Short Takes – 7-11-23

McCarthy seeks to ward off GOP uproar on spending stopgap. TheHill.com article. Pull quote: “Conservatives are not yet saying they’ll flatly oppose a short-term funding patch, known as a continuing resolution (CR), as they push to secure sharp spending cuts in next year’s appropriations bills. But such an extension, by keeping spending at current levels, would defy the hard-liners’ demands for aggressive deficit reduction in fiscal 2024.”

Congress Dives Back Into Fights on Spending Cuts, Military as Deadline Draws Near. WSJ.com article. Pull quote: “Sarah Binder, a political scientist at George Washington University, said that provision likely means lawmakers will be able to postpone a major fight on government spending until the winter. They could even push past the Jan. 1 deadline, since the automatic cuts don’t take effect until April, she said.”

As many as six lunar landers could launch in the next six months. ArsTechnica.com article. Pull quote: “Finally, there has been some interest from private companies in the commercial development of the lunar surface, both to exploit resources there but also for other purposes. This has stimulated investment in private companies to provide transportation to the lunar surface, including ispace, Astrobotic, Intuitive Machines, and Firefly.”

NASA decides not to launch two already-built asteroid probes. ArsTechnica.com article. Pull quote: “Janus was designed to fly to two binary asteroids—consisting of two bodies near one another—that orbit the Sun closer to Earth than the metallic asteroid Psyche. While the Psyche mission can still reach its asteroid destination and accomplish its science mission with a launch this year, the asteroids targeted by Janus will have changed positions in the Solar System by too much since last year. They are no longer accessible to the two Janus spacecraft without flying too far from the Sun for their solar arrays to generate sufficient power.” For want of a ride the mission was lost…

Trump Lawyers Seek Indefinite Postponement of Documents Trial. NYTimes.com article. Some interesting issues for a friendly judge to decide. Pull quote: “There could be complications of a sort never before presented to a court if Mr. Trump is a candidate in the last legs of a presidential campaign and a federal criminal defendant on trial at the same time. If the trial is pushed back until after the election and Mr. Trump wins, he could try to pardon himself after taking office or have his attorney general dismiss the matter entirely.”