Military Seeks Approval to Develop Space Weapons

ranson writes "The New York Times is reporting that U.S. Air Force officials are seeking Bush's Approval to begin researching and developing space arms. While analysts feel this move will be unwelcome in the international community, military officials believe that "Space superiority ... is our destiny, ... our vision for the future.""

Comments

There's no way... right?

[bman08]

He's never going to sign this... right? Not Bush... Right. That guy is a conservative who hates spending our tax money on pie in the sky ideas, and loves life... right? He believes we've already got the best weapons in the world, and couldn't imagine us needing more...right? Besides, at his heart, Bush is a diplomat who understands that the US can't go it alone in the world and far be it for him to swing his cock around... right? Right?

Re:Obligatory..

[TripMaster Monkey]

Screw bills....we'll drop pennies on them.

Re:Obligatory..

[interiot]

Fucking brilliant...

after the war is over and we've killed all the terrorists, the people who are still alive can rebuild their country by picking the pennies from the skulls of the dead people. Not only will we have won the war, but we don't even have to worry about paying war reparations. It's the perfect plan because everybody wins. We kill all the evil terrorists, and give them some of our own currency to rebuild their country with. Eventually when we open the first Starbucks in their country, we won't even have to worry about currency exchange because they can use the left-over money to buy beverages, and let's face it, who could resist an ice cold frappuccino after a long war?

Re:$82 Billion Well Spent

[jd]

International Space Race Sweepstakes!

• European Space Agency, riding Arianne V, hoping it won't throw them at the first jump, 100-1 outsiders.
  
• China, trying to get something that doesn't blow up, 100-1 outsiders.
  
• Russia, who are very good now about not blowing up but whose space center fell down and the only good engineer they had died of a brain tumor some decades ago, 100-1 outsiders.
  
• India, who seem to have rockets but don't seem to realize you can't reach orbit on curry powder alone, 100-1 outsiders.
  
• The OzRoc team, who could probably reach orbit by climbing up the pile of spent rockets they've launched, but who have never got anything close to orbit by flight, 1000-1 outsiders.
  
• Burt Rutan, who seems to have a clue but whose designs spin out of control at the mere sight of a weightless M&M, although his designs HAVE reached the recognized edge of the atmosphere, 1000-1 outsider.
  
• Sir Richard Branson, whose ego IS in orbit, would probably try if he wasn't busy trying to make sucker millionaires pay him big bucks to see weightless M&M's for themselves, 10000-1 outsider.
  
• The combined forces of the FSF, BSD developers, EFF, Slashdot, Linus Torvalds, a slightly puzzled penguin and some University drinking society - provided the tensions didn't undergo a matter/anti-matter reaction, I'd probably rate this as being the best bet. You have the brains, the raw computing power required, the expertise needed to make use of that computing power, and probably enough financial clout to build something based on the designs worked out. On the other hand, put that lot in the same room, and you'll think the bloodier bits in the Old Testament were tame in comparison. I don't see how you'd get a gestalt out of them, though if you could, it would be close to unstoppable.