Free Republic

By harnessing the innovation unleashed by the free enterprise system, private space enterprise is ready to explore the next untapped horizon: asteroids. We’re going to the moon. We’re going to Mars. And, before you know it, we’ll be going to the asteroid belt.Space is back, baby. It’s back in the news, back in our thoughts, and back in the culture. America, and the world, are better for it.Over the past few years, space exploration has returned to public consciousness in ways not since the first shuttle mission in 1981, or even since Americans landed men on the moon then brought...

According to the U.S. Treasury, as of February 29, 2020, there was $16.9 trillion in marketable U.S. Treasury securities outstanding. Of that amount, at the end of February, the Federal Reserve held $2.47 trillion or 14.6 percent – making it, by far, the largest single holder of U.S. Treasuries anywhere in the world. ...But exactly how can a so-called “free market” function smoothly if the country’s own central bank is cornering the market. Salomon Brothers paid a $290 million fine and came close to getting slapped with criminal charges by the U.S. Department of Justice in 1992 for manipulating prices...

THE American space agency is planning to send a spacecraft to a lump of metal in space worth quadrillions of dollars. The 200km-wide asteroid is currently orbiting the sun between Mars and Jupiter. It is made up of various precious metals such as iron, nickel and gold. Experts believe the iron alone in the rock would be worth $10,000 quadrillion – enough to cause the world’s economy, worth $73.7 trillion, to promptly collapse altogether.

Legislation introduced in Congress recently would define the U.S. dollar as a fixed amount of gold, a move that supporters say would help stabilize the monetary system while protecting savers, workers, and investors from the ravages of inflation. If signed into law, the bill would also restrict the ability of the controversial Federal Reserve System to confiscate the American people's wealth and manipulate the economy by expanding the currency supply. President Donald Trump has publicly supported the idea of returning to a gold-backed dollar, but the prospects for the new legislation remain uncertain. The legislation, H.R. 5404, would “define the...

The Commercial Space Launch Act of 2015, recently passed by both the House and Senate, is unique because the legislation covers a subject that is not directly related to space launches and was once the stuff of science fiction. An entire title of the bill covers the subject of mining resources from asteroids and other celestial bodies.

The increasing price of precious metals has prompted mineral prospectors to consider unusual places. Jon Evans looks into the future of mining © Stocktrek Images/AlamyMining is already a reasonably extreme activity, moving and processing large quantities of material in often unpleasant and hazardous conditions. But imagine how much more extreme it would be to mine at the bottom of the ocean or on asteroids in the depths of space. That is exactly what a few pioneering companies are planning to do.The impetus for these extreme forms of mining is the recent dramatic rises in the price of many metals, driven...

Earlier this year, entrepreneur and X-Prize impresario Peter Diamandis hinted he was about to unveil something amazing: a startup that will mine asteroids for precious metals. “Since my childhood I’ve wanted to do one thing, be an asteroid miner,” Diamandis told Forbes. “So stay tuned on that one.”

IRON AND ICE NASA Funds Space Center With An Eye To Asteroid Sample Mission Fayetteville - Jan 09, 2003 The Arkansas-Oklahoma Center for Space and Planetary Science has moved one step closer to launching an asteroid sample return collector thanks to funding from NASA. NASA recently announced a grant of $330,000 awarded to the University of Arkansas- and Oklahoma State University-based center and its industrial partner, SpaceWorks of Tucson, Ariz., to develop a sample collector for use with the space center's Hera space mission. Hera is a proposal being led by the space center to send a spacecraft to three...