Light power on the power, easy power from the time. Light power for the perfumes of your body, so you might. Light power for the perfumes of your body, so you might. Light power for the perfumes of your body, so you might. Light power for the perfumes of your body, so you might. But we're going to continue where we left off last night, and we're going to add a little atmosphere to it to bring back the feeling of those times. And some of you will remember. Some of you will not. But you should enjoy what you're going to hear. I got a fax today I want to read to you. Actually, it's not a fax. It's email. Well, for those of you who don't know what email is, it's electronic mail that comes to me through my computer from all over the world. And it says, excuse me, it's starting already. It says, great show last night, Bill. I'm ordering the book today. Please reserve me a copy. I've wanted to tell this story for the past 15 years. I was a human factors engineer at Grumman Aerospace Corporation, which, as you know, built the lunar module. I was assigned at one point to creating a videotape that would help employees and NASA understand procedures in the cold flow facility at Bethpage, Long Island, which was the test facility for all helium cryogenic systems, liquid helium, et cetera. After a month of fumbling around, it became apparent to me that no one knew what was going on except for isolated ritualistic procedures that didn't seem to tie together. I was shattered and confused. During the Apollo 11 touchdown, I remember standing in plant five in Bethpage, where the three Apollo astronauts died, with the entire staff of lunar module engineers watching the NASA feed. Or was it from dreamland? When the lunar module landed, we turned to each other mystified, shook our heads, and said, I don't believe it. How did they do that? To this day, I don't believe anyone has ever landed on the moon. The laser reflector mirrors could easily have been positioned onto the surface by remote control from the command module with small rockets. Curious, too, how astronaut radio transmissions still use narrow bandwidth, single sideband instead of hi-fi FM, and low-resolution TV images instead of high-quality video. Easier to mask imperfections? Feel free to quote me on this if you find it interesting. And I did. One, two, three o'clock, four o'clock, rock. Five, six, seven o'clock, eight o'clock, rock. Nine, ten, eleven o'clock, twelve o'clock, rock. We're gonna rock. Around ten o'clock tonight. When you're back, I start. Point behind me. I'm going to go. When the stars start, we'll be right. Around ten o'clock tonight. Four o'clock, rock, rock. Two o'clock, eight o'clock. We're gonna rock. We're gonna rock. Around the clock tonight. When the stars start, we'll be right. And the stars start, we'll be right. Around ten o'clock, rock. Around ten o'clock, rock. We're gonna rock. Rock, rock. Just a rock, baby. We're gonna rock. On a rock. Oh, I'm gonna rock. And I'm gonna rock. When President Eisenhower, ladies and gentlemen, a Republican born and bred, left office, he uncharacteristically tried to warn us about the military-industrial complex, but we paid no attention. He gave a speech in which he said, quote, In the councils of government, we must warn against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. He should also have warned us that the military-industrial complex had control of the central intelligence agency which President Harry Truman created after World War II to stave off the fatal hug of the Russian bear. Had Truman been a closer reader of bureaucratic history, he would have known that intelligence organizations have a way of inevitably expanding themselves into covert actions. Then, by infiltration and blackmail, they become a forceful shadow over the very government that gave them life. Witness, ladies and gentlemen, the recent revelations concerning the transvestitism of the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover. Remember, and bear in mind, that all of those allegations come from people you wouldn't trust no matter what they told you. But still, they put enough doubt in the minds of the public that it could have been true. Shadow governments become more totalitarian year by year. Ike might have also warned us about this, and the fact that they're sometimes handmaidens, the academic, legal, and medical professions, are also complexes that bolster and protect these entities. The story of that period and the political ramifications from our expanding Cold War with the Russians is best summed up by the authors of an excellent and contemporary book on NASA, printed in 1969, shortly after the Apollo 11 flight. And it says, The concepts of politics and war may seem to defile the beautiful picture of brilliant thinkers acting out private dreams. But it is these that gave the journey to tranquility a troubled, uncertain, and sometimes sordid passage. Some politicians built careers on it, others lined their pockets from it, while corporations survived on the strength of it as tiny groups of men decided where its billions of dollars would be distributed. The builders of Apollo were not technicians at work in a laboratory insulated from the world. They were soldiers in an age when technology has become warfare by other means. No subject. As I brought on, I wonder. Oh, what went wrong with our love? Although our Wakans felt bad. And then I saw all my life and gone, but they could have done together. While I was young I'm walking in the rain To the water and I feel free To keep everybody Young, Silcock, and Dunn wrote these words, ladies and gentlemen. Long before the satellite got off the ground, it became the object of political and military wrangles of the most virulent kind. When it finally reached its destination, it was no longer a triumph of science. It had been transformed from a box of technical tricks into the obsessive tool of Cold War politicians. There could have been no after-beginning to the real history of America's great space adventure. Immediately after Sputnik, we were playing a losing game. We could orbit a tiny, tinned toy, and they would answer with a big, heavy, mean machine. They had Cummins diesels, and we had Volkswagens. Our Mercury program popped Alan Shepard up in ballistic flight for all of 15 minutes. We hailed this, even though we could not achieve a true orbit. Their cosmonauts were breathing air at normal atmospheric pressure, 14.7 pounds per square inch. But ours were forced to use 100% oxygen at 5 pounds per square inch. Senpai stated, A shell strong enough to hold normal pressure in space was much heavier than our then rockets could even lift. The hysteria caused by Sputnik destroyed the logical development course we should have followed in attempting to reach the moon. In his book, called Angle of Attack, Mike Gray writes how we should have flown. He says, The X-15 to the edge of space, then build an X-16 that would fly into orbit, then an X-17, a space shuttle, that would carry cargo, use the shuttle to build an orbiting space station, and then, say about 1985, depart from there on an expedition to the moon. In due time, our second astronaut, Virgil Grissom, spent 16 minutes in ballistic flight. But two weeks after that, the Russians upped the ante by putting a cosmonaut in orbit for over 25 hours. Six months later, John Glenn finally boosted into orbit. Fame and politics by staying up for almost five hours. Five hours, not even the United States Senate. Three months after that, Scott Carpenter duplicated almost to the minute. Glenn's ride. Two months later, on August the 11th and August 12th, 1962, the Russians really played hardball by sending up two cosmonauts and two separate birds. They also had the nerve to add a lot of insult to our entry by staying up for 94 hours and 71 hours respectively. Plus another first. They made a rendezvous with each other. At the mountain, the mountain, the mountain, the mountain. Ooh, wah, ooh, wah, ooh, wah, ooh, wah, ooh, wah, wah, why do the poor, for your love? Why do good things, oh, say, love is the way to play, to play, why do they fall in love, love? Why do the poor, the rain, fall for the world? Why do the poor, fall in love, why do they fall in love, love? Love is a losing game, and love can be good, and I know how cool you'll be, oh, say, good is the love in love, why do they fall in love, why do they fall in love, tell me why, why do they fall in love, why do they fall in love, things were quiet for a while, and then on May 15th, 1963, we orbited for over 34 hours. A month later, the Russians played one upmanship again, and then within two days, sent up another two birds. The first one stayed up 119 hours, and the second carried the first woman into space. Valentina V. Tereshkova, who orbited for 17 hours. Excuse me, make that 71 hours. Then, rub-a-dub-dub-dub, the Soviets sent up three men in a big, big tub. Six months later, we got two men up in our own washtub with the first shot of the Gemini program, but we finally had the bit in our teeth. We were going to win that space race, no matter who it killed, or how much the cost. The decision, ladies and gentlemen, to go to the moon was not made by President Kennedy, but by NASA itself. A man named George M. Lowe pressured an internal NASA committee into accepting that goal. You see, it was the tail wagging the dog that day when NASA set its own agenda to start the Apollo program. And nothing, and I mean nothing, ladies and gentlemen, has changed since. Had rocket expert Werner von Braun, ex-German Retread, been allowed to fire off his rocket in the fall of 1956, we would have orbited the first satellite. However, you see, it was politically incorrect to use former Nazi expertise. Politically, our great leaders desperately wanted the Navy to be first with an all-American made Vanguard rocket. In the early 60s, the only technicians who actually knew how to build rockets were those harvested up by the Army from the German B-2 program through Project Paperclip. They were all working in Huntsville, Alabama on our missile program and miraculously, the military an organization rarely known to give up the spoils of war, released them to NASA. I maintain that just as its predecessor, the Nazi V-2 missile project in Norway, had been taken over by the Nazi SS, ours was also held in thrall by the Central Intelligence Agency. How this machination was accomplished and maintained is not known, but as the Tiger is known by its stripes. You can bet that whenever big bucks are involved, the Central Intelligence Agency is going to be there and the NASA bucks, ladies and gentlemen, are still big. The estimate given to Kennedy to put a man on the moon was less than $20 billion. The final cost, if tallied by the total expenditures of NASA from 1962 to 1973 was over $39 billion. And if you think I've been joking you about the constant deflation, or I should say inflation, the constant inflation of your dollar and its decreased buying power, that $39 billion that NASA spent from 1962 to 1973 is about $200 billion five years ago in 1990. Norman Mailer said of the Apollo project that he couldn't decide whether it was, and I quote, the noblest expression of the 20th century or the quintessential statement of our fundamental insanity. End quote. some extemporary I'm on the verge of going to bed. Ladies and gentlemen, my throat is not working properly, and I don't think my head is reading properly either. I'm coming down with something. So, every once in a while I'm going to have to go back and read something over again because I'm just not seeing it right. Couple that with a failing vision in my right eye and you can get some kind of feeling for what I'm going through in this studio in the dim light. Some contemporary critics called NASA's moon project a Roman circus. And you heard me call it that on many occasions on this broadcast. However, Renee feels that term is a little too strong. I don't know why. Because his old boat proves it right. Space opera, he says, has a better ring to it. First, there was the terrifying quasi-cremation of three astronauts on pad 34. Then, in each of the manned missions that followed, serious problems developed, but each time, in the nick of time, American astronauts and our unsung NASA geniuses saved the day. who's this underwolf man that'll fall? This is going Little Rock, way down in the valley. You come from Little Rock, California? Yeah, long distance. Nah, nah, nah. Listen, man, what kind of entertainment you got in that town? All he's got is you. That'll be the name, the late, great, funny, holly, underwolf man jack show. I don't know how many of you have started to make the connections because I've given you plenty of hints. I've given you so many hints that it's just absolutely incredible that some of you are yelling and screaming and jumping up and down with your own discoveries about these things. The original number of astronauts was seven. The first manned Apollo mission was what? Apollo seven. But they skipped some numbers to make it Apollo seven, didn't they? And which one? Which of the moon? Apollo 11. How many of you have been with me when we've studied the mysteries and the symbology? When you going to wake up, folks? You know what? You're dozing with your nose in your coffee. I bet it burns. What do you think? After the Apollo 11 landing, the American public began to ignore the subsequent landings. Congress was getting a little shaky because of the Central Intelligence Agency's secret Laos War and the Vietnam police action, racial rioting, hippie rebellions, and student demonstrations. Our leaders were working overtime trying to throw a great war in Vietnam, but many of the kids from farm and slum, the backbone of all our previous armies, just didn't want to go to the party. Tens of thousands of draft dodgers were leaving the United States for Canada and other parts unknown. The legacy of Vietnam, ladies and gentlemen, still troubles this country. Potential draftees seemed to know instinctively it took me another 20 years to find out that basically Vietnam was a central intelligence agency war over who would control the worldwide distribution of heroin from the Golden Triangle and the oil in the Gulf of Tonkin in the South China Sea. NASA had planned the first manned landing for some time in October 1967. There were three very political reasons for this schedule. The first was that the Russians were expected to execute a moon landing to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution. The next because 1968 represented the beginning of a period of intense solar flare activity. And the last was because it could affect the coming presidential elections. The American public never quite caught space fever. Yes, they cheered on the launchings, but by Apollo 12, the second landing, even America's patriotic silent majority began to question the necessity of more moonshots. But since it is an old Washington joke that the letters NASA N-A-S-A stand for quote, never a straight answer end quote, nothing much came of it. All right, baby, here we go with another call out of the stations. Can you leave it? Answer the phone, dummy. Thank you, pizza. Are you listening to you anymore those secret agent space scopes? It's right on the sethoscope. No, no, secret agent space scope, man, that pulls in the moon, the stars, the planets, and satellites, and a spaceman. You must have the wrong number, Parker. If you want to do the job, Buster Brown, Matty May. Spidey. Tell me what the world made you need. I won't tell anybody to tell me what the world made you need. I ain't gonna take the bunch of military easy. I tell you, baby, tell me what the world made you come home. money baby. Don't know what the world had been wanted Oh, baby. Oh, baby. Oh, I ain't got enough. Oh, I know what you do. Oh, baby. Baby. I can take you away. Oh, now, now, I am. Baby. Baby. I can take you back on me. Oh, now, now, now. Baby. Baby. Baby. I'm on a roll down. I'm on a roll down. Baby. Baby. Ah, despite it all, NASA's Public Relations Department was equal to the task. They kept grinding out action scripts right on schedule, and if I had known about the mysteries back then, I would have known that if anything was going to happen, it would have happened on Apollo 13. The number of death and resurrection, and that's exactly what happened. The liquid oxygen storage containers on Apollo 13 exploded between here and the moon. And the nation waited breathlessly glued to their television sets to watch the astronauts die, hoping, of course, that they wouldn't. And, magically, a death mission, just exactly as the number predicts, was resurrected. And it was reborn and brought back to the earth. Apollo 14 had trouble with the limb while landing on the moon. On Apollo 15, they were drowning in the capsule. Apollo 16 suffered strange vibrations. Apollo 17 saw the end of the space opera, despite NASA's previous plans for many more landings. In the meantime, we were being devastated by racial rebellions. Apollo 17, that's right. You remember those? Shortly after leaving the Air Force, I remember going to Los Angeles to Englewood, which wasn't then as it is now. And I stayed in an apartment with a friend of mine and his family, his mother and father, who had just got out of the Air Force a short time before I left. And one night, we looked out the window down below and saw a gasoline truck pulled into the driveway. And members of the black community were filling cans with gasoline, which they were passing down the driveway to people who were filling bottles with this gasoline and sticking rags in the mouths of the bottles. And we called the police immediately and disappeared for several days. That was a time of riots and flames and death in the streets. Campus riots and a simmering anger as the poor began to realize that they paid most of the freight for all those grandiose adventures. At least that's what they tell us. I've never been able to figure out how the poor paid for anything. In fact, it's a myth, ladies and gentlemen. The middle class is what really pays for everything. And when the middle class goes, there won't be anybody to pay for anything. There was a slight surge of interest when the lunar rovers were introduced. They, too, soon grew boring despite the fact they were now broadcasting live color television. Had we known at the time that each throwaway rover cost over $12 million, we probably would have had more riots. And I've never been able to figure out, ladies and gentlemen, how they ever got $12 million into that little gold cart. And that's all it was. Very sophisticated go-kart. Run on batteries. Also, the end of the Apollo program saw a shift in direction from the professed scientific toward military and commercial ventures. Mr. Hurt said it succinctly. Henceforth, the space agency paid only lip service to the noble theme etched on the plaque of Apollo 11 that the astronauts left on the moon. We came in peace for all mankind. The first series of shuttle flights pioneered the commercialization and militarization of space, forsaking manned exploration of the solar system to concentrate on the pursuit of profits and the development of a strategic defense initiative, SDI, also known as Star Wars. Perhaps, Mr. Hurt's position is closer to reality than we believed, and his conclusion may change, of course, after he reads this book. 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4. O'er the The hour of the time, ladies and gentlemen, is brought to you by Swiss America Trading. It's the only place that I can, with a clear conscience, recommend you to for real money. Precious metals in their various forms. I got a letter the other day from a guy, I don't know if I told you about it, said that he didn't care. He was going to go to the cheapest place, even if they bought it from our enemies, he didn't care. In fact, he put it in stronger language than that. I've got to caution you against doing things like that, ladies and gentlemen. 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And coins have been known to appreciate quite a bit, literally overnight. They've also been known to depreciate quite a bit, literally overnight. So you have to know what you're doing. You have to be very careful if you're doing any kind of commodity investing. I don't care what it is, wheat, gold, silver, moon dust, you name it. I don't care. Because you could lose everything. But if you're going to purchase and take into possession real money, and specifically I'm talking about precious metals in the form of gold coins, whether bullion or numismatic, I don't care. But if you're paying any more than 15% above the value of the metal in the coin, then you're into numismatics. And I don't recommend that unless you're doing it for investment purposes. But that's up to you. You have to make your own decisions about that. 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They care about the message that we deliver. They've been loyal to our cause. And the only way we're going to be winning this battle, ladies and gentlemen, is to be loyal to those who are loyal to us. To support our causes and our people. And if we can't do that, I'm going to tell you right now. If you're like the jerk that took me the letter that said he didn't care, if everybody feels that way, we're going to lose this battle. In fact, the moment that that kind of attitude prevails, you've already lost the battle. I hope you're smart enough to understand that. I know most of the listeners to this broadcast are. So, call Swiss American Trading 1-800-289-2646 or if it's easier for you to remember, 1-800-BUY-COIN. 1-800-BUY-COIN. Ladies and gentlemen, I think that you will be very happy. Very glad that you did. I've been searching for a girl that is not that a police failure When I saw her standing there I had to figure out my goodness failure Cause I knew I had to make her mine She's so she's so kind Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh I'm a little big of a face in the face Scrolling up to her and my pleasure I've tried to get a shot of her For later on the show of fun Cause I knew I had to make her mine She's so cool She's so Oh This music brings back a lot of memories for me. I don't know about you. That one really does. I can remember sitting in the band room at Monroney Junior High School in Midwest City. My class was the first class that attended that school. And I saw this beautiful blonde haired little girl sitting across from me. I played the trumpet and she played the clarinet and I just feeling my oats and you know feeling what little boys feel winked at her. And I almost fell out of my chair when she winked back. From that moment on I carried her books after school and walked her home. some night we're going to have to play some of this old music and just talk about some good things for a change. And that's one of the reasons why the Oklahoma City bombing affected me because I know so many people there whom I went to school with as a boy. My father was stationed at Tinker Air Force Base for a period of time. I'd like to talk about these kinds of happy things all night but got to get back to the topic at hand. Unfortunately on evenings back then ladies and gentlemen and even now where I'm at you see I live at 7500 feet in the White Mountains of Arizona. And I can walk out my door and see stars that most of you will never see in your life where you live. Not because the stars aren't there but because at lower altitudes some of those stars just can't be seen even on the clearest of nights because of the thickness of the atmosphere and the diffraction of light and all kinds of different things. And for many of you who live in cities and densely populated areas there are so many pollutants and waste materials in the air that you're lucky if you can see the brightest stars on any given night. And I have seen times in Southern California when I lived there that you couldn't see anything in the sky for nights upon end even there were no clouds at all. the sky here where I live right outside my door if I just walk outside my door and look up is breathtaking it's overwhelming and on evenings when the sky is clear as the day's light fades from this fluorescent atmosphere of hours some of us look up seeking the first star of the night at such times those of us still young at heart remember the old litany that someone at some time taught us in which we asked the God or gods whatever you believe for one small measly little favor remember starlight star bright first star I see tonight wish I may wish I might have this wish come true tonight we remember squinching up our eyes shut real hard and telepathically broadcasting our wish up into the heavens the ancient magical chant I don't know how old it is but I think every child that's probably ever lived in this country has said it at one time or another most of us quit the practice as we get older we quit because we noticed that very few of those wishes ever came true and like I have become jaded with the vast herds of sheeple out there we become jaded about the innocent things of childhood and for the few wishes that did come true we usually soon came to regret making that particular wish in the first place especially when it involved sex jobs or money all the really neat things in life indeed sometimes a granted wish is so hard to get rid of that we desperately attempt to make it go away by again eliciting the same God or gods or spirit or star or whatever who granted it to do this you have to try again and again and again and again right y'all remember that and for all you fanatics out there I'm not practicing blasphemy here I don't believe there's anybody who did not wish upon a star when they were a child it has nothing to do with the mysteries or being unfaithful to God or anything else it has to do with the innocence of childhood and the willingness to believe that anything was possible I had to say that because some nut's going to write me a letter they always did always by human standards the fickle stars have a very distorted sense of humor giving us what we ask for only when it is not what we truly want despite that fact we sometimes have an idea why they do what they do you see they sock it to us because most people wish on a star ladies and gentlemen that isn't even a star at all isn't that incredible the two brightest objects in our sky are the planets Venus and Jupiter most people seeking to make a wish or too anxious you see they usually mistake one or the other of these planets for the first star of the night so their wish doesn't even count and it doesn't come true we just can't figure out why it wasn't a star see you have to wish upon a star I can see some of you out there shaking your heads where is this guy going with this what's this all about we'll be clear in a moment these planets are usually the first visible celestial objects but from the viewpoint of the gods we are ignorant and greedy you see if we're thinking as children if there really were gods up there if the stars could really grant us a wish here they are seeing us not even waiting to wish upon a star they see us as ignorant and greedy because we grabbed this planet ignorant for not knowing the difference and greedy for not waiting a few more moments had we but waited we would have had our pick of the brightest stars the important stars used by navigators you see when I was in the United States Navy ladies and gentlemen I was a navigator my rake was quartermaster now don't get that confused with the army where a quartermaster is what we called in the Navy a storekeeper quartermasters take care of supplies in the army in the Navy the quartermaster is the one that in the old ancient Navy was in charge of the quarter deck the ceremonies the navigational instruments navigating the ship keeping the charts the man who stood at the helm and steered the ship that's what the quartermaster in the Navy does you see another ten minutes in the darkening night provided we weren't legally blind would have allowed us to see at least a hundred stars and if you were at an elevation where I live hundreds of thousands of stars you could spend your lifetime trying to count them it is breathtaking it is as if the sky is a huge lens and everything is magnified I have seen people come up here to visit from the city and I have taken them outside at night and just made one simple request look up into the sky and the look on their face to me is worth a million dollars when they see what they have never seen the incredible beauty of the natural universe and then mere minutes later a thousand would peek through in all their various shades of color and varying degrees of brightness that's just going from the planets about ten minutes later to a hundred stars and then a few moments later a thousand stars and then where I live tens of thousands of stars and then hundreds of thousands of stars from horizon to horizon in a crystal clear atmosphere despite the fact that most of us live at the bottom of the atmosphere what's called the atmospheric well by some which is laden with dust humidity smoke particles and pollen this despite ground light pollution from house and street lights headlights lighted signs and smog which destroy our night vision that's another reason we can see the heavens so well here there are no bright lights anywhere there is no light pollution on top of this mountain where I live professional and amateur astronomers along with a few hundred million other folks all over the world know that the higher the elevation the less the ground lighting the less the moonlight the colder and drier the air the more stars there are that can be seen in fact tens of thousands of stars are visible to the naked eye naked eye and hundreds of thousands particularly at higher elevations on cold dry nights star watchers are entranced people who have been known to drag their kicking and screaming friends out into the dark night just to get them to stare up at the sky I am guilty of that but when one friend came from Maryland she brought her telescope with her and we stayed out half the night looking at the stars through her telescope I am a dragger I've urged many a friend out of warm sleeping bags and camped out on hunting and fishing trips in my younger years I've hauled them from warm cabins and cars on sub-zero nights and even run them out of the warm cabin on my boat when I had my boat 43 foot pacemaker without exception no matter how cold the night was the racist complaints stopped instantly once they looked up at the magnificent heavens that most people do not ever even pay the slightest attention to now the point here folks is that in my entire life I've never met anyone who was star blind in fact I had no idea that the condition even existed everybody I know personally that's hundreds of people with the exception of those who are truly blind can see the stars and I can remember being on the bridge wing of a ship far out at sea at what we call star turn stepping out into the cold with my sextant in my hand and looking up getting my bearings identifying the stars and then taking the evening pics I would go back in and spend an hour at the chart table plotting the results and then I would send a report to the captain I would repeat that in the morning sunlines at noon sunlines at mid-morning and mid-afternoon local apparent noon I should say at noon and on nights when the whole moon would hover at the zenith directly overhead the ship I could go out and shoot moonlines and shoot the stars by moonlight because the moonlight would give me a horizon I really enjoyed doing that everybody I know personally that's hundreds of people with the exception of those who are truly blind can see the stars yet ladies and gentlemen after NASA poured through thousands of service records in 1961 and after multiple screenings and batteries of tests NASA selected seven truly exceptional men for astronauts training eventually one of them Alan Shepard was put in a tin can and blasted into a ballistic arc barely touching what NASA called space close space is a more accurate term a place where many men had already been flying the X-15 and in high altitude balloons and had reported seeing millions of stars brighter and clearer than they had ever been able to see the stars standing at any elevation upon the ground of this earth Alan Shepard went up despite the G's thrust on him from the cannon shell they called a red stone rocket Shepard reported seeing no stars stars that's where I'm going with this ladies and gentlemen every photograph you've ever seen that NASA has ever taken in the space program has never contained even one star if somebody strapped me in a tin can atop a red stone rocket and pulled 4G's acceleration I think I would have seen stars don't you but unbeknownst to us at the time though this was the first recorded case of star blindness in the whole world Alan the poor guy had all the right stuff but Alan ladies and gentlemen was star blind star blind isn't that incredible star blind next NASA spent three and a half months setting up another lightweight tin can this time Virgil Grissom duplicated the ballistic arc for the same 15 minutes or so when he was recovered and questioned believe it or not he hadn't seen any stars either isn't that amazing no stars think about it down here at the bottom of an atmosphere full of dust and clouds and moisture and pollution and all kinds of things we can still see the stars at least the brightest ones unless you live in LA on a smoggy night the higher up in elevation you go the better you can see the stars yet these guys with the right stuff could not see the stars never mind those who had been up there in aircraft could see the stars so what's going on here can you tell me no well ladies and gentlemen if you'll be here tomorrow night I'll tell you and this last one sort of fits the bill it's also Annie's favorite good night folks and god bless each and every single one of you they asked me how I knew my love was blue I'm I'm lost with life something here inside cannot be denied one one day one day said someday you'll find all who love are blind on fire on fire you must be alive smoke gets under iron so I said them can't my day to take a good job love yet today my love has gone away I am without my love without my love no nothing gently right tears I cannot hide I can't find when the love may lie smoke gets in your eyes you you you you you you you you you you