Click here to view original web page at pjmedia.com
The Hubble Space Telescope. NASA photo. Over the past few weeks, I’ve sporadically communicated with a longtime friend at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. That’s the Hubble Space Telescope’s home office, where the images we see and the science we learn from the flying eye are processed. My friend was cautiously optimistic that the telescope, which mysteriously went offline a few weeks ago, would be brought back to life again. He’s always positive, and us Hubble huggers are nothing if not optimists when it comes to the venerable telescope. It has lasted far longer than anticipated and survived numerous hardware failures and glitches over the years. It’s been orbiting for so long that people who started out on Hubble a year or two before its launch have since retired. Hubble has logged more than 1.5 million observations and pretty much rewritten the books on what we understand about the universe.
It’s also done spectacular things like this, which I just happened to have on my hard drive. The Helix Nebula. Hubble/NASA. Hubble is an extremely complex and delicate system of systems. It lives in orbit about 340 miles above us, in space which is passively trying to kill everything it can. Systems and gizmos sometimes fail, as happens with any machine. With Hubble, since spherical aberration was corrected long ago it’s usually the gyros that bust. Hubble is also old but hardy technology.
In past years, when Hubble suffered an issue, we could send astronauts up to fix it and add new systems and capabilities. Hubble is to a great extent barely the same telescope it was at launch in 1990. It has new cameras, new solar arrays, new guts. Even the insulation that blankets it has been replaced.
The end of the shuttle program removed that possibility. From now on, Hubble must be fixed from the ground. Hardware replacements are no longer an option. The telescope operates on metaphorical rusty rails. And it recently suffered a serious failure and went dark. A series of multi-day tests, which included attempts to restart and reconfigure the computer and the backup computer, […]
Click here to view original web page at pjmedia.com
Will America-First News Outlets Make it to 2023?
Things are looking grim for conservative and populist news sites.
There’s something happening behind the scenes at several popular conservative news outlets. 2021 was bad, but 2022 is proving to be disastrous for news sites that aren’t “playing ball” with the corporate media narrative. It’s being said that advertisers are cracking down, forcing some of the biggest ad networks like Google and Yahoo to pull their inventory from conservative outlets. This has had two major effects. First, it has cooled most conservative outlets from discussing “taboo” topics like Pandemic Panic Theater, voter fraud, or The Great Reset. Second, it has isolated those ad networks that aren’t playing ball.
Certain topics are anathema for most ad networks. Speaking out against vaccines or vaccine mandates is a certain path to being demonetized. Highlighting voter fraud in the 2020 and future elections is another instant advertising death penalty. Throw in truthful stories about climate change hysteria, Critical Race Theory, and the border crisis and it’s easy to understand how difficult it is for America-First news outlets to spread the facts, share conservative opinions, and still pay the bills.
Without naming names, I have been told of several news outlets who have been forced to either consolidate with larger organizations or who have backed down on covering certain topics out of fear of being “canceled” by the ad networks. I get it. This is a business for many of us and it’s not very profitable. Those of us who do this for a living are often barely squeaking by, so loss of additional revenue can often mean being forced to make cuts. That means not being able to cover the topics properly. Its a Catch-22: Tell the truth and lose the money necessary to keep telling the truth, or avoid the truth and make enough money to survive. Those who have chosen survival simply aren’t able to spread the truth properly.
We will never avoid the truth. The Lord will provide if it is His will. Our job is simply to share the facts, spread the Gospel, and educate as many Americans as possible while exposing the forces of evil.
To those who have the means, we ask that you please donate. We have options available now, but there is no telling when those options will cancel us. We have our GivingFuel page. There have been many who have been canceled by PayPal, but for now it’s still an option. Your generosity is what keeps these sites running and allows us to get the truth to the masses. We’ve had great success in growing but we know we can do more with your assistance.
Thank you, and God Bless!
JD Rucker