Just how glamorous was "spam in a can"?

"The idea was to prove at every foot of the way up . . . that you were one of the elected and anointed ones who had the right stuff and could move higher and higher and even -- ultimately, God willing, one day -- that you might be able to join that special few at the very top, that elite who had the capacity to bring tears to men’s eyes, the very Brotherhood of the Right Stuff itself," wrote Tom Wolf in his 1979 classic -- called by People Magazine "an exhilarating flight into fear, love, beauty and fiery death" -- The Right Stuff. Above, Dennis Quaid as cutie-pie flyboy Gordon Cooper in the 1983 movie. (American Photo Library)

"Is there no dignity left for that archetypal American figure, the astronaut," asks Ann Althouse, echoing the MSMs take on the tragic fallen angel whose wearing of diapers during her cross-country mission of madness was music to the ears of Jay Leno's and David Letterman's comedy writers. Ann writes:

Now, they [NASA] are reduced to whimpering to the media: "we call them urine collection devices."

Actually, they ARE urine collection devices:

Male astronauts have the option of wearing a device that resembles a condom with a bladder attached, but some opt for the diaper because they do not trust the catheter to stay attached. NASA has been less successful finding a technology that can serve the needs of women, who accept the diaper as one of the tribulations of their work.

We can send a man to the moon, but so far, nothing beats dydies for answering nature's call under those bulky space suits. Ann quotes the NYTs history-and-literature-challenged commentary:

Today’s astronauts find themselves in a world much less glamorous than the original crews. While the Mercury Seven raced Corvettes, today’s family-oriented fliers are likelier to tool around in minivans. They spend much more time in suburbia than in orbit, and there are no more ticker-tape parades for the returning heroes.

'Guess the NYT reporter didn't catch the poignant story behind the headlines of The Right Stuff. As we noted in Ann's comments:

How quickly they forget . . . Just how glamorous was "spam in a can," as the boys in Tom Wolfe's TRS called themselves? Like other dream factories, the Space Program was never what it seemed.

Tonight, of course, it's all Anna Nicole all the time. Thank God for the internet. It's looking like we may be starting to surge forward in Iraq even as the media, willfully hiding its head in the sand, obsesses on gold-digging druggies who've bitten the dust.

Comments

[goomp]

MSM a disgrace to the Nation for which our flag stands.

[hnav]

i agree with GOOMP...

in a war against radical fascist monsters, the MSM has decided a Republican is really the enemy.

and instead of just using the truth to undermine, has decided to fabricate, slander, etc.

unfortunately for NASA, they lost my admiration long ago, especially with unlawfully trying to help Kerry's campaign, which unwittingly produced the famed bunnysuit photos.

it seems a vast number of our institutions have been overrun by 'democrat partisans', including the MSM, instead of open minded professionals.

a sincere shame.

[Tara]

Driving home in the car this afternoon , I hear the news on the radio reporting Zsa Zsa Gabor's 9th husband, Prince Somebody , claiming he and Anna Nicole Smith had been having a 10 year on / off affair and he too could be the father of the baby she gave birth to last year.

I laughed out loud.

This is news ?

Pathetic.