Chapter 432: No, This Isn’t Your Merit
Cape Canaveral’s ground launch center.
After finishing his speech, Nixon sat in front of the screen with White House senior officials and reporter teams, watching the real-time data from Freedom Space Station.
Nixon had reserved a full three days for this space station.
His itinerary at Cape Canaveral included watching the rocket launch, space station docking, giving a speech, and observing the astronauts’ life on the space station.
The screens of the engineers at the launch center were flashing with real-time data from Freedom Space Station.
On the vast open ground, there was another larger screen showing the live broadcast footage from space.
Blurry snowflake dots occasionally flashed across, but this did not diminish people’s enthusiasm at all.
The live broadcast footage would also be transmitted via radio signals to every corner of Earth.
Even in Moscow, people were following America’s space station.
They used televisions from China to watch television programs from Europe.
“Professor, this is Freedom,” Buzz Aldrin’s voice came from the speaker, carrying the characteristic distortion of radio.
This was a very magical feeling.
Because the Moon is so far away, the Moon has a science fiction feel, signals transmitted back from over 300,000 kilometers away.
But now, right above their heads, the space station’s altitude was only 462 kilometers, in a relatively low low Earth orbit.
This gave people the feeling that it was within reach.
From the Wright brothers’ research airplane to airplanes becoming everyday transportation for people, it was only a short few decades.
From the first test flight in 1903 to the opening of the first regular commercial air route between Los Angeles and San Francisco in 1914, it was even just a short 11 years.
A distance of 320,000 kilometers, and talk of colonizing the Moon, major Moon modification, everyone would feel they wouldn’t see it in their lifetime.
But now, in this era of technological explosion, in this era where humanity’s exploration of boundaries is constantly expanding, people would feel that the routine operation of space stations, short as a few years or long as over a decade, could become reality.
Now it’s astronauts up there, but possibly in the near future, everyone will have the opportunity to go to the space station.
It was precisely this wonderful feeling, combined with the technological explosion, that made everyone hold their breath and watch expectantly the footage transmitted back from the not-so-distant sky.
“Professor, do you think I have a chance to go to the space station?” Nixon turned sideways and asked Lin Ran.
This was Lin Ran’s home turf; Nixon and he were sitting in the very front row of the audience seats, with only the two of them in that row.
In the past, Nixon had often seen on television how Johnson was treated: during visits to NASA-related bases, Lin Ran and Johnson walking and chatting, or the two watching a launch together, with Lin Ran explaining to the president.
Now that he was president, he wanted that kind of treatment too.
All the White House administrative staff were arranged to sit in the back, not to disturb the master from personally explaining space and the universe to him.
“Of course, as I said before, soon we could do some routine operations within five years.
The Burning One Rocket has already been successfully developed; soon, we should be able to start commercial operation of the space station next year. For one million US dollars, tycoons can go to the space station.
We could even change it to an auction format, highest bidder wins.”
Lin Ran explained.
Nixon clapped lightly: “Professor, good idea. In the past, NASA has always been burning funds. Even though we accomplished the great feat of the Apollo Moon Landing, there have always been voices in Washington and among the public criticizing it.
Saying that NASA’s work has not created actual value.
Such completely mistaken claims are still easily believed by the public.
When GPS shone brightly on the Vietnam War frontline, such voices in Washington disappeared.
At times like this, a little commercialization of NASA would help dispel such voices.
What could win more support from capitalists in finance and media than letting them go to space?”
Lin Ran nodded: “I’m very confident; they just need to look at our blue planet from the space station, and they will surely have a new understanding of NASA’s work.
They might even become NASA’s most loyal supporters.”
While Lin Ran and Nixon were talking quietly, the footage on the screen began to move, and voices came from the speakers on both sides.
“We are now conducting our evening routine work, and we will show you how we live in space.”
In the footage, Mission Specialist Allen Spencer slowly floated into view in front of the lens, holding a bag full of water in his hand.
He gently squeezed it, and a crystal-clear water ball formed like a huge teardrop in the air.
“My God,” the engineers present exclaimed in admiration.
Many of them had spent their lives dealing with numbers, formulas, and graphs.
But at this moment, they were captivated by the spectacle before their eyes.
Allen Spencer pushed the water ball toward Armstrong.
Neil gently sucked it with a straw, and the water ball disappeared without a trace.
“In space, we lose weight, but we gain freedom,” Allen’s voice continued, “Here, we can fly freely.”
Buzz Aldrin floated to the corner of the living module, showing the ground their home.
It was a cramped space filled with various pipelines and equipment.
The astronauts showed the lens how they used sleeping bags fixed to the wall to ensure they wouldn’t float away during sleep; they also showed how they used special cutlery to ensure food wouldn’t scatter everywhere.
The astronauts showed everyone their kitchen.
Their food was all dehydrated and needed to be rehydrated with heated water.
When they squeezed dehydrated shrimp from the bag, it floated in the air like a huge, dry, white bubble ball.
They had to use straws to suck it up to prevent food crumbs from scattering into the air.
In space, bathing and washing hands were both challenges.
The astronauts showed everyone how to use special wet wipes to clean the body and how to use a special waterless hand sanitizer to clean their hands.
They also showed the audience that in space, their hair would stand up due to no gravity, like wearing an exploding afro.
They also placed a container of liquid in front of the lens, letting the audience see that without gravity interference, the liquid would form a perfect sphere.
The whole process was very interesting.
Compared to the Moon landing, it was a completely different experience.
When the live broadcast ended and the screen turned to snowflakes, the audience on Earth felt an indescribable sense of loss.
Nixon turned around and said loudly to the reporters behind him: “Everyone, I believe this two-hour live broadcast has left a profound impression on you.
On television screens, the headline of the evening news every day is the casualty list from the Vietnam War, young soldiers’ lives replaced by cold numbers.
On the streets, anti-war slogans rise and fall, hippies counter guns with flowers, mocking Washington’s decision-makers with ideals of love and peace.
Hoover’s death, constantly appearing mysterious video tapes casting the shadow of the Kremlin over the White House.
This country is finally beginning to doubt itself.
However, we have not given up; we are still fighting; we insist that freedom is an ideal.
This Freedom live broadcast tells us even more that amid the chaos on Earth, there is a hopeful space dominated by Americans.
In the future, we will train astronauts for our allies.
Our space station is called Freedom, not America; our space station will be open to our allies, and our allies can also send astronauts to the Moon.
On Earth, we are divided into different countries, but in the universe, we are one whole; we all have only one name: humanity.”
Nixon’s final speech once again elevated the entire live broadcast.
In Fred’s apartment in Queens, the Italian immigrant Francesco family gathered around the black-and-white television.
Francesco was a construction worker; his life had been spent dealing with gravity and bricks.
He couldn’t understand the physics in space, but he could understand the smiles on the astronauts’ faces.
When he saw the astronauts flying freely in space, he turned to his son beside him and said, “Look, child, only we can do this.”
His tone was full of envy and also full of pride, pride in bringing his son from Italy to a country with better prospects.
The “we” in his words had changed from Italy to America.
On a small farm in Kansas, farm owner Old John sat in a rocking chair, watching the live broadcast on television.
He too couldn’t understand the science in space, but he could understand the pride on the astronauts’ faces.
When he saw the astronauts waving to Earth, he felt that those waving hands also represented him.
After Nixon’s final speech, Old John’s favorable impression of this new president soared: “Nixon is great, much better than that damn Johnson.”
The public is blind, and even more blindly conformist.
If you ask him exactly where Nixon is good, he couldn’t say; he could only give a vague but affirmative answer from an emotional level.
Precisely because of this, in countries with electoral politics, media is so important.
They shape this feeling.
Of course, the proposer of nipples-for-peace theory, Brzezinski, racked his brains and couldn’t imagine there would be short videos, such entertainment products that can shift emotions multiple times in 15 seconds.
The past nipples-for-peace, no matter how outrageous, was at most refined carbs; short videos’ blood sugar spike is comparable to directly injecting glucose.
The framers of democratic elections similarly could never imagine there would be social media as a medium, electing new monsters to power.
The space station live broadcast completely reversed Nixon’s declining trend.
Pulling Nixon out of the swamp of the past Vietnam War and Hoover.
But obviously, the media controlled by the Donkey Party didn’t want to let Nixon off so easily.
You can shift blame, everyone shifts blame, but whether it’s GPS or the space station, these are not your merit; you’re just picking up ready-made achievements.
These were all foundations laid in the Kennedy era and Johnson era.
Like the New York Times emphasizing, the New York Times taking the lead also had an important reason: Jenny similarly needed to attribute the merit to Lin Ran, not Nixon.
“.Despite the Nixon Administration constantly accusing the Elephant Party and past presidents of leaving him an unsolvable mess over the past six months.
Believing that whether the Vietnam War, Hoover, or the unequal relationship with the Soviet Union in the Cold War, the unauthorized nuclear restraint agreement, etc., were all the Donkey Party’s responsibility.
As Nixon’s polls gradually rise, this administration walks out of the quagmire in a short half year, a glimmer of light appears on the Vietnam War frontline, and we have a new foothold in space.
No Moon base, but we have a space station.
But in fact, NASA had already set its sights on a farther future even before the Moon landing.
The professor proposed the great concept of the space station as early as 1961, and has been cultivating at NASA, single-handedly creating the Apollo Moon Landing, Freedom Space Station, and GPS satellite positioning system.
When in the television live broadcast, the astronauts waved to Earth from space, showing footage of drinking coffee, sleeping, and working in zero gravity, the whole world was deeply shocked.
At this moment, we forget all the things that have divided this country in the past; what we see is American heroes exploring a brand new future for all humanity.
President Nixon’s speech at Cape Canaveral also declared to the world that the free world is fighting for humanity’s future.
We built Freedom Space Station, the starting point for humanity to conquer the universe.
On the Vietnam War frontline, with GPS’s help, Hanoi took the initiative to propose peace talks for the first time.
Nixon shifts the blame to his predecessors but attributes the merits of GPS and Freedom Space Station to himself; is this a double standard?
His enjoyment of these two major achievements benefits from the professor.
Benefiting from President Kennedy digging the professor out from Columbia University, benefiting from President Johnson giving the professor greater trust and more support.
What did Nixon do? He did nothing; he was just enjoying the achievements of his predecessors.”
Written by her subordinate reporters, finalized by Jenny, this report throughout says these are all the professor’s merits; Nixon is purely picking up scraps.
Of course, this is not the purpose; the real purpose is to tell Nixon that he should give the professor greater support.
What is greater support?
Naturally, more budget and more trust.
Additionally, the Hearst family has always been in the Donkey Party camp; their family had two congressmen who were Donkey Party congressmen in the past.
So it’s normal for them to help the Donkey Party question Nixon.
This is a form of indirect messaging.
This is the good thing about having media.
Many things, you don’t need to say yourself; the media will say them for you.
If Nixon wants to question, Lin Ran just needs to shake his head helplessly and say he doesn’t know about it and will go back to ask.
The next day, tell Nixon that it was Jenny acting on her own.
You wouldn’t even find a reason to lash out.
As for Nixon not reading the New York Times, how could that be.
As America’s most influential newspaper in this era, its influence can reach every American family.
Jenny’s report was like a starting gun; after publication, media biased toward the Donkey Party found the angle and all attributed the merits to Lin Ran, continuing to accuse Nixon.
Nixon will shift blame; is the Donkey Party just vegetarian?
Media biased toward the Donkey Party can find fancy angles to criticize Nixon.
Just like when Nixon lost the California governor election in 1962, what the media did.
At this time, the media had already found Nixon’s Achilles’ heel, which is the Elephant Party.
The logic chain is very clear: the Civil Rights Act pushed by the Donkey Party, minority ethnic groups White House senior officials appointed by the Donkey Party; if changed to the Elephant Party, it’s impossible to give someone like Randolph Lin, a mixed Asian and Jewish person, the high position of NASA director.
This both proves Nixon is picking up scraps and proves why the Elephant Party’s claims won’t work.
Meanwhile, on the Vietnam War frontline, subtle changes were occurring; things were far less optimistic than Nixon had anticipated.
