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Former NASA Astronaut Says Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk Are Key to Our Future in Space

January 10, 2018
Staff

WRITER

What’s it like to leave Earth and realize that from now on, your home planet won’t be the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen? Leroy Chiao, former International Space Station commander and NASA astronaut, can tell you exactly what’s that like.

On today’s show, Glenn wondered if Chiao could compare a spacewalk to anything that everyday people could comprehend.

“Even the sixth time, it’s a bit of a surreal experience,” Chiao said of walking out into space.

What’s in store for the future of U.S. space exploration? Chiao detailed some of NASA’s projects but also pointed to the private sector, calling Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos “visionaries” who will propel the next phase of our ventures into space.

“It’s Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, SpaceX and Blue Origin,” Chiao said. “Here are two guys who are visionaries and who are willing to commit their resources, their personal and influential resources, to go ahead and do exploration. That’s never been done before by commercial companies.”

This article provided courtesy of TheBlaze.

GLENN: Leroy Chiao, he's an astronaut with NASA. He was the commander of the international space -- was he the -- Leroy, you're here. I should probably ask you.

LEROY: International Space Station.

GLENN: International Space Station. And aren't you the guy who went -- you have piloted Russian and Chinese, or just Russian vehicles?

LEROY: Oh, no. I'm an American. I was born in the US, and I flew three space shuttle missions before traveling to the international space station as a copilot aboard a Russian space craft and I was the commentary of the station for six and a half months.

STU: So you haven't really accomplished much in your life.

(Laughter.)

GLENN: Leroy, just on a personal aside, what is it like to come back to earth and look up and go, I'm never going back there, and it was the coolest thing ever?

LEROY: Well, you know it's kind of funny. I mean, when I got selected to be an astronaut, I never imagined the day would come when I would decide to leave NASA. But, you know, during my first two weeks at NASA, there was a going away party for one of the senior guys, and I overheard somebody talking to him, and talking to another guy, and how do you know when it's time to leave?

And he said, when it's time, you'll know.

And I remembered that. And 15 years later, sure enough, I was getting are they to go fly to the International Space Station -- or actually I had just gotten back, and the chief asked me if I would stay for another shuttle mission, and I thought about it for about 30 seconds, and I turned him down. And I surprised himself, but I had done everything that I could do and hope for in a flying career, you know. I've flown space shuttle missions, I've done space walks to help build the space station --

GLENN: What is it like --

LEROY: -- and done all that stuff, and it was time to do something else.

GLENN: Is there anything that the average person can compare to walking out into space the first time?

LEROY: No. It's -- it is, you know, even the sixth time, it's a bit of a surreal experience. You're actually in the space suit which you can think of it as a personal space craft. It's got all the life support system and everything. But you're all alone. There's nobody else that can help you except for your partner who's out there with you.

But, you know, it's kind of a weird feeling the very first time, looking back through the shuttle windows and waving to my buddies inside who are about three feet away, but something happened, we were out there alone, and, you know, it was kind of up to us to save ourselves.

But, you know, it's okay. Because we're well trained and everything works well, and, you know, certainly there's risk, but you know what to do.

And, you know, we were able to get our jobs done, but it is kind of a weird thing, you know. [Laughs.]

GLENN: Yeah, I bet it is. I wanted to ask you about the Chinese shot of the -- what is it, the Chang E?

LEROY: Yep.

GLENN: Can you explain, going on the other side of the moon, it'll be the first time really that we can hear deep sky, or -- or radio without all of the static from earth. Right?

LEROY: Well, hmm, not really. Because you still have to relay through that -- that relay satellite. Right? So, you know, you're -- the fact that they're going to the far side of the moon is unique. Nobody has landed a probe over there. Not for any particular reason, except that, you know, you have to have a relay satellite in order to communicate with it. So they've got to first put that relay satellite in that HALO orbit so you can relay messages from the far side of the moon back to the ground stations on the earth. But it's going to be interesting to see if there's any difference between what we found on our scientific probes on the side that we can see versus the far side.

GLENN: Why all of a sudden -- and I think it's a great thing. I'm excited with, you know, with what Elon Musk is doing and everything else. But why all of a sudden do we have this race, it seems, to go up into space again?

LEROY: Well, you know, you're right. The commercial side has been the very exciting wild card. NASA has been going along. We've gone the shuttle program, spatial program and we're plodding along with exploration, although there's been no serious -- or know significant, I should say, or farther advancing political and financial commitment to that. There's been a lot of talk, but -- and we are hopeful of developing the new vehicles, but it's Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, Space X and Blue Origin, and here were two guys who are visionaries and who are willing to commit their resources, their personal and influential resources, to go ahead and do exploration. That's never been done before by commercial companies.

You know, where's the profit in colonizing Mars, as Elon Musk wants to do, or in the case of Jeff Bezos, he wants to build infrastructure in low earth orbit and out into cis-lunar space. So he's kind of going -- sounds like a Field of Dreams thing, build it and they'll come. But it would be difficult to get like a Boeing or a Lockheed. There's no way their shareholders or boards would let them go do these things. But these guys, they're out there and they're serious. They're building rockets, launching rockets, and it's exciting. They're pushing exploration for the first time we've got commercial companies pushing exploration.

GLENN: How realistic -- I've read that helium 3, the moon is rich with helium 3, and if you had a fusion system, that you could -- if you could fill the space shuttle with helium 3 and it would run -- it would be enough power for the United States for a year. Is there any way to transfer this or use this?

LEROY: [Laughs.] Well, helium 3, I mean, helium 3 is present on the moon. But it's in the soil in the parts per billion concentration. So that is, you know, for every gram of helium 3 that you might harvest, it'd be a billion grams of regular, you know, lunar soil that you'd have to go through and find a way to separate this stuff out. So it's theoretically possible. You could even -- theoretically possible to separate the helium 3 and store it and bring it back to earth. But the other part of the problem is we don't have a fusion reactor. We've been 20 years from a fusion reactor since the 1950s. Right? And so -- [Laughs.] -- we need to invent a fusion reactor that is practical and actually works before -- before we talk about bringing helium 3 back from the moon.

But people, you know, have used helium 3 as a justification for going back to the moon. And to me, that's nice, but there are a lot more practical reasons to go. If we're going to go to Mars, the moon is the perfect place to prove your equipment, to train your crews, to get some experience before sending all that stuff to Mars, because the moon is pretty close. It's only three days away. If there's an issue you can get your crew back. Mars on the other hand, closest approach is on the average about six months away.

STU: As we saw with Matt Damon.

GLENN: That guy, man.

STU: He's had a tough time. Many journeys are turned out poorly for Matt Damon

GLENN: Leroy, when you hear the size of the rocket that Elon Musk is building, he says it's going to be 40 stories tall and with fit a 747 inside of the day when you see -- and I know this is Hollywood, but when you see these movies, and we are developing eventually some sort of inner planetary, you know, vehicles, they're enormous. Do we -- do we build those in space on the moon? Or do we launch them?

LEROY: You know, there's different ways to look at this. Elon Musk did announce these huge rockets that he wants to build. And that's to support his vision of colonizing Mars.

So he's envisioning building space craft that can take 100 or more passengers to go, you know, start to colonize mars. There's two schools of thought. Either you launch it all at once and you have to have a huge rocket to do that or you build gas station in, say, low earth orbit or orbit around the moon, and then you launch kind of an empty vehicle out there and then fuel it up to go. Right?

So there are pluses and minuses to each approach, but what Elon is talking about is building a huge rocket, much bigger than the Saturn 5. In the 1950s, 1960s, the United States, it was called the Nova rocket. They had these ideas where they were going to build these similarly huge rockets to do interplanetary explorations.

So there's certainly something to that. There's some history to it. You know, the thing with Elon Musk that I've learned, he may not make the exact date that he projects, but by and large, he's able to get things done. You look at the successes of Space X, with Falcon 9 and with Tesla. It's pretty impressive.

GLENN: So if Elon Musk called you and said, hey, I want you to come and colonize Mars, you could take your family, would you do it?

LEROY: You know what? I would love to go explore Mars, but I have no interest in living there. Life is much better here on the earth. Earth orbit, it's great to go out there and have the adventure, but I'm going to come back here.

GLENN: Leroy, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

LEROY: My pleasure.

GLENN: Leroy Chiao, an astronaut extraordinaire, and something that the early astronauts did not have the opportunity to do, and that's to go back into space over and over and over again.

The Crisis of Meaning: Searching for truth and purpose

Mario Tama / Staff | Getty Images

Anxiety, anger, and chronic dissatisfaction signal a country searching for meaning. Without truth and purpose, politics becomes a dangerous substitute for identity.

We have built a world overflowing with noise, convenience, and endless choice, yet something essential has slipped out of reach. You can sense it in the restless mood of the country, the anxiety among young people who cannot explain why they feel empty, in the angry confusion that dominates our politics.

We have more wealth than any nation in history, but the heart of the culture feels strangely malnourished. Before we can debate debt or elections, we must confront the reality that we created a world of things, but not a world of purpose.

You cannot survive a crisis you refuse to name, and you cannot rebuild a world whose foundations you no longer understand.

What we are living through is not just economic or political dysfunction. It is the vacuum that appears when a civilization mistakes abundance for meaning.

Modern life is stuffed with everything except what the human soul actually needs. We built systems to make life faster, easier, and more efficient — and then wondered why those systems cannot teach our children who they are, why they matter, or what is worth living for.

We tell the next generation to chase success, influence, and wealth, turning childhood into branding. We ask kids what they want to do, not who they want to be. We build a world wired for dopamine rather than dignity, and then we wonder why so many people feel unmoored.

When everything is curated, optimized, and delivered at the push of a button, the question “what is my life for?” gets lost in the static.

The crisis beneath the headlines

It is not just the young who feel this crisis. Every part of our society is straining under the weight of meaninglessness.

Look at the debt cycle — the mathematical fate no civilization has ever escaped once it crosses a threshold that we seem to have already blown by. While ordinary families feel the pressure, our leaders respond with distraction, with denial, or by rewriting the very history that could have warned us.

You cannot survive a crisis you refuse to name, and you cannot rebuild a world whose foundations you no longer understand.

We have entered a cultural moment where the noise is so loud that it drowns out the simplest truths. We are living in a country that no longer knows how to hear itself think.

So people go searching. Some drift toward the false promise of socialism, some toward the empty thrill of rebellion. Some simply check out. When a culture forgets what gives life meaning, it becomes vulnerable to every ideology that offers a quick answer.

The quiet return of meaning

And yet, quietly, something else is happening. Beneath the frustration and cynicism, many Americans are recognizing that meaning does not come from what we own, but from what we honor. It does not rise from success, but from virtue. It does not emerge from noise, but from the small, sacred things that modern life has pushed to the margins — the home, the table, the duty you fulfill, the person you help when no one is watching.

The danger is assuming that this rediscovery happens on its own. It does not.

Reorientation requires intention. It requires rebuilding the habits and virtues that once held us together. It requires telling the truth about our history instead of rewriting it to fit today’s narratives. And it requires acknowledging what has been erased: that meaning is inseparable from God’s presence in a nation’s life.

Harold M. Lambert / Contributor | Getty Images

Where renewal begins

We have built a world without stillness, and then we wondered why no one can hear the questions that matter. Those questions remain, whether we acknowledge them or not. They do not disappear just because we drown them in entertainment or noise. They wait for us, and the longer we ignore them, the more disoriented we become.

Meaning is still available. It is found in rebuilding the smallest, most human spaces — the places that cannot be digitized, globalized, or automated. The home. The family. The community.

These are the daily virtues that do not trend on social media, but that hold a civilization upright. If we want to repair this country, we begin there, exactly where every durable civilization has always begun: one virtue at a time, one tradition at a time, one generation at a time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

A break in trust: A NEW Watergate is brewing in plain sight

Gary Hershorn / Contributor | Getty Images

When institutions betray the public’s trust, the country splits, and the spiral is hard to stop.

Something drastic is happening in American life. Headlines that should leave us stunned barely register anymore. Stories that once would have united the country instead dissolve into silence or shrugs.

It is not apathy exactly. It is something deeper — a growing belief that the people in charge either cannot or will not fix what is broken.

When people feel ignored or betrayed, they will align with anyone who appears willing to fight on their behalf.

I call this response the Bubba effect. It describes what happens when institutions lose so much public trust that “Bubba,” the average American minding his own business, finally throws his hands up and says, “Fine. I will handle it myself.” Not because he wants to, but because the system that was supposed to protect him now feels indifferent, corrupt, or openly hostile.

The Bubba effect is not a political movement. It is a survival instinct.

What triggers the Bubba effect

We are watching the triggers unfold in real time. When members of Congress publicly encourage active duty troops to disregard orders from the commander in chief, that is not a political squabble. When a federal judge quietly rewrites the rules so one branch of government can secretly surveil another, that is not normal. That is how republics fall. Yet these stories glided across the news cycle without urgency, without consequence, without explanation.

When the American people see the leadership class shrug, they conclude — correctly — that no one is steering the ship.

This is how the Bubba effect spreads. It is not just individuals resisting authority. It is sheriffs refusing to enforce new policies, school boards ignoring state mandates, entire communities saying, “We do not believe you anymore.” It becomes institutional, cultural, national.

A country cracking from the inside

This effect can be seen in Dearborn, Michigan. In the rise of fringe voices like Nick Fuentes. In the Epstein scandal, where powerful people could not seem to locate a single accountable adult. These stories are different in content but identical in message: The system protects itself, not you.

When people feel ignored or betrayed, they will align with anyone who appears willing to fight on their behalf. That does not mean they suddenly agree with everything that person says. It means they feel abandoned by the institutions that were supposed to be trustworthy.

The Bubba effect is what fills that vacuum.

The dangers of a faithless system

A republic cannot survive without credibility. Congress cannot oversee intelligence agencies if it refuses to discipline its own members. The military cannot remain apolitical if its chain of command becomes optional. The judiciary cannot defend the Constitution while inventing loopholes that erase the separation of powers.

History shows that once a nation militarizes politics, normalizes constitutional shortcuts, or allows government agencies to operate without scrutiny, it does not return to equilibrium peacefully. Something will give.

The question is what — and when.

The responsibility now belongs to us

In a healthy country, this is where the media steps in. This is where universities, pastors, journalists, and cultural leaders pause the outrage machine and explain what is at stake. But today, too many see themselves not as guardians of the republic, but of ideology. Their first loyalty is to narrative, not truth.

The founders never trusted the press more than the public. They trusted citizens who understood their rights, lived their responsibilities, and demanded accountability. That is the antidote to the Bubba effect — not rage, but citizenship.

How to respond without breaking ourselves

Do not riot. Do not withdraw. Do not cheer on destruction just because you dislike the target. That is how nations lose themselves. Instead, demand transparency. Call your representatives. Insist on consequences. Refuse to normalize constitutional violations simply because “everyone does it.” If you expect nothing, you will get nothing.

Do not hand your voice to the loudest warrior simply because he is swinging a bat at the establishment. You do not beat corruption by joining a different version of it. You beat it by modeling the country you want to preserve: principled, accountable, rooted in truth.

Adam Gray / Stringer | Getty Images

Every republic reaches a moment when historians will later say, “That was the warning.” We are living in ours. But warnings are gifts if they are recognized. Institutions bend. People fail. The Constitution can recover — if enough Americans still know and cherish it.

It does not take a majority. Twenty percent of the country — awake, educated, and courageous — can reset the system. It has happened before. It can happen again.

Wake up. Stand up. Demand integrity — from leaders, from institutions, and from yourself. Because the Bubba effect will not end until Americans reclaim the duty that has always belonged to them: preserving the republic for the next generation.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Grim warning: Bad-faith Israel critics duck REAL questions

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

Bad-faith attacks on Israel and AIPAC warp every debate. Real answers emerge only when people set aside scripts and ask what serves America’s long-term interests.

The search for truth has always required something very much in short supply these days: honesty. Not performative questions, not scripted outrage, not whatever happens to be trending on TikTok, but real curiosity.

Some issues, often focused on foreign aid, AIPAC, or Israel, have become hotbeds of debate and disagreement. Before we jump into those debates, however, we must return to a simpler, more important issue: honest questioning. Without it, nothing in these debates matters.

Ask questions because you want the truth, not because you want a target.

The phrase “just asking questions” has re-entered the zeitgeist, and that’s fine. We should always question power. But too many of those questions feel preloaded with someone else’s answer. If the goal is truth, then the questions should come from a sincere desire to understand, not from a hunt for a villain.

Honest desire for truth is the only foundation that can support a real conversation about these issues.

Truth-seeking is real work

Right now, plenty of people are not seeking the truth at all. They are repeating something they heard from a politician on cable news or from a stranger on TikTok who has never opened a history book. That is not a search for answers. That is simply outsourcing your own thought.

If you want the truth, you need to work for it. You cannot treat the world like a Marvel movie where the good guy appears in a cape and the villain hisses on command. Real life does not give you a neat script with the moral wrapped up in two hours.

But that is how people are approaching politics now. They want the oppressed and the oppressor, the heroic underdog and the cartoon villain. They embrace this fantastical framing because it is easier than wrestling with reality.

This framing took root in the 1960s when the left rebuilt its worldview around colonizers and the colonized. Overnight, Zionism was recast as imperialism. Suddenly, every conflict had to fit the same script. Today’s young activists are just recycling the same narrative with updated graphics. Everything becomes a morality play. No nuance, no context, just the comforting clarity of heroes and villains.

Bad-faith questions

This same mindset is fueling the sudden obsession with Israel, and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in particular. You hear it from members of Congress and activists alike: AIPAC pulls the strings, AIPAC controls the government, AIPAC should register as a foreign agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The questions are dramatic, but are they being asked in good faith?

FARA is clear. The standard is whether an individual or group acts under the direction or control of a foreign government. AIPAC simply does not qualify.

Here is a detail conveniently left out of these arguments: Dozens of domestic organizations — Armenian, Cuban, Irish, Turkish — lobby Congress on behalf of other countries. None of them registers under FARA because — like AIPAC — they are independent, domestic organizations.

If someone has a sincere problem with the structure of foreign lobbying, fair enough. Let us have that conversation. But singling out AIPAC alone is not a search for truth. It is bias dressed up as bravery.

Anadolu / Contributor | Getty Images

If someone wants to question foreign aid to Israel, fine. Let’s have that debate. But let’s ask the right questions. The issue is not the size of the package but whether the aid advances our interests. What does the United States gain? Does the investment strengthen our position in the region? How does it compare to what we give other nations? And do we examine those countries with the same intensity?

The real target

These questions reflect good-faith scrutiny. But narrowing the entire argument to one country or one dollar amount misses the larger problem. If someone objects to the way America handles foreign aid, the target is not Israel. The target is the system itself — an entrenched bureaucracy, poor transparency, and decades-old commitments that have never been re-examined. Those problems run through programs around the world.

If you want answers, you need to broaden the lens. You have to be willing to put aside the movie script and confront reality. You have to hold yourself to a simple rule: Ask questions because you want the truth, not because you want a target.

That is the only way this country ever gets clarity on foreign aid, influence, alliances, and our place in the world. Questioning is not just allowed. It is essential. But only if it is honest.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

The melting pot fails when we stop agreeing to melt

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

Texas now hosts Quran-first academies, Sharia-compliant housing schemes, and rapidly multiplying mosques — all part of a movement building a self-contained society apart from the country around it.

It is time to talk honestly about what is happening inside America’s rapidly growing Muslim communities. In city after city, large pockets of newcomers are choosing to build insulated enclaves rather than enter the broader American culture.

That trend is accelerating, and the longer we ignore it, the harder it becomes to address.

As Texas goes, so goes America. And as America goes, so goes the free world.

America has always welcomed people of every faith and people from every corner of the world, but the deal has never changed: You come here and you join the American family. You are free to honor your traditions, keep your faith, but you must embrace the Constitution as the supreme law of the land. You melt into the shared culture that allows all of us to live side by side.

Across the country, this bargain is being rejected by Islamist communities that insist on building a parallel society with its own rules, its own boundaries, and its own vision for how life should be lived.

Texas illustrates the trend. The state now has roughly 330 mosques. At least 48 of them were built in just the last 24 months. The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex alone has around 200 Islamic centers. Houston has another hundred or so. Many of these communities have no interest in blending into American life.

This is not the same as past waves of immigration. Irish, Italian, Korean, Mexican, and every other group arrived with pride in their heritage. Still, they also raised American flags and wanted their children to be part of the country’s future. They became doctors, small-business owners, teachers, and soldiers. They wanted to be Americans.

What we are watching now is not the melting pot. It is isolation by design.

Parallel societies do not end well

More than 300 fundamentalist Islamic schools now operate full-time across the country. Many use Quran-first curricula that require students to spend hours memorizing religious texts before they ever reach math or science. In Dallas, Brighter Horizons Academy enrolls more than 1,700 students and draws federal support while operating on a social model that keeps children culturally isolated.

Then there is the Epic City project in Collin and Hunt counties — 402 acres originally designated only for Muslim buyers, with Sharia-compliant financing and a mega-mosque at the center. After public outcry and state investigations, the developers renamed it “The Meadows,” but a new sign does not erase the original intent. It is not a neighborhood. It is a parallel society.

Americans should not hesitate to say that parallel societies are dangerous. Europe tried this experiment, and the results could not be clearer. In Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, entire neighborhoods now operate under their own cultural rules, some openly hostile to Western norms. When citizens speak up, they are branded bigots for asserting a basic right: the ability to live safely in their own communities.

A crisis of confidence

While this separation widens, another crisis is unfolding at home. A recent Gallup survey shows that about 40% of American women ages 18 to 39 would leave the country permanently if given the chance. Nearly half of a rising generation — daughters, sisters, soon-to-be mothers — no longer believe this nation is worth building a future in.

And who shapes the worldview of young boys? Their mothers. If a mother no longer believes America is home, why would her child grow up ready to defend it?

As Texas goes, so goes America. And as America goes, so goes the free world. If we lose confidence in our own national identity at the same time that we allow separatist enclaves to spread unchecked, the outcome is predictable. Europe is already showing us what comes next: cultural fracture, political radicalization, and the slow death of national unity.

Brandon Bell / Staff | Getty Images

Stand up and tell the truth

America welcomes Muslims. America defends their right to worship freely. A Muslim who loves the Constitution, respects the rule of law, and wants to raise a family in peace is more than welcome in America.

But an Islamist movement that rejects assimilation, builds enclaves governed by its own religious framework, and treats American law as optional is not simply another participant in our melting pot. It is a direct challenge to it. If we refuse to call this problem out out of fear of being called names, we will bear the consequences.

Europe is already feeling those consequences — rising conflict and a political class too paralyzed to admit the obvious. When people feel their culture, safety, and freedoms slipping away, they will follow anyone who promises to defend them. History has shown that over and over again.

Stand up. Speak plainly. Be unafraid. You can practice any faith in this country, but the supremacy of the Constitution and the Judeo-Christian moral framework that shaped it is non-negotiable. It is what guarantees your freedom in the first place.

If you come here and honor that foundation, welcome. If you come here to undermine it, you do not belong here.

Wake up to what is unfolding before the consequences arrive. Because when a nation refuses to say what is true, the truth eventually forces its way in — and by then, it is always too late.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.