The Hemingway Report

Wednesday, November 28, 2018

Mars landing: NASA's InSight spacecraft takes selfie after supersonic landing

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Minutes after touching down on Mars, NASA's InSight spacecraft sent back a "nice and dirty" snapshot of its new digs. Yet the dust-speckled image looked like a work of art to scientists. The photo revealed a mostly smooth and sandy terrain around the spacecraft with only one sizable rock visible.

Another photo taken by its robotic arm-mounted camera after it landed on the planet shows a close-up of the spacecraft itself.

This photo provided by NASA shows an image on Mars that its spacecraft called InSight acquired using its robotic arm-mounted, Instrument Deployment Camera (IDC) after it landed on the planet on Monday, Nov. 26, 2018.

NASA / AP

"I'm very, very happy that it looks like we have an incredibly safe and boring landing location," project manager Tom Hoffman said after Monday's touchdown. "That's exactly what we were going for."

Images which have baffled scientists came hours later and more are expected in the days ahead after the dust covers come off the lander's cameras. These photos came from a camera low on the lander. Late Monday, NASA released a clear photo taken by a higher camera that showed part of the lander and the landscape.

"In the coming months and years even, history books will be rewritten about the interior of Mars," said JPL's director, Michael Watkins.

Tuesday, November 27, 2018

Obama's 'car of the future' goes kaput

On a tip from Ed Kilbane

by Philip Wegmann

It came with a turbocharged four-cylinder engine, churned out about 140 horsepower, and made upwards 40 mpg highway. What’s more, the Chevy Cruze was the only compact sedan to come with a presidential seal of approval.

When a prototype of the 2011 model rolled off the assembly line, then President Barack Obama put his signature on the hood writing that the Cruze was “the car of the future.”

But the future lasted only seven years. Responding to slumping sales, General Motors announced plans to push the Cruze out of their showrooms and off of a cliff.

(What rhymes with cliff? Sniff...and I'm getting hints of Solyndra with notes of Fisker and Ener1)

President Obama relentlessly promoted the Chevy Volt, promising to buy one when he left office (he didn’t)

He also autographed a Chevy Cruz describing is as “the car of the future”

GM announced today they will end production for both cars in 2019 pic.twitter.com/qqgR3YdVWW
— Charlie Spiering (@charliespiering) November 26, 2018

The Motor City has learned the hard way that what was good for Obama’s green agenda wasn’t good for GM. Fuel efficiency made the Cruze a poster child of that president’s energy legacy. If Detroit could make a car capable of making the round trip between New York City and Washington, D.C. on a single tank of gas (the Cruze comes standard with a 13.7 gallon gas tank and those cities are 220 miles apart), then the automaker could make higher fuel economy standards.

Obama wanted higher Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, and his administration mandated a 54.5 mpg standard for cars and light-duty trucks by model year 2025. Consumers did not, however, want the Cruze.

Sales were never stellar and more were sold in China than in the United States. And when President Trump reversed the Obama-era fuel standards, sales plummeted even further. Automotive News reports that sales of the Cruze dropped 26 percent through last March. Soon they will free-fall.

A freshened up 2019 Cruze goes on sale in the fall for a final time. Soon after, the plant in Lordstown, Ohio, that makes them will cease production.

This was nothing more than one big F--KING scam

Christine Blasey Ford updates fundraising page, says testifying against Kavanaugh was ‘terrifying’

You know what's really 'terrifying'?

She found enough assholes to increase her net worth by $650,000!

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Christine Blasey Ford shared on a fundraising page how “terrifying” it was to testify against then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh but noted that she’s “grateful” that she was able to fulfill her “civic duty.”

“Although coming forward was terrifying, and caused disruption to our lives, I am grateful to have had the opportunity to fulfill my civic duty,” Ford wrote in a recent post on GoFundMe.

(Her real duty was to make money)

She said that the fundraiser, which raised nearly $650,000, had allowed her family to “take reasonable steps to protect ourselves against frightening threats, including physical protection and security for me and my family, and to enhance the security for our home.”

Ford has kept a fairly low profile since testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee in September.

“Words are not adequate to thank all of you who supported me since I came forward to tell the Senate that I had been sexually assaulted by Brett Kavanaugh,” she wrote Thursday.

The Palo Alto University psychology professor claimed that Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her during high school in the 1980s. Her accusations were uncorroborated by alleged witnesses.

Kavanaugh has adamantly denied all of Ford’s allegations.

What else did she say?

Ford thanked her supporters for their support.

“Your tremendous outpouring of support and kind letters have made it possible for us to cope with the immeasurable stress, particularly the disruption to our safety and privacy. Because of your support, I feel hopeful that our lives will return to normal,” she said.

How has the GoFundMe money been used?

Ford described the donations as a “godsend” that helped pay for a security service since Sept. 19, a security system for her home, the costs of housing and security while she was in Washington, D.C., and local housing for some of the time since she returned to California.

Oh yes, she needed the security. I'm sure everybody and their brother were out to kill her.

Stop the Invasion: Non-Lethal Weapon: Active Denial System (ADS)

On a tip from Ed Kilbane

Interesting piece of equipment looks as though it has potential to repel large numbers of illegal invaders trying to make a mass assault on our borders.