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Obama Moons America
by L. Neil Smith
lneil@netzero.com

Attribute to The Libertarian Enterprise

You may have heard that the God-Emperor Barack I has imperiously decreed that there will be no more American manned missions to the Moon. He has ordered the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to cease the planned development of a new rocket intended for that purpose.

Instead, NASA will limit itself to the study of global warming.

A phenomenon that doesn't exist.

Understand, I have never been a fan of NASA, which has now been demoted (not entirely undeservedly) from the historic collaboration that put human footprints on another world, to this country's equivalent of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.

Nor have I ever believed that the Moon is any kind of logical stepping stone to the remainder of the Solar System, let alone to the stars. For reasons I have explained in several of my novels, the future of our species would be vastly better served by making one of the asteroids, Pallas or Ceres, the next target for exploration and settlement.

Or failing that, the increasingly intriguing planet Mars.

All of which is why I feel strange preparing to write what you are about to read. We've all watched the Obama Administration mishandle everything it's touched so far. Reluctantly, some of us have come to the conclusion that the resulting damage is deliberate, that the revolutionary idea behind Obama's suicidal policies is to destroy the United States, to break it down completely, so that it can be rebuilt along lines more pleasing to him and his fellow Marxists, currently in control. Cambodia's former dictator Pol Pot would think well of this plan.

Now I think I can see some of the details of that plan, and one major long range objective. Some of my readers will, too, as soon as I mention the names of Luis and Walter Alvarez, and that of Robert A. Heinlein.

The Alvarezes, distinguished father and son scientists, were the first to figure out, in 1980, the effect on natural history of falling pieces of rock from space. Most people now believe that the dinosaurs were wiped out by such an "Extinction Level Event" and that others, before and afterward, also determined the path that life on Earth has followed.

Heinlein pondered, in his splendid 1966 novel The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress how rocks might be made to fall from space onto various predetermined targets on Earth, as a means of waging war, using the Moon as a base for launching them. We now appreciate, thanks to the Alvarezes, that this tactic is much more effective than even Heinlein predicted.

At present, several nation-states are preparing to follow the trail that Americans first blazed into space and to the Moon, among them, the Communist Chinese. Having given up the Moon, Obama places us in unspeakable danger—forever and ever—of a future under the thumb of the sworn enemies of private capitalism and individual liberty. Try as I might, I cannot bring myself to believe that this is unplanned.

Now before we start to hear the hysterical screechings of those whose only hobby seems to be willfully misunderstanding what brighter and more articulate individuals have to say about the events and issues of the day, allow me to describe the quandary we find ourselves in.

On the one hand, we have a clumsy, inefficient, rather stupid, and often downright evil government agency, NASA, that could prevent other countries from gaining a deadly monopoly on the ultimate high ground that is the Moon by building a base there. On the other hand, the same government's parasitic stranglehold on the American economy, through taxation and regulation, makes any private response to this danger impossible.

I'm reasonably sure that conservative Republicans are going to be running the government after the 2010 and 2012 elections. I'm equally sure that many of them will share my concerns in this area. While I would be the very last individual to advocate relying on NASA "for our future security", regrettably I fail to see any immediately effective alternative.

Believe me, I wish to hell I did.

Before the usual bunch of blubbering clowns starts arguing like liberals, by yelling nouns at me, I want to hear other people's ideas concerning what might be done about this mess. Obama has treacherously betrayed us and means to leave us vulnerable to attack and control by others. Hillary Clinton is trying to help by selling us out to a United Nations personal disarmament treaty, although even my trusty Marlin Model 95CB .45/70 isn't going to be much use against a falling mountain.

I've spelled out the long range answer in my new novel Ceres.

What do we do until then?

Note

Take a look at: [THIS LINK]

Four-time Prometheus Award-winner L. Neil Smith has been called one of the world's foremost authorities on the ethics of self-defense. He is the author of more than 25 books, including The American Zone, Forge of the Elders, Pallas, The Probability Broach, Hope (with Aaron Zelman), and his collected articles and speeches, Lever Action, all of which may be purchased through his website "The Webley Page" at lneilsmith.org.

Ceres, an exciting sequel to Neil's 1993 Ngu family novel Pallas is currently running as a free weekly serial at www.bigheadpress.com/lneilsmith/?page_id=53

Neil is presently at work on Ares, the middle volume of the epic Ngu Family Cycle, and on Where We Stand: Libertarian Policy in a Time of Crisis with his daughter, Rylla.

See stunning full-color graphic-novelizations of The Probability Broach and Roswell, Texas which feature the art of Scott Bieser at www.BigHeadPress.com Dead-tree versions may be had through the publisher, or at www.Amazon.com where you will also find Phoenix Pick editions of some of Neil's earlier novels. Links to Neil's books at Amazon.com are on his website

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