Live Spacewalk

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Wed Aug 03, 2005 5:04 am

I am currently watching the live space walk as the astronauts attempt to remove the two ceramic strips which are protruding from between the heatshield tiles on the underbelly of the space shuttle.

Anybody else checking this out? Pretty fascinating stuff, although a little dark perhaps

It can be found on http://news.bbc.co.uk (and presumably other news websites).

Royston

[ This Message was edited by: Counterparts on 2005-08-03 06:05 ]

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Wed Aug 03, 2005 12:11 pm

I watched it on NASA tv (over the internet). It is amazing how clear it was. NASA tv is on 24 hours a day and is better than a sleeping pill when you need to fall asleep.

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/

Spirit · Post by **Spirit** » Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:13 pm

NASA TV picture quality is so poor! I suppose they have huge andwidth demands, but still.

I watched the shuttle launch a couple of systems simultaneously and was quite disgusted to find that Yahoo's "live" feed was about one minute delayed ! TV is still good for something.

[ This Message was edited by: Spirit on 2005-08-03 20:13 ]

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Wed Aug 03, 2005 8:17 pm

You obviously don't remember the live walk on the moon. That was poor video!

Me$$iah · Post by **Me$$iah** » Wed Aug 03, 2005 8:20 pm

And as everyone watched the shuttle,the house passed CAFTA.

That was kept quiet eh?

Post by **garyb** » Wed Aug 03, 2005 9:19 pm

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 2:13 am

Sick stuff indeed.

http://www.stopcafta.org/article.php?list=type&type=2

"CAFTA is modeled after the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). NAFTA has been a disaster for small farmers and working people in Canada, the United States, and Mexico. Hundreds of thousands of jobs lost, family farms foreclosed, and public interest laws overturned or challenged in secret NAFTA courts. Despite this dismal record, the Bush administration is seeking to expand NAFTA to Central America and the rest of the Western Hemisphere."

IMHO we should be sorting out our own planet before pissing about in space.

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 2:53 am

The unemployment rate in the United States was at 6% before NAFTA, it now is at 5%. In Mexico the unemployment rate has dropped even more; from nearly 8% to 4%. Canada has seen a slight drop in unemployment since 1995. It stands at about 7%.

NAFTA has been good for all 3 countries. I don't know where you get your information from. It's true that farmers are hurting but not the Mexican ones! As an American, I could care less if my money goes to an American farmer or a Mexican one. Mexicans are people who need to feed their children too and one thing about Mexicans is they don't bitch and complain like Americans do. In capitalism, things change. Sometimes you need to find another job. Maybe our time in the sun is over. Maybe China and India and Vietnam are on the rise and we are on the decline. I will buy the products which are cheaper and I highly resent any attempt to artificially control the market. We should mainly consider the price and the quality when we buy products. That is the free market. If you do not like the free market system, then maybe you ought to consider moving to Cuba. I hope you enjoy the economy down there!

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 3:09 am

Bollocks, I'd rather stay and fight than run and hide. I've seen lots of this kind of right-wing view since the war on terror ("if you don't like it here, get back to your own country" and quite frankly it's exactly what the government wants. So think before you act like a government pawn, okay?

Here too the government always fiddles the unemployment statistics.. there's lots of things you can do to make the figures more pretty

Things like increase the amount of low-paid part-time workers with no rights, employ more people for less pay, etc. Everyone's happy... or are they?

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 4:37 am

braincell wrote:
I will buy the products which are cheaper and I highly resent any attempt to artificially control the market.

Urhm...well, that's a pretty self-contradictory sentence! Also consider cheap doesn't equate to quality. Take Macdonalds for example

If you do not like the free market system, then maybe you ought to consider moving to Cuba. I hope you enjoy the economy down there!

Well, for a start, the standard of heath care and education (literacy for example) there is far superior to that in America. If America hadn't f***** Cuba so much, perhaps the ecomony would be better too. That's a "Free Market" is it? Sounds like Maggy Thatcher's old bollocks to me.

Royston

Spirit · Post by **Spirit** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 5:29 am

Whatever....

About the shuttle, I do remember how poor the moon video was. Judging by that, web video is 35 years behind TV

Spirit · Post by **Spirit** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 5:33 am

On 2005-08-04 05:37, Counterparts wrote:
Well, for a start, the standard of heath care and education (literacy for example) there is far superior to that in America. If America hadn't f***** Cuba so much, perhaps the ecomony would be better too. That's a "Free Market" is it? Sounds like Maggy Thatcher's old bollocks to me.

Royston

You make Cuba sound so nice. I wonder why so many Cubans want to go to the US ?

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 5:47 am

There's materialistic people in any society, even communist ones...

And by the way, Cuba IS nice... several friends of mine went there, and were struck by the good vibes and the great spirit of the people.

And really, before you judge central/south American countries, please first read up a little on CIA involvement in murder, drug-running and genocide in the area.

[ This Message was edited by: darkrezin on 2005-08-04 06:50 ]

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 6:29 am

Spirit wrote:
You make Cuba sound so nice.

Well, if I was offered a free choice between two airline tickets, one to Cuba and one to the USA, I'd be off to Cuba!

I've been to the States once, and have no intention of ever returning.

I wonder why so many Cubans want to go to the US ?

How many, exactly?

I'd imagine that it would be the more materialistic Cuban who has such a desire.

There's people all over the world who would like to live elsewhere...and many others who are happy to stay where they are. I don't see that says anything about the country, really. I know people who'd love to live in Australia. Does that mean it's "better" than England?

I really enjoy going abroad and travelling about, but am always completely gob-smacked by how beautiful the South West of England is when I return...I guess it's a "home" thing.

oh....topic...thread...did they fix the shuttle?

Royston

Post by **garyb** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 8:49 am

of course. it was a non-emergency, anyway.

skwawks · Post by **skwawks** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 4:04 pm

Why does talk about the shuttle turn into lefty politics and cuba and yank bashing

I reckon it's great that they are back on mission and practicing repair techniques .Lets hope the boys and girls get back safe eh?

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 4:44 pm

On 2005-08-04 17:04, skwawks wrote:
Why does talk about the shuttle turn into lefty politics and cuba and yank bashing

If I may offer some corrections... there was no yank bashing, there was bashing of the US government for its underhand foreign policy and even more underhand use of distracting news items in order to quietly pass fascist laws. This time it was the shuttle repairs, in the past it has been totally banal things like a split-second of nipple on national TV... OH THE HUMANITY!!

On the other hand there were several uninformed assumptions made about Cuba and its continued economic persecution by the US government.

And it's not "lefty politics", it's common sense and a desire to stop corporations from exploiting people..

Note the differences.

And by the way, I hope they get home in one piece too.

Spirit · Post by **Spirit** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 5:08 pm

On 2005-08-04 17:44, darkrezin wrote:
And it's not "lefty politics", it's common sense and a desire to stop corporations from exploiting people..

It may be 'common sense' to you, but other people equally see their position as 'common sense' as well. Perhaps you might be generous enough to allow your ideas to be a 'position' rather than some ultimate truth ?

Doesn't every unthinking fanatic or religious zealot believe it is only they who know the truth and everyone else is misguided or deluded ? Isn't that from where so much trouble comes ?

And it would also be nice not to have all these threads subverted with the usual "evil west conspiracy" claims.

The idea that NASA manufactured a fake repair crisis in order to divert attention from some political bill is getting a bit far-fetched.

It's almost as silly as the early claims in the "bombs in London" thread that the bombs were planted by British government orders to divert attention from the G8 meeting. And that premise too now looks very silly indeed imho.

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 5:27 pm

Now who's making assumptions... I never said that NASA planned it... on the other hand the government chose their moment rather well..

Re: the common sense thing - I find it weird and disappointing that you can say that supporting corporate exploitation of humanity can be a valid point of view. How can you say it is fine for a government to mislead its people by passing laws in secret? I find it as reprehensible as terrorists thinking it's okay to kill innocent people.

But then you're probably one of those people like Braincell who doesn't give a monkeys that people are treated like s**t in sweatshops as long as you can have your cheap consumer goods. Apologies for the assumption if I'm wrong, I'm just trying to get an angle on how your ethics work..

Did you even read the CAFTA link? sigh...

It's almost as silly as the early claims in the "bombs in London" thread that the bombs were planted by British government orders to divert attention from the G8 meeting. And that premise too now looks very silly indeed imho.

That's just one assumption as to the motivation (it doesn't even approach what's really happening). Your naivety astounds me.

The reason for all these terrorist attacks is to facilitate a police state with the backing of the people. At the moment they're appealing to peoples' racist tendencies by targeting black and asian people. I've been searched by cops most days I've been to work recently, it gets tedious *fast*. It's kind of strange being interrogated by 2 cops while one of them is staring at you with his hand on his penis extension. You're kinda afraid to even sneeze. Let's just say I'm much more afraid of being shot in the head by a pig than being blown up by an Arab..

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Thu Aug 04, 2005 6:06 pm

On 2005-08-04 18:08, Spirit wrote:

It may be 'common sense' to you, but other people equally see their position as 'common sense' as well. Perhaps you might be generous enough to allow your ideas to be a 'position' rather than some ultimate truth ?

This statement has me really astounded, I don't know whether to laugh or to cry. While not for one second equating myself to their greatness, I suppose by your rationale people like Mohandas Ghandi and Martin Luther King were self-righteous zealots who should have been more 'generous' to their oppressors?

Times may have changed and MLK may be embraced by the majority of people as a hero, but back then, he wasn't all that popular among the vast majority of white folk down in Alabama...