbit, and returning for a wet landing, like the Mercury/Gemini/Apollo had.

The launcher is an aircraft launched propane & liquid oxygen rocket. The whole emphasis has been on economy and simplicity of design - and seems to be making some real progress - possibly having things ready to go b\y '08 or '09 - an unheard of timeline for NASA projects.

Best of all, this will be privately owned/operated, flying as contractors to NASA, or whoever else wants/needs to get to orbit. Meanwhile, NASA is proceeding with its plans for vehicles to replace the shuttles also apparently based on a larger, more advanced capsule design for personnel, and a heavy lift cargo launcher, for well, cargo. NASA doesn;t plan to be ready to fly before 2012 at best, so the T/Space CVX could fill a gap to help keep the International Space Station in business until then.

The folks at T/Space emphasize that they are NOT building a shuttle replacement - but perhaps a modern replacement for the truly antiquated Soyuz technology.

This is truly good news - the US must maintain an effective capability for space, if for no other reason, to prevent a default ceding of the ultimate high ground to China, Russia, or whoever else goes after it.

Enter stage right, the newest blog to South Dakota, South Dakota Right to Life. Welcome aboard. They noted this yesturday:On their website, EMILY's list notes that one of the pre-requisites of candidates they help to elect is that they are...

Time for a Sheriff's Relief Fund update. Today I wrote a check and took it to the bank for deposit. Y'all donated $55 so far. The deposit slip is available for the donors to look at. If you wish to...

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