America’s ability to wield power effectively in the global commons is a cornerstone of U.S. foreign policy and a key source of American influence, but today’s world is witnessing a dramatic expansion of those commons—into outer space. America’s response to this broadening terrain will carry tremendous weight for the stability of the international system. Satellites allow U.S. forces to communicate, navigate, gather intelligence, and use precisi...
The men behind Google and Avatar want to mine asteroids. Elon Musk, a co-founder of PayPal, is scheduled to send the SpaceX Falcon 9, the world’s first commercial launch vehicle, to the International Space Station (ISS) on May 7. Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos has a rocket company of his own. Hotel magnate Robert Bigelow is developing inflatable space habitats for use by private companies and government agencies. And the chief executive of Virgin...
Illustration by Stephanie Mannheim Recently, the Washington Post ran an editorial by Ed Rogers called “OWS is over.” Writing that the movement “never constituted any class, or even a sub-class, to begin with,” Rogers argues, “It is possible the OWS movement will infest public space again. But they won’t be forming the core of Obama reelection rallies – or at least he hopes not. Only the most marginal Democratic officials would appear in close...
NASA. You can say whatever you like about spending priorities and government waste, but this is one program that a majority of Republicans and Democrats consistently back. Their reasons vary—advancing science, inspiring schoolchildren, maintaining American leadership, and, of course, lucrative contracting jobs. NASA—particularly when it comes to human spaceflight—remains a cherished institution, but it has its detractors. Looking back on the Spa...
...orking sites then we have a serious problem. This growing trend warrants a critical evaluation of laws and norms surrounding interaction on the Internet. There must be an attempt to outline what constitutes public and private space on the Internet. The information made public by the HB Gary hack shows us that, contrary to the current electronic communication laws, the government and their cyber-security contractors like HB Gary, Berico, Palantir...
“The Great Wall of China is the only man-made structure visible from space.” How many times have we heard this phrase – in class, in the media, and on visits to China? The idea was first proposed by William Stukeley, an 18th century antiquarian dubbed the founder of the field of modern archaeology, in 1754. By the end of the 19th century, it had become an established fact that the Wall could actually be seen from the moon. Since man first...
...via social media. Protests and other forms of direct action took place multiple times a day, and students diligently kept each other up to date on where to find them through Facebook. The culture of the student movement was a space for vibrant democracy, but this had a divisive effect on the students and the general population alike. Students quickly split into several factions, who made their affiliations known by wearing differently colored squ...
...rce multipliers, thus increasing its effective number of troops. The main weakness of this strategy is that it leaves the American military utterly dependent upon the free use of the global commons: sea, cyberspace, and outer space. Without ships to deploy carrier air wings and Marine expeditionary units, without secure computer networks, and without space-based intelligence, navigation, communications, and targeting, the United States would be p...
...owing the United States off balance. This does not mean that conventional forces have become useless or outdated. The United States will still need a large standing force across the full spectrum of conflict – land, sea, air, space, and cyberspace – in order to deter potential aggressors. However, since the threats we face are meant to exploit American weaknesses and curtail our conventional superiority, we will have to fight in a smarter way and...
...tion of politics and memory that drives their creation) are actively redefining identity and political expression in communities of all sizes. According to Hite, the essential purpose of a memorial is to provide an open, safe space in which communities can endeavor to sort out the complex, conflictive, and often-contradictory process of grief and memory. Memorials, if they effectively move observers toward contemplation, can be both cathartic and...
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