Since when is the Pope an authority on ethics?

I don't think so. The British Navy is sending ships to Spain to help transport stranded passengers from there to the UK. Brits in the US still have to get to Spain.

The ISS was not the driving force behind the shuttle's size. The opposite is true. Various ISS modules were sized specifically to fit the shuttle's cargo bay.

The shuttle was designed in the 1970s -- first seeing flight in 1981. The ISS wasn't even seriously contemplated until after the fall of the Soviet Union. Thus, it couldn't have played a role any aspect of the design of the shuttle. In fact, before the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States began work on its own Space Station Freedom in response to Mir's accomplishments. It simply wasn't politically feasible for the Cold War rivals to cooperate on a significant international project until they both toned down their ideology a bit.

While it is widely believed that no commercial traffic is allowed on the amateur bands, this is incorrect. In 1993 the FCC issued a report significantly broadening what is allowed in terms of commercial traffic. These changes are reflected in the current regs. Please see Part 97.113. Commercial traffic which benefits either the operator or his employer are prohibited. Requesting a web page which contains advertisements is just fine. Ordering a pizza online is just fine too (although using SSL is not). You can even email some friends about that old rig you are selling for $50 due to an exemption in Part 97.113(a)(3). Sending instructions to your stock broker or notifying a business client you'll be late, on the other hand, clearly are not OK.

Just analog sound? Hardly... In addition to the vast array of commercial spec digital modes at the Radio Amateur's disposal, we use a few home grown modes: PSK31, WSJT, and WSPR. Radio Amateurs are an incredibly innovate bunch and lead the way in narrow band long distance communications -- North America to Europe for example -- emitting far less power than a typical cell phone. Remember too, Morse is generally transmitted via CW (Continuous Wave). That's ON/OFF keying. That's digital.

While console access via serial port has long been a given on commercial Unix and network hardware, it never caught on in the PC world. Sure, there are specific manufacturers and replacement BIOS options available to allow low level configuration of a PC via the serial port but this should have been standard from the '80s. I truly don't understand why PC manufacturers never saw the value in being able to view boot messages and configure BIOS options via the good ol' serial port.

The cubesat platform has provided a means for quite a few orbiting radio amateur experiments.

Terminally ill residents of Oregon and Washington have the option of ending their own life within the existing medical framework. There are strict requirements and a number of checks and balances, but my understanding is that patients who request this option (and receive the appropriate approvals) are usually prescribed a lethal dose of a barbiturate. The high dose causes sleep and ultimately death. IMHO, this is significantly more dignified than a gunshot.

But large tanks of aviation fuel flying around on their own isn't nuts?

What exactly do they mean by "twist". Do they mean to transmit information by modulating the polarity of the signal?

Ha! I was going to suggest Anderson Power Poles before Molex but figured few people would even know what I was talking about. Good call!

Phone and camera manufacturers should just switch to "Molex" connectors... :^)

This would be an interesting project. Don't forget to factor in Doppler shift which is not insignificant at 2.4GHz.