what's the difference between profit-taking of private companies for government companies, and naked corruption?
that's not a joke, somebody please explain this to me.
this post was submitted on 08 Mar 2025
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They made it so SSA takes 100% of your check for overpayment instead of just 10% to cover overpayments to "Get the money back quicker and punish overpayments" (Even though overpayment is usually an error made by SSA, not the recipient)
It was 10% because leaving the applicant with enough money to survive is not only not cruel, it lowers the chances that the person will appeal and get one of those altruistic Pro-Bono Disability Lawyers involved (Many of whom are inspired to do so by being disabled and mistreated by the system themselves.. met a few, all wonderful people)
They will now be FLOODED in appeals, so many that many will likely be approved without examination due to lacking the resources to review them all and not wanting to get a disability lawyer involved to drain more time and energy from understaffed overworked offices
What he's done isn't just cruel, it's stupid and will have the opposite of the intended effect
and will have the opposite of the intended effect
Pretty sure the intended effect is the eventual collapse of the USA, so this is one little helpful piece amount many
You assume a non-complicit legal system.
No I assume an overworked system that cares more about lightening its workload than kissing Elon's ring
It would be nice if that were true, but unfortunately the debris falls over populated Caribbean islands to the east.
“wasted” tax payer money means something different to musk, than normal people.
its a “waste” if its not lining his pockets
Man, I'd sure hate to be in those two stranded astronauts' shoes!
Because they would have had to take the risk and come back in their leaky original vessel that made it home successfully?
Not sure if I prefer a leaky vessel or to depend on the whims of an orange turd and an insufferable man child. Maybe the leaky ship would've been safer.
Starship has nothing to do with the ISS crew. They're coming back on the extremely reliable Dragon capsule that's already up there.
The "rescue" mission already launched and docked during the Biden Administration.
Get out of here with your facts and objective reasoning! You're supposed to say Fuck Elon
Both awful choices none of the astronauts should have to deal with.
To be fairer with the initial faulty ship, I'd say the difference in weight might have changed the odds of success.
Was this under a gov contract? I thought it's commercial
SpaceX has been awarded 2.89 billion to develop starship into HLS. They have zero deliverables even though the first orbital flight was supposed to be 2021, cryogenic in orbit refueling in 2022.. They're supposed to be landing on the moon this year. They're not even trying.
nope, never. they might also have some small commercial contracts, but none of it works without government subsidies.
Starship's development (and all of SpaceX, really) is being funded at least in part by government subsidies. They're building it for NASA as their next manned vehicle platform.
not wasted, invested in genocide and Trump Gaza!
Ok look I'm all against the BS they're pulling but lets not forget the fact SpaceX has made anything space related significantly cheaper than NASA ever could in the same timeframe. The money lost on these experiments is peanuts compared to what they've saved already AND are needed to progress towards our space-age. I really hope with France putting more money towards competing with SpaceX we'll have an EU alternative that can actually compete on price.
cheaper than nasa could
no. they just got more funding and violated a bunch of environmental rules that NASA had to follow, because funding to efficient government programs is threadbare, and funding to military or subsidies of those deemed the beneficiaries of our society.
This is how spaceX made launches cheaper:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5cZEZoa8rW0
By not following regulations and ruining a town that homes more than 100 000 people.
To be fair, the person you're responding to is probably talking about the falcon 9 which was developed in California. Brownsville on the other hand is being ruined by a space program that makes no fucking sense and will likely fail in the end.
As much as it's fun to hate on Musk. The Spaceship program is already cheaper than any other option, even if the second stage never becomes reusable.
If all they do is gut the starship so it's a little lighter and more reliable, and keep the reusable booster, it's going to cut the cost of putting large and heavy payloads into orbit.
The James Webb telescope would have been significantly cheaper and easier to build and launch if Starship was available. There was an enormous amount of science that was cut at NASA due to the cost and time overruns from the overly complex build.
It still may never be a real option for lunar missions without the reusability and refueling, but just the ability to send huge things to earth orbit is a giant success.
The American way
SpaceX wouldn't exist without NASA. Not just because all of their tech is upon the foundational tech created by NASA, but because their employee knowledge base is formed from talent poached from NASA, directly stealing experience from the public space sector to hoard for their own profit.
love your username.
but yes, there is no wealth on this magnitude without pillaging the world others have built, tearing out the wiring, and selling it for scrap. they can only destroy. the creative urge is, as they say, also a destructive urge. more true for capitalists than most.
Counterpoint: we don't need a space age (yet).
Counterpoint: yes we do
Innovation aside, why?
Innovation, yes. Learning more about the universe
You don't necessarily need a space age to learn more about the universe. We've been doing great with remote tools like the Webb telescope and the rovers. Besides, there are more pressing matters at home like the rise of fascism. I feel like we'd be better off without space nazis but that's just me.
James Webb is literally space. It would never have existed without a strong rocket to push it there. And it cost billions more than it should have because it needed to be folded up in complex shapes in order to fit in a rocket. With bigger rockets and smaller costs, satellites like the James Webb could be numerous. James Web has a backlog of research that it will never get to because there is only so many things it can do. That's a glimpse of what space exploration can give us. It's ridiculous that you use the pinnacle of our space capabilities to say we don't need more capabilities
I mean 'space age' to necessarily include human space travel. These are remote tools that aren't vivid in the public conscious every waking moment. What I mean is commercial space tourism and the mining industry and all of that. Why spend in space vacations when everything but the kitchen sink is catching fire, y'know? People are gearing up their armies because there's imminent conflict. Not to drag politics into this, but a good example is how the EU needs to figure out how to develop new weapons systems if they plan on supporting their allies. Now that the US has stopped funding the war, the EU needs to look at defending against Russian hypersonic missiles about to rain down on Ukraine. Then on the West side, the US's leading companies are both led by some shady folks. Do we really want all that? lol
That's going to happen regardless. Humans are violent and aggressive throughout history. The only way to prevent armed conflict these days is to have nuclear weapons. Great combination, right? Europe has been sleep walking it's own defense for decades, and it's unfortunate that it takes an existential threat from Russia and Trump to finally wake up