Latest / The Bill Handel Show / Cost of the American Dream | SPACE NEWS w/ Rod Pyle

Transcript

Cost of the American Dream | SPACE NEWS w/ Rod Pyle · The Bill Handel Show

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: You're listening to Bill Handle on demand from KFI AM
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: six forty.
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: Am six forty live everywhere on the IHEARTRADIOPP.
• 0:13
  Speaker 3: Hey everybody, good morning to you. Happy New Year's Eve.
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: Neil Savader in the Morning crew here with you. Handle
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: is off this week. I'm gonna be off next week.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: So we're kind of two romantic ships passing in the night,
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: except its morning and we're not ships and we're not romantic.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: Other than that, my analogy stands, thank you very much.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: But head a brooker in for Amy King. People freak
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  Speaker 2: the hell out what I call her by her full name?
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: What is wrong with people? Her actual social media is
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  Speaker 2: Amy K King, not just the initial her middle name Kay,
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  Speaker 2: which happens to be my mom's name. But I call
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  Speaker 2: her by her actual social media Amy K King, and
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  Speaker 2: people freak the f out like they can't handle what
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  Speaker 2: are you doing? No one says, why are you calling
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: me a kono? He doesn't have a first name, or
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: his first name is kono?
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  Speaker 3: I don't know. It's the weirdest it is.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Don't bring marshmallows to the parade, Root It is just
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  Speaker 2: I'm there's too many. I don't I can't handle what
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  Speaker 2: people can't handle. I'm done. That's what it comes down to.
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  Speaker 3: Well, you call her Amy K King. That's her name.
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  Speaker 4: Don't wear it out.
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Petunia, that's your name. Now what's your middle name?
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  Speaker 2: Neil Savedra I was named after two astronauts that stepped
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  Speaker 2: foot on the moon, and that is Neil Armstrong and
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: buzz Edwin aldren.
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  Speaker 5: So.
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  Speaker 3: I am Neil Edwin Savedra, born in nineteen sixty nine,
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  Speaker 3: days after they landed on the moon.
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  Speaker 4: I love that. I love a good moon.
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  Speaker 3: Backstory, I love a good moon in the back.
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  Speaker 4: You know what I'm saying that direction?
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  Speaker 3: Well, no, I never but I got kicked out, don't
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  Speaker 3: you know? All Right? The American Dream Heather Brookers with us.
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  Speaker 2: Heather, what what comes to your mind when I say
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  Speaker 2: the American Dream?
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  Speaker 4: Well, I'm an older I'm an old So for me,
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  Speaker 4: when I think of American dream, I think of financial
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  Speaker 4: security and owning a home.
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  Speaker 6: Yeah, I don't know, what's same, same, it's close. I'm
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  Speaker 6: more I guess old minded, school minded. Okay, just having
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  Speaker 6: an opportunity to do something that you want to do. Yeah,
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  Speaker 6: like the opportunity to you know, yeah, do something. Yeah,
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  Speaker 6: it's about opportunity. Everybody's like, no, they got to hand
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  Speaker 6: out everything. No, it's about it's about having cleared the
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  Speaker 6: pathway for me to do everything I can on my own. Yeah,
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  Speaker 6: Like I don't have to wake up and go to
• 3:03
  Speaker 6: like a coal mine and then have to do that.
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  Speaker 6: I can wake up and be like, what do I
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  Speaker 6: really want to do today?
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  Speaker 5: Type of thing.
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  Speaker 3: Then he ends of the day and goes, you know,
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: maybe coal mine's not that bad. Black lawn.
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  Speaker 2: Will Coleschreiber you nearby? Are you in the can? I'm here, Okay.
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  Speaker 2: I just kept asking, Yeah, I'm American, about the American dream?
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  Speaker 2: What's the American American dream?
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  Speaker 7: You know that I always think back to that fifties
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  Speaker 7: post war thing where you own your own house with
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  Speaker 7: a little green lawn and blah blah blah blah. But
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  Speaker 7: I think I think Kno's right any opportunity, just just
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  Speaker 7: to have that opportunity in freedom.
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  Speaker 2: Well, they're saying that the American dream now costs five
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  Speaker 2: million bucks, Like when you when you see it in
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  Speaker 2: that number, it is alarming. But that's the total lifetime cost, right,
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: Because there are these eat what they refer to as
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: core American dream milestones, and this comes from Investipedia. But
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  Speaker 2: the biggest expense is going to be retirement. And they
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  Speaker 2: say that's why one point six million. That's for twenty
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  Speaker 2: years of living, you know, to cover you to be
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  Speaker 2: to be about where you are in life.
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  Speaker 3: Now I've heard bigger numbers.
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  Speaker 2: My wife and I were just talking about this where
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  Speaker 2: you're looking at three to five million to be able
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  Speaker 2: to you know, and we're nowhere near that, you know,
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  Speaker 2: so I mean we'd have to sell our stuff. We
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  Speaker 2: probably have that in stuff because your house goes up
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  Speaker 2: in value and you know, those types of things, so
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  Speaker 2: you have it somewhere, but you'd have to sell it
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  Speaker 2: all to be able to take care of all. That
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  Speaker 2: biggest expense is that retirement. That's what's gonna that's the big,
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  Speaker 2: big one of having that money for retirement. Home ownership
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  Speaker 2: is nearly one million over a lifetime once mortgage, interest,
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  Speaker 2: HAG and insurance are included, which is ridiculous here in California.
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  Speaker 2: In So cal you know, you can find a fixer
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  Speaker 2: up for one point two you know, depending on where
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  Speaker 2: you want to live. But if you live in further
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  Speaker 2: out areas, you can get beautiful homes for less. I've
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  Speaker 2: never understood that they we have a housing shortage. No,
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  Speaker 2: there's plenty of place you can live, just not right here.
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  Speaker 2: It's like looking at my street and going, we've got
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  Speaker 2: a housing shortage. There's only one house per plot. Well
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: that's no, that's that's how many houses are on the street.
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  Speaker 2: That's not a shortage. You got too many people that
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  Speaker 2: can't afford it here. I can't afford Beverly Hills, so
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  Speaker 2: I don't live there. And if things get more expensive
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  Speaker 2: then I'll move too. I know many people who have
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  Speaker 2: and live great lives. They're like, oh my gosh, once
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  Speaker 2: I got California off my back, you know, living in
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  Speaker 2: North Carolina, and they're like, this is the greatest thing ever.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: So it looks like these things are adding up. Cars
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: rival housing, because buying a new car every ten years
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  Speaker 2: cost nine hundred thousand dollars. Now, I don't buy new cars.
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  Speaker 2: I've had one new car my whole life. And you know,
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  Speaker 2: whereas Heather Brooker, they're like tissue, She's like pulling them
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  Speaker 2: out and she's like.
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  Speaker 3: Oh, it's been three years. What color's in right now?
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  Speaker 4: Ooh, I'm getting a new car.
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  Speaker 3: Cause you I heard you talking about leasing right, Heather.
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: So every what every twenty days?
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  Speaker 4: You're like, yes, every thirty days. I get in your It's.
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  Speaker 2: Like, you literally have what is that Carvana or whatever
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  Speaker 2: with the big the big vending machine off the side
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  Speaker 2: of the five or whatever it is.
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  Speaker 4: Now, I want a purple one?
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  Speaker 2: Can you just you put a coin in and it
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  Speaker 2: drops a new one each day for you.
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  Speaker 4: It's all those kfi big bucks that I make that
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  Speaker 4: allow me this luxurious lifestyle.
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  Speaker 3: But if that's your thing, I respect that.
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  Speaker 2: If you say, hey, you know what, that's the one
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  Speaker 2: thing that brings me great joy is to have a
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  Speaker 2: new you know, yeah, every it's like that.
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  Speaker 3: That's fine to me.
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  Speaker 2: Nothing better than having a car for ten years that
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: I bought three years old.
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  Speaker 4: You just drive it into the ground.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I take care of it the best
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  Speaker 2: way I can. But if it gets over two hundred
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  Speaker 2: thousand miles. And I did that when I drove BMW's,
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: I would buy used And then I got a GMC truck.
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  Speaker 2: I got an accident with one of my sedans and
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: they gave me a truck as a loaner.
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  Speaker 3: I'm like, what am I doing? I'm a truck guy
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  Speaker 3: getting in a Sedan every day. I'm a truck guy.
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  Speaker 4: You do have truck vibes.
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  Speaker 2: But here's the thing. I used to treat my BMW's
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  Speaker 2: like trucks. I'd put boards in the back with the
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: leather seats and there, you know, I'm like, I just
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  Speaker 2: like the ride. They're just beautiful, beautiful vehicles. They ride beautifully.
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  Speaker 2: And then I'm like, well, this has beautiful leather seats,
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  Speaker 2: but it's also got a truck bed, a four wheel drive.
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  Speaker 4: You can help your friends move.
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  Speaker 2: No, they don't. As far as they're concerned. I'm like,
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  Speaker 2: I don't know if it'll fit in my BMW. Yeah,
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  Speaker 2: I tell them that.
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  Speaker 4: I used to drive an F one fifty for.
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  Speaker 3: All those are beautiful too.
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  Speaker 4: I loved it. It was bright red. It was like
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  Speaker 4: a cherry red and I are more like a fire
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  Speaker 4: engine red. And I absolutely loved it. And then and
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  Speaker 4: now I think because of that, I drive SUVs more
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  Speaker 4: and more like SUV's because it's got especially the ones
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  Speaker 4: that have that truck feel to them.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, there's just something great about having, you know, moving
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  Speaker 2: home on all right, Neil Servada in the morning crew.
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  Speaker 2: Here Heather Broker filling in for Amy King. So people
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: don't flip their crap man. They get so weirded out
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: by calling her with their middle name. I call handle
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: I call them handleman because an old lady one time,
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: like back in the nineties, came up to me at
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: a handle event and said, I love him.
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: So I'm probably his biggest fan. He's the greatest Bill Handleman. Handleman.
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  Speaker 2: Handleman is my favorite, and so since then I've called
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: him Handleman. We yell it down the halls a Neil Handleman.
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  Speaker 2: I also call him Willie Wolf. You know, all kinds
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  Speaker 2: of things. Nobody says anything about that. But you call
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  Speaker 2: Amy King amy K King, which is her full name
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  Speaker 2: and her actual social media handle, and people freak out,
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  Speaker 2: like we're trying to be inside. People don't understand that, yes,
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: this is radio, but it is a workplace. Like we
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: have nicknames for each other. We pick on each other,
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  Speaker 2: we joke with each other. It's it's like, you can't
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  Speaker 2: do that. I'm just flabbergasid You've got nothing going on
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  Speaker 2: in life that that bothers you.
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  Speaker 3: Amy K King. Anyway, so Heather Noel Brooke is.
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  Speaker 4: In before they will call in to compliment.
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  Speaker 3: What's that?
• 10:04
  Speaker 4: People will always call in to complain about something before
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  Speaker 4: they'll call in to I.
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  Speaker 3: Have no problem with that.
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  Speaker 2: You know we're not perfect, but make it something more
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  Speaker 2: interesting than Amy k King.
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  Speaker 3: Why does that? Other people?
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  Speaker 4: I don't know.
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  Speaker 2: It's like a like a puzzle. They're trying to figure
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  Speaker 2: out what does that mean? It's you know, Ockham's razor man.
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  Speaker 2: The simplest answer is the answer. It's her middle name.
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  Speaker 2: Uh and Matthew's in for And we're talking about the
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  Speaker 2: American dream. It's gotten very expensive. But I got to
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: tell you there are some things in here that people do,
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: like the big wedding. Did you have a big wedding,
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  Speaker 2: Heather Noel Brooker?
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  Speaker 4: I think so. I mean it depends what you mean
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  Speaker 4: by big. I think it was just like maybe an
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  Speaker 4: average medium size that we had about one hundred and
• 10:48
  Speaker 4: twenty five people.
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  Speaker 3: Oh crap, that sounds like a big wedding. Is that big?
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  Speaker 4: I feel like some people have had like hundreds and
• 10:54
  Speaker 4: I don't. I don't know. Maybe it was around one hundred,
• 10:57
  Speaker 4: but yeah, we was ch is a big wedding to me? Okay,
• 11:00
  Speaker 4: so was that a big church?
• 11:00
  Speaker 7: Yeah?
• 11:01
  Speaker 4: We had a We rented out the Petroleum Club in.
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  Speaker 3: Get into details. Geez did he?
• 11:08
  Speaker 4: And then Beyonce showed up.
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  Speaker 3: Wow the petroleum.
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  Speaker 4: No, I'm old. We got married way before Beyonce was something.
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: Uh.
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  Speaker 5: You know my.
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  Speaker 2: Wife Tracy, she did not want a wedding.
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: She's like, let's just go get to the courthouse. Yeah,
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: go to the car.
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: And we got sad face from her mom and my mom.
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  Speaker 4: Oh yeah.
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  Speaker 2: So it's like, well, okay, So I called the folks
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: the little brown Chapel on Cold Water.
• 11:46
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I know that place.
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: That's where that's where the Reagans got married.
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: Really yeah, and it's also where Brittany lost her her crap.
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: She shaved her head and ran.
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  Speaker 4: In there was hitting the car with the umbrella.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah those days.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: And so we got married there and no no camera, videography,
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: no music, no flowers. Just like you like her, you
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: like him, You're good. And I took everybody out to lunch.
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  Speaker 2: Not even the whole families were there, so.
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  Speaker 4: Just like very small, very intimating if.
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: There were ten people there, I'd be surprised. Wow.
• 12:23
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: And then we all went to and I made little
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: statues of us, so the little guy with a goatea
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: on the cake, and we went to a restaurant right
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: down the street, like the Elks lunch right there, and
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  Speaker 2: everybody got a shirt that said I went to Neil
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: and Tracy's wedding and all I got it was his
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: crummy shirt.
• 12:41
  Speaker 4: Oh there you go. Yeah, party favors or a big deal.
• 12:45
  Speaker 4: You got to give everybody something for coming to your.
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  Speaker 3: Wedding, just a little thank you.
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  Speaker 2: But so those things, you know, those things hit weddings,
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: college vacations. But I think if you keep them, you
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: can go on vacation for inexpensively, don't It doesn't have
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: to be lavish.
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  Speaker 3: As a matter of fact.
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  Speaker 2: Sometimes I think what ends up happening is you go
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  Speaker 2: on these fancy vacations and you're like, oh, this is great,
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: and then you come back to the bills of it or something,
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: and then you're stressed again. So I think, you know,
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: the math not working here is that the fact that
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: this new study from Investopedia that sounds totally.
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: Like it's legit.
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the dream costs five million dollars for the American dream,
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: that's home, that's college, all this stuff. Most people earned
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: about two point eight million in their lifetime there. So
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: this they're saying, who's this built for? But I think,
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: you know, we live in a fourteen hundred square foot house.
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: We don't live in a fancy home. It's in a
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: decent area, but it's nestled between two ghettos. I mean,
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: you know, I see lapd birds in the air every day.
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: Every day, I see them circling. So it's like, it's
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: nothing fancy. We live, you know, below our means, don't.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: You don't pay more than you make, you do things
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: like that. But I feel like we've got the American dream.
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: At the love of my life. I got a beautiful boy.
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: We have a roof over our head. We can eat,
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: we can buy clothing. But you know, and healthcare is crazy.
• 14:30
  Speaker 3: I get all that.
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: Gosh, one hundred and eighty thousand dollars, what they're saying
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: for one trip a year in a lifetime?
• 14:40
  Speaker 4: What for? Oh so if people go on vacation once
• 14:43
  Speaker 4: a year their whole lifetime, they're spending one hundred and
• 14:45
  Speaker 4: eighty thousand dollars.
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what they're saying, like for the lifetime of it,
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: you know, which I don't know what a lifetime is
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: in that case. I mean, because you're not necessarily going
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: out your whole life.
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: I didn't.
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: Max has been to Italy once because we went for
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: Handle's wedding last year.
• 15:05
  Speaker 4: We travel a lot. Travel is something in our family
• 15:08
  Speaker 4: that's really important, and we probably spend more on vacation
• 15:11
  Speaker 4: than we should.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: Well, all that's again about the car. Here's my rule,
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: take it or leave it. Art, education and travel are
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: never a waste of money.
• 15:24
  Speaker 4: Absolutely, I agree with you.
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: They're just those are things that I think are are
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: profound to somebody's life, and I think there's power in
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: those things. And if you can do that and find
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: ways to do that, it doesn't have to be the
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: most expensive art. I mean, seriously, I will tell you
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: the most depressed burglar would be the one that enters
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: our home thinking they're going to bring home something great.
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: It's just not.
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: My wife does not like fancy jewelry at all. She
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: likes costume jewelry. She doesn't want anything expects expensive. She
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: doesn't like flower aren't a big deal to her too,
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: Fancy dinners she doesn't like.
• 16:05
  Speaker 4: I don't spend a lot of clothes like. I'm not
• 16:07
  Speaker 4: a big like obviously.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but you know what, you always I don't thank you.
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: You always well put together. You don't look so I.
• 16:14
  Speaker 4: Don't need to have Gucci and like high end stuff
• 16:17
  Speaker 4: like that. So I would rather spend our money on,
• 16:19
  Speaker 4: like you said, things like experience like travel or art
• 16:23
  Speaker 4: or you know, we take classes like I love getting
• 16:26
  Speaker 4: my daughter dance classes. Yes, I'd rather spend money for
• 16:28
  Speaker 4: stuff like that.
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: You know, there's a sponsor.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: I don't know much about them, but they talk about
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: fencing that I've heard on the air a couple of times,
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: some fencing school or something, and I'm like, that sounds interesting.
• 16:40
  Speaker 3: I wonder if my family would want.
• 16:41
  Speaker 5: To do that.
• 16:41
  Speaker 4: Oh for sure? Is I wonder if it's the one
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: in Burbank.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: Well, they had that weapons place that had fencing and
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: stuff that was on Magnolia or something.
• 16:49
  Speaker 4: Yeah, there's a great fencing and sword fighting place in Burbank.
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: I thought they closed during COVID, but.
• 16:57
  Speaker 4: I might have just like temporarily closed. But I believe
• 16:59
  Speaker 4: they're still around because I looked at I looked at
• 17:01
  Speaker 4: classes there for chan to have something for heard.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I just those are the things that I think
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: money is worth. So maybe recalibrating a little bit or
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: thinking about we're so coast focused the east and west coast.
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: They're expensive there's a bunch of places in America that aren't,
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: and your money it can be stretched. And now with
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: the ability to work from home in many ways, there's
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: may be a way to squeeze that out a little different.
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: Otherwise you just look at the numbers and it looks
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: depressing as hell. I would if I looked at that,
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: I'd say, we're never ever going to get a house.
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: We bought a house at forty. I don't have a
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: college degree. My wife does, she's got multiple. But you know,
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: you can make these things happen if you if you
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: want them. It may not be a castle, but you
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: can get it. A Rod Pyle, Uh what a guy.
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: Veteran space journalists. He's an author, covered NASA planetary science,
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: commercial spaceflight, all these things. We've at him on the
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: program many times before. And as I said earlier, I'm
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: proud to call him friend.
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: How you know him?
• 18:05
  Speaker 5: Brother? I'm good. How are you. It's good to talk
• 18:08
  Speaker 5: to you.
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: Nice to talk to you. It's been it's been a minute.
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: We are long overdue to get together and face to
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: face and say.
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: Howdy, howdy.
• 18:17
  Speaker 5: Yeah, let's do that.
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: I think it's uh, don't sound so damn excited. Yeah,
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: let's sea.
• 18:22
  Speaker 5: I'm pretty easy to please.
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: Let's do it.
• 18:26
  Speaker 5: After all, you're named after astronauts.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah again, your name after an ass Uh, speaking of which,
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: I guess we got to start as we always start.
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: How's your anus?
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: Well, it's got an extra moon, so I guess that
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: feels pretty good.
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: You know, that's like a kidney stone.
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: Going the other way not so good. Hey, let's start
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: with a Maven. Uh, that Mars orbiter? What we lost contact?
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: These are never I know, they have missions, but there
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: are always more than that. There is more that comes
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: with these things and the loss of these things than
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: oftentimes we know here on Earth, those of us that
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: just watch this kind of peripherally. So tell us about
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: that white matters.
• 19:17
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: So Mayven was launched in twenty thirteen, took about seven
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: eight months to get to Mars, and then it goes
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: into orbit. And the whole point of Maven was to
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: look down at the planet and try and figure out
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: what the heck happened to the atmosphere, because we know,
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: way back when billions of years ago, Mars had a large,
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: almost global ocean, and at least on the northern hemisphere.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: It goes fairly deep, so there's a lot of water
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: and a much thicker, warmer atmosphere, we think, and it's gone.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: So Maven's mission was to try and study what that
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: process was, presumably and as it turned out to be
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: mostly erosion from solar wind for the Sun. But you know,
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: it was launched a twenty thirteen on a one year
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: mission and it was still operating up until early December.
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: So this is kind of kind of JPL's jam. You know,
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: at least it has been with all the cuts from NASA.
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: There's a bit of a question mark there. But they
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: build this stuff to last for a year, two years,
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: and then as you've seen the rovers especially, most people
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: notice that fourteen fifteen years in some cases. So Maven
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: went behind Mars that day on December fourth, and when
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: it came out the other side, it wasn't talking to
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: us anymore. And they got a little scrap of data
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: on December sixth that said, hey, I'm spinning out of
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: control here. So the thought is that it impacted something
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: in Martian orbit, or was hit by something that said
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: it has been or as some have suggested, that maybe
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: a death ray came from asteroid three I Atlas and
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: knocked it off trajectory, but most of us don't think
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: that's the case.
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: But it's possible, right, It could be aliens, of course.
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: It's just it's always so fascinating to me that we
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: get more life out of these things when we do,
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: you know, when they go above and beyond. That's why, Yes,
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: this is the one mission or whatever it is, but
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: the hope is that there's more to come. The fact
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: that the last thing it's said is I'm spinning out
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: of control is interesting. Did they ever have any ability
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: to know whether that is some sort of impairment with
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: the you know, metrology on their gauging what's going on,
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: or if it's actually spinning.
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: As far as I have seen, all they can do
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: is evaluate the weak radio signal they got, so they
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: don't have a lot more information. It's also possible propellant
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: line blue and that that set it off access. But
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: you know, the big loss here is that we've had
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: three Mars orbiters for years, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: Mars Odyssey, both launched in the two thousands and May
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: even in twenty thirteen. All three of them have served
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: as relays from their perseverance of Curiosity rovers back to Earth.
• 22:00
  Speaker 5: I'm sure you know.
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: Both those rovers have nuclear power supplies, so they're going
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: to last a very long time. But if you're just
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: transmitting directly from them to Earth, it's a pretty weak signal.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: So it's nice to get more bandwidth from these orbiters.
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: So it's a bit of a loss there. But there's
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: another mission called Escapade that launched a few weeks back,
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: and that's two orbiters.
• 22:21
  Speaker 5: This is another NASA JPL mission.
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: Two orbiters will go into orbit around Mars and continue
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: the work that Mabon was doing. And because there's two
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: of them, they can actually build a three D model
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: of the atmosphere for people to get excited about that
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: kind of thing, to tell us exactly what's going on
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: up there.
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: Let's go to the Moon, shall we. Everyone's talking about
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: the Moon. It's about time we actually go there. Don't
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: you think, well.
• 22:44
  Speaker 5: It's about time we go back.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think easy for some people, not you, because
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: if you're named legacy, but it's easy for some people
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: to forget. You know, the US set cruise there six
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: times to the surface nine times a total back in
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: the sixties early seventies.
• 23:00
  Speaker 5: In the first base age.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: And when you look back at the technology then, which
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: was really just kind of warmed over updated nineteen fifties
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: aerospace technology. The fact that they got out there, I mean,
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: we're talking a computer on that lunar module that would
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: barely be powerful enough to run your oven at this point,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: and landed and did those expeditions for days at a
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: time and came home without losing a single man is
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: pretty jaw dropping. And of course, now that we've decided
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: to go back, we're seeing once again how hard it
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: really is. Because we've been working on this art of
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: his program, depending on how you parse it out, for
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: well over a decade, and it's it's slow, And I
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: got to say, I think at this point there's a
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: good chance China is going to do it before we do.
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: Wow, why is the South Pole the focal point right now?
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: Because years ago an orbitter I think it was the
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: Indian orbiter the South Pole and got a reading of
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: hydrogen down there, saying, h looks like there's water ice
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: down below the soil, and whenever you can find water
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: off earth, that's a good thing. It's very heavy, it's
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: expensive to launch, Like I think at this point it's
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: about six thousand dollars.
• 24:15
  Speaker 5: A gallon to launch water.
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: And from water, if you can find it out there,
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: you can make rocket fuel. You can split it in
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: hydrogen and oxygen, which is a good rocket fuel. You
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: can make breathe able oxygen and of course drinkable water.
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: And so if you have that on the Moon, instead
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: of hauling fuel out of this big gravity well on
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: the Earth, you can go to the Moon set up
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: a refinery, which is what China and the US are
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: both planning to do, and create fuel there to go
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: onto places like Mars and so forth. And it also
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: helps support a lunar base, which both China and Russia
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: and the US and its partners want to build up
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: there as well.
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: So we're looking at ways to harvest water, filter it,
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: utilize it up there in a way that gives us
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: another rock to jump off of to go further.
• 25:05
  Speaker 5: Yeah, exactly. So it's both a good training ground from Mars.
• 25:08
  Speaker 5: There's good science to be done at the Moon.
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: There are arguments for a full market cycle between the
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: Earth and Moon, what they call cys lunar space, where
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: you're actually extracting and making things up there that allow
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: you to make money back on Earth.
• 25:21
  Speaker 5: That's a little thinner.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: But there's a lot of companies working on this. So
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: NASA has this program called CLIPS, which is the Commercial
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: Lunar Payload Services, where they're paying a variety of companies
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: in the US to build landers and go up there
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: and start prospecting for water, ice and so forth. And
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: we had a mission gosh for five years now called Viper,
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: which was a rover that was going to land near
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: the South Pole and do some prospecting, and it was canceled,
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: It was brought back, and it was canceled again.
• 25:49
  Speaker 5: And this is the problem. You know, the US.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: Runs very hot and cold on space efforts and what
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: it wants to do in hell, whereas China just plans
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: ten years out and they just keep stepping through it.
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: So Jared Isaacman, the new administrative NASA, has a big
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: job on.
• 26:05
  Speaker 5: His hands for the next few years.
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: Well, not to mention, you get with each generation, especially
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: with tiktoking, like you get another group of the ignorant
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: that believed we didn't land there the first time, or
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: the Earth is flat. So it's like we keep going
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: forwards while going backwards quickly. This isn't on our list
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: to talk about or anything. But I saw pictures that
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: just came back from Pluto, which has been an interesting
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: mass for those of us that grew up in the
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: seventies and eighties as to what it is and all that.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: But there was pictures about the mountains, it ice mountains
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: or something that are on there, and that just came
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: out recently.
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: Well, I didn't see the new ones, but ever since
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: new horizons flew by in the teens, excuse me, that's
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: been an area of interest because, among other things, they
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: spotted what looks like volcanoes, which are volcanoes that spew
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: out ultra cold crygentic fluids instead of lava, and that
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: would explain a lot about the formation of these distant
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: icy planets and so forth.
• 27:10
  Speaker 5: So that's certainly been an object of interest. And anytime
• 27:13
  Speaker 5: you can compare new images to images taken ten or
• 27:16
  Speaker 5: fifteen years ago, you start seeing these changes and you
• 27:19
  Speaker 5: get very excited because this means it's a living planet,
• 27:22
  Speaker 5: not just a dead rock.
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the comparisons I think have to be amazed. I'm
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: still amazed by the space program. I'm like you, I'm
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: always floored that people, If people aren't why they aren't.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: And I don't think people understand modern times as to
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: what it will mean for the future of life as
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: we know it and information as we learn about planets
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: around us and space materials and things like that. But
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: I'm always fascinating that people go, well, why are we
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: even doing it? Why are we spending so much money
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: to go to these places? And there are purposes right
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: for generations to come about living other places or about resources.
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: Correct, Well, all that is true, and also geopolitically, it's
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: a big deal as far as your status in the
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: world stage. But I think more than anything, it's just
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: historically been this incredible motivator for stam education and the
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: sciences and people doing the smart things that America has
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: been so good at and that other people are starting
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: to get better at than we are. And NASA has
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: always been a prime motivator of that. And you look
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: back at the first base age between sixteen and twenty
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: five dollars came back for every dollar invested, and that's
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: still true.
• 28:38
  Speaker 5: So it's just a good idea.
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah, wow, that is amazing.
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: All right, one dead piece of proof not video that
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: we landed on the moon. For the young people that
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: are on TikTok right now, what's my proof, like a
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: concrete like, can you shine a laser at something up there?
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: And yes, So there's the retroflectors that the POLO program
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: put up, which are these mirror boxes where you can
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: actually bounce a laser being back to Earth. So that's
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: kind of proof positive we were there. But there's also
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: pictures by both India and China from orbit of the
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: Apollo landing sites. And you know, we might be able
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: to twist India's arm in to faking it. But if
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: China saw that we had never gone, you don't think
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: you'd call us out in a hot minute. Yeah, absolutely,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: it's case closed, all right. You just got to take
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: those people in a room and work them over till
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: they agree done.
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: Cono and I are going to have a couple of
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: pops and go out there and beat the crap out
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: of non believers. It'll be fun. Rod, always a pleasure, Rod,
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: pile pile books. God, I turned into handle this morning.
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: I entered this Week in Space podcast available everywhere including IRT.
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: Yes, and I got to tell you such a font
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: of information. Always enjoy talking with you, buddy, and we
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: do I know you're terribly excited about it.
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: We do need to.
• 30:00
  Speaker 5: Connect, yes, and I am your font, so let's do it.
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: Soon, all right, my friend, mister Rodpile, Ladies and gentlemen,
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: we'll come back with much more. So go know where
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: this is KFI heard everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: You've been listening to the Bill Handle Show.
• 30:15
  Speaker 7: Catch my show Monday through Friday, six am to nine am,
• 30:18
  Speaker 7: and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app