Posted on 07/20/2019 8:02:37 AM PDT by Kaslin
Normally, I try to steer clear of putting opinion pieces into the first person, but the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon Landing is enormously personal for me. I was the kid in 5th Grade who dressed as Neil Armstrong in order to give a presentation of my report on Armstrong as one of the great “explorers” in world history.
And I find it interesting that like the trashing of the legacy of those other great explorers by today’s progressives, the singular event of man’s achievement of landing on the moon is not spared the smearing of the world’s left. The “Gray Lady” herself, The New York Times, supposedly the gold-standard of modern journalism, couldn’t help but try and diminish the anniversary of the moon landing by putting out a pair of stories—both about the absence of women astronauts in the space corps at the time of the Apollo missions, as well as the dubious “achievements” of the Soviet Union in putting a woman, a person of color, a person from Asia, into space before the United States. Because, of course, the politics of intersectionality are far more important than, well, actually achieving something astonishing.
I do a radio show on Saturday mornings on WBAL—a news/talk station in Baltimore, Maryland. One of the mottos I repeat ad nauseum to my listeners is that “substance matters”—we, as a people, have to be focused on substantial achievements, especially when it comes to public policy. That we cannot allow ourselves to be distracted by surrealistic frippery.
Fifty years ago this week, in July of 1969, America achieved something truly amazing: we accomplished the very core mission President John F. Kennedy commanded from the floor of the US House of Representatives in May of 1961: to send men to the moon, to land them on it, and bring them home again. Eight years and two months – a time span that we would later realize was the mere blink of an eye, in terms of mobilizing a nation to do something extraordinary.
Moreover, despite our enmity with the Soviet Union, it was an achievement that brought nearly the entire world together. Despite the fact that the astronauts were American, despite the fact that the American taxpayer had footed the bill, these landings were done in the name of the world.
It is astonishing that The New York Times could take a moment in which the world was almost one, an anniversary which could bring us all a little closer together, and use it instead as yet another excuse to divide us. But then again, it is 2019… And in 2019, according to The New York Times, modern-day Russia is bad, but we're supposed to admire the "achievements" of the USSR!
Let’s be abundantly clear—the moon landing was a singular effort by a nation with an enormous mandate. Despite incredible odds: the need to invent new technologies, to master completely new skills, to overcome the illness, injury, and death of not just the three Apollo 1 astronauts, but other astronauts injured or killed during the course of training… despite all this, America was able to land astronauts on the moon (and bring them home again) within 100 months of Alan Shepard’s first rocket flight.
We were able to accomplish this because we did not allow ourselves to be distracted by the aforementioned surrealistic frippery. Our scientists and engineers recognized that we needed to focus on the very real risks and tasks that were essential in understanding and accomplishing before we could land on the Moon.
This week, HBO re-released a remastered version of their incredible miniseries, From the Earth to the Moon. In the first episode, NASA Flight Director Chris Kraft, portrayed by actor Stephen Root, lays out each of the skills that NASA (and its astronauts) would need to master, in succession, before any attempt at landing on the Moon—skills like rendezvousing in space, docking two spacecraft, spacewalking, etc. Legitimate and actual tasks that would have to be accomplished, over and over again, so that they would be like a second nature to the personnel engaging in them.
Nowhere present in any of this was someone’s political agenda. Sure, a cynic might say that the entire moon mission was an exercise in political propaganda, that we did it to simply “show up” the Soviets (all the more reason why The New York Times shows its true colors with these twin headlines).
But that cynicism is belied by the actual achievement itself. Beyond the technologies (both simple and complex) that were introduced to the world as the result of the Apollo program, beyond the sociological accomplishment of, for a fleeting moment, bringing billions of people around the world together in celebration, there is this singular truth: in 1969, America launched three men into space. They traveled from the confines of the Earth to another heavenly body. Two of those men landed on that heavenly body, got out of their spaceship, and walked around. They launched from that heavenly body, met up with their colleague in orbit, and the three of them returned home, splashing down back on earth several days later.
Until we send people to Mars and return them home again, this is an unassailable seminal moment in human history. There is a time before we landed on the Moon, and there is a time after.
Kennedy was right. In his speech at Rice in September of 1962 he said, “We choose to go to the Moon, and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”
Those are heady words. They’re more than a reminder—they’re a commission to all of us that substance matters. That in order to achieve greatness, we have to focus on substantial things, and that we are all diminished when we are distracted by insubstantial political frippery. And we cannot allow the divisive cynicism of The New York Times to diminish this “giant leap for mankind.”
Today.....even doing EASY things with snowflakes is HARD.
It was a great triumph of life itself. For the first time in Earth’s history life was on another world from Earth .
I look back on that time with strong emotions - and seeing the 50 year celebrations of the moon landing reawakens them.
Young people today only think they have more advanced knowledge and tech than 50 years ago.
People then used less computing power than it takes to apply a filter to a photo to go to another world.
They are but tiny ants standing on the shoulders of giants.
They have more advanced technology but they have far less knowledge.
Don’t forget all of the effort that went into the space program for many years before JFK ever made the speech. It wasn’t just 100 months, but many more than that. Then you need to multiple that by the tens of thousands of people who played some role in putting men on the Moon.
Just watched an interview on Cavuto with Gene Kranz. Was inspired to see him still well and actually he looks great and is still sharp as a tack.
He was always kind of a hero of mine and in my opinion epitomizes American exceptionalism.
The moon landing was the pinnacle of American greatness and we have gone downhill ever since. I find it ironic that the election of JFK spawned both our crowning achievement as well as the downfall of America. It was at this moment the American left realized they could steal the Presidency and assume power against the will of the people. Nixon was wrong not to challenge the results that everyone knew was a fraud. Today we live in denial of the obvious and complete absurdity is taken as truth. This was the last time in American history when being the best at anything was the road to success. Nothing coming close to this magnitude will ever be accomplished with the culture of denial that we live in today. The 50th anniversary to me only demonstrates how far we have fallen.
Yep, a signed copy.
This is why Make America Great Again should be more than a slogan. The USA in 1969 did not have much that was great beyond the monumental achievement of the Moon landing. The contrast of American on the Moon as Americans were fighting in vain in Vietnam is stark. America was to struggling to where it was headed as is it is today.
The Times’ obscene attacks on the Apollo program
https://nypost.com/2019/07/18/the-times-obscene-attacks-on-the-apollo-program/
the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon Landing is enormously personal for me.
Same here! I was riveted, then and now. Fifty years on, I see that it truly encapsulates the process and concept of actually achieving something astonishing.
Let’s be abundantly clear—the moon landing was a singular effort by a nation with an enormous mandate. Despite incredible odds: the need to invent new technologies, to master completely new skills, to overcome the illness, injury, and death of not just the three Apollo 1 astronauts, but other astronauts injured or killed during the course of training… despite all this, America was able to land astronauts on the moon (and bring them home again) within 100 months of Alan Shepard’s first rocket flight.
There are no "odds."
A people unified in purpose to create and do something productive and astonishing is not the same as consensus, but those minded to pull down the achievers love to conflate the two. The free-minded achievers achieve *because* they reject the way that everybody else is doing things. The whole history of man bears witness. The greats in the worlds of science, mathematics, medicine, et al are the ones who see beyond the "way things always are and always should be", yet they must suffer the slings and arrows from the consensus crowd. Every. Step. Of. The. Way.
The "Can't Do" types endlessly screech, "You can't do that!" because "it's not right", or "everybody knows", or tradition or racism or climate change or whatever...
YET...
Nobody got to the Moon by doing something wrong - violating the natural order of the universe (God's Laws). Those are the reality-based ordinances that actually make reality happen. In fact, the achieving Can-Do people are the folks who are hyper-observant and respectful of every conceivable law that must be taken into account in order to "go beyond" business as usual. Otherwise they would not be able to go beyond. Q.E.D.
Relevant example: the Saturn V rockets that carried man to the Moon didn't defy gravity; they were designed to go beyond it. The diligent engineers - to the best of their abilities - analyzed every minuscule detail of the natural laws in order to figure out how to do something new and different through the very principles that guide all of creation. When details slipped by, bad things happened, like the loss of the Apollo 1 crew. That horrific event made everyone become more observant, not less. That's because you can't keep a *good* man down.
Of course when achievers follow their dreams and perform what they set out to do, most naysayers are happy to ride on the contrails of success, even after they had pummeled the visionaries all along the way.
The consensus control-freaks have become so arrogant and delusional about their own power to make the universe conform to their corrupt ideals, that the Times and the rest of their ilk can't even acknowledge success when they see it; they'd rather keep up the beatings until the accomplishment-oriented people convert or die.
They will invent any accusation to send out to their consensus-minded minions instead of getting up and achieving something good and useful to the best of their own abilities. The believers want to believe the lies so that they too can wallow in victimhood and hate. The failure in their logic is that accomplishment-oriented people don't convert. Why would they move from houses that have running water and electricity and are set on a hill, to relocate to mud huts erected in a flood plain. No guilt, no penance needed.
Abel made Cain look bad, so he had to go. It goes a long way in explaining why in the language of 1001 Bible translations (English), "Abel" sounds exactly like "able" and uses the same letters.
Abel was the "Can Do" man of his time, whereas Cain was the insecure, resentful "Can't Do" underachiever. He operated with a "good-enough-for-government mentality". When Abel exposed the dysfunction of Cain's failed paradigm, Cain's worldview was suddenly in peril. Cain wasn't interested in a better way, so the obvious solution was to erase the troublemaker off of the map. There's nothing new under the sun.
Abel (able) verses Cain (cane - a crutch, excuse).
Stinky Pete blamed Sputnik 1, the Space Age it brought, and the space toys it inspired for the lack of interest in Stinky Pete toys and the cancellation of Woody's Roundup.
Stinky Pete was a prospector. He had the great potential to find gold treasure, yet he channeled his energies into hate and resentment. In his mind, he didn't stink. It was everybody else. His solution was to keep everyone locked up and paralyzed in a climate-controlled toy museum. That way *he* would not have to worry about rolling up his sleeves and getting dirty or breaking a sweat. Free-spirited children muss things up and ruin mint-condition toys!
Anyway, today is the 50th anniversary of the greatest achievement in the history of mankind. It was fitting that the first message from the Moon (from an astronaut fresh out of the box, so to speak) would be the most important announcement in the history of the word:
"That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."
The name Hebrew means the one from beyond, the one who transcends boundaries. It's the identity of a peculiar type of people who by nature go beyond, making them the fear and dread of the nations and of the internal enemies who operate with the same constrained, consensus mindset. That world knows only how to ride the prevailing winds. Can-do people don't ride. They soar. They *are* the wind.
In Hebrew, the initials of the phrase "Can Do" (regardless of gender or number) are yud-lamed. In English that's IL, the abbreviation for Israel.
What Buzz Lightyear said:
"To infinity and beyond!"
Religious people are crying out for a Redeemer -- everyone having expectations and rules for positive identification depending upon the consensus of his religious paradigm.
He's not a man with the consensus mindset of the lower worlds. If he were, he would not be capable of going beyond and doing all of the things that everybody is expecting. Besides, he's only one man. His team will consist of everyone who desires to be just like him; that is, they want to go up and touch the stars, to literally stand upon heavenly bodies. Apollo was the Greek ideal of the ideal man. What didn't Apollo know how to do?
America: a nation with an enormous mandate.
It's a simple observation that America is the nation everyone just assumes is going to save the world. Hello.
Haman was famous for his hate and demagoguery. His end: he was hanged along with this ten sons.
So much for consensus. It's end is at the end of a rope, right where it belongs. It explains why [Christian] religious consensus can't ever manage to nail down the infamous "mark of the beast." That's because it's the simple meaning of the text. While everyone is still "watching", waiting and theorizing, consensus has taken over the world and put everyone under lockdown. Challenge consensus and they'll be gunning for you.
The basic rules laid down by God for all of mankind are the ones that truly matter.
Matthew 22
36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
38 This is the first and great commandment.
39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
The commentaries and traditions about Purim - the quintessential "flipped over story" - teach that people should become drunk to the point where they can't tell the difference between "Cursed be Haman" and "Blessed be Mordecai."
Huh? My sober self sees that these two statements have the same meaning, because a bad day for Haman IS a good day for Mordecai.
The commentaries continue by pointing out that the two statements have the same numerical value: 502.
In the spirit of the above passage, I'll point out that 502 is also the value of a man saying "I love you".
The present world is certainly in need of a makeover.
https://www.oceancitytoday.com/news/moon-landing-memories-where-they-were/article_08fa557e-a985-11e9-a7a2-239d7cc2f9bd.html
ff
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.