Posted on 09/18/2006 12:33:07 AM PDT by ReignOfError
MOSCOW, Russia (CNN) -- A Russian-built rocket carrying the world's first female space tourist lifted off Monday in Kazakhstan on a flight to the international space station.
Anousheh Ansari, an Iranian-American telecommunications entrepreneur, was accompanied by a U.S.-Russian crew on the Soyuz TMA-9 capsule.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
I just hope that the theocrats in Iran can't keep the story out. Let young Iranian women see what one of their own can do in a free society. Let them watch the light in the sky and find the courage to tell the mad mullahs where they can shove the chador.
The Persian culture has been hijacked for the last 28 years by the Ayatollahs. I hope Ms. Ansari can offer a sliver of light through the curtain so Iranians can see what they could do if they were free. And that they then will demand it.
Godspeed, Anousheh Ansari. And when you get back, call me (not to be crass about it, but she's a pretty serious babe).
Yes, a pretty serious babe.....
Who is pretty seriously MARRIED.
Sorry to bust your bubble there. But i do agree...she's a good lookin' woman.
Yeah, as if I had a chance anyway.
Iranian space tourist or terrorist?
It's dificult to know if the headline is a typo or not.
Mock if you must, but if someone had been tending to the outside of the shuttle, Columbia might have made it back. Or at least its crew.
For the record, the first woman in space was Valentina Tereshkova, on a Vostok capsule, long before the Shuttle.
Persian by birth, American by choice. She's a smart, successful woman, and I have no reason to doubt her loyalty. If you have any information, feel free to share.
There's currently 12 people orbiting the Earth at 17,500 mph in 3 different vehicles. Godspeed to them all.
Not everybody who comes from Iran is a terrorist. I would say that she made a outstanding carrer after being born into a political and religious nightmare. Beside my (bad) jokes (see above)- we need for sure more women like this.
However, if I were an American taxpayer, I'd be more than a little displeased at having my tax dollars being used to fund a tourist attraction with the fees going to Russia.
You have to admit, for a communist nation, Russia sure adopts capitalism pretty well when it enables them to profit off of the investments of others. And the American government is being provokingly silent about this obvious abuse of their facilities.
"Iranian space tourist or terrorist?"
I read in another article that she was told to remove an Iranian flag from her uniform, and she was told not to make any political statements by the Russian and American governments. I have no doubt, though, that she would be highly critical of the current Iranian regime.
Russia is not a communist nation. It may be a resurgent U.S. rival some day, but its no communist. Its amazing how you deny Reagans legacy.
"OK, Socialist then. Or do you have another term to describe its economic system?"I don't believe it quaifies either as "communist", because of the absense of Marxist-oriented totalitarian state (Putin's authoritarianism still does not equate even to the most lenient era of Soviet totalitarism, as anyone who had lived in the actual USSR can attest.) I do not believe it falls under "socialism" either, as many West European liberal democracies do - also because the "social welfare" does not exist in the Russian Federation nearly to the levels it existed in USSR. For instance, any decent healthcare infrastructure exists only in the major cities (Moscow and St. Petersburg most prominently) and even then any decent health care is only accessible to those who can afford it. That is not very socialist, is it? As the matter of fact, anywhere outside Moscow and other major population centers the medical and other social infrastucture has SEVERELY DECLINED since the USSR's fall. I would call the current form of Russian government a "State Inc." more than anything else.
Hah-hah! "State, Inc." -- I like it!
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