Utter nonsense.

Look, we all acknowledge the accomplishments Mother Russia, OK?
But stop trying to make out that this is either high tech or difficult to make. Its a very basic simple design (as is almost all Russian space hardware), simply scaled up.

Engines with the exact same principal of operation powered the Shuttle. It had the additional requirement of being reusable. SpaceX already has the Raptor engine in production and testing.

The metallurgy is not a particular impediment, because it was already developed for prior rocket motors (F1) as far back as the 50s.

I save my best editing for people who pay me.

Russia was not given a contract. Check your facts.

Boeing and Lockheed got the contract.
The US (NASA and Air Force) has been buying and using these motors since forever.

The US licensed the technology (Pratt and Whitney), and could build them stateside any time they want. Its just been cheaper to buy them in Russia from the original manufacturers.

History also moves backward. Where have you been for the last several months?

The contract will probably be re-opened, and this temporary injunction is mostly aimed at doing just that.

DOD will not let it stand in the way of their mission critical launches.
When security critical payloads need to be put in orbit this ruling goes away without a whimper.
To paraphrase Joseph Stalin: "How many divisions does the Court of Federal Claims have?"

DOD and Launch Alliance has nothing to worry about from the Court or from SpaceX. They SHOULD be worried about Putin.

Not really.
This decision won't stand. The DOD will not let some meddlesome judge stand in the way of a security need, and friendlier judges will quickly overturn it. (It was a temporary injunction anyway).

Look people, this is just to get their (Air Force's) attention. It isn't going to be a permanent thing, by simply making headlines it has served its purpose. (Note that the Russian's will probably block the sale anyway soon).

DOD will promise to revise the bidding, they may also tell Pratt and Whitney to start manufacturing these engines in western countries (P&W bought the license to do this a long time ago, but it was never economic to do so in the past). This isn't particularly difficult tech to build when all of the plans and specs are already in US hands due to long existing licensing deals.

But mostly, the purpose was an attention grab, to demonstrate how stupid it is to encourage US companies to develop lift capabilities and then turn around and buy Russian made engines on a sole source contract.

And Thank God they are.

If the USPS hadn't killed off this whackjob scheme, the Snowden revelations would have done it for them, because
the NSA would never be able to resist cataloging every bit of it.

Including Mr Snowden.

Officially Government Sanctioned Spam is still Spam.

It would have died of its own accord anyway, because the junk mailers would have figured out that it was a waste of effort and money and found ways to configure their junk mail to foil scanning. And citizens don't want people opening their mail to scan it either.

I can't imagine what there wasn't a three letter agency behind this scheme anyway.

The story is remarkably DATE Free. Without the date in Leno clip you can't tell if this was 1985 or 2013.

Plus its SO much easier to deal with disasters at sea and we have such a good track record in doing so.

Not as much as it once was.
Go surf their site, they cover a wide wide variety of topics.

Yes, but his experimental platform is far from perfect, wouldn't you agree?

He's talking parabolic flights in powered aircraft, which lasts, what, maybe 30 seconds, and could not easily be shielded from all sorts of vibrations.

So the good geologist's work probably can't account for a moon-sized platform, or a mixed particle size, or the inclusion of water ice, etc. The angles do vary with gravity, grain size, grain polishing, binding agent inclusion, etc.

Still the Subject study uses a wide definition of the Angle of Repose ("anything between about 25 to 40 depending on size and type of particles involved."), and they suggest that all (or most) of these observed ridge shapes fit within that definition. While they mention water ice in their theory they don't seem to acknowledge its ability to drastically increase the Angle of Repose, easily up to 60 degrees in terrestrial gravity).

Exactly, this article essentially is an elaboration on the Wiki Article's theory # 3.

They make much of the angle of repose, but the angle of repose is not a constant. Gravity of the planet/moon affects this angle, (which I am sure they accounted for), but so does the water content, or any other potentially binding agent (frozen CO2, etc) of the material. Even the shape of the grains of sand can affect the Angle of Repose.

Dono If I believe that.

The Economist has always had a penchant for saying very little with the largest number of words.

If you sit down and try to outline one of their major articles, as I recently did, you will see how few points they actually try to make and the inordinate burden they imposed on the reader while making them. And its not like they provide quality supporting documentation to justify their points. Often they simply trout out half truths and over simplifications in point after point of seemingly endless paragraphs of supporting verbiage which provide little enlightenment.

And the story should have been about WHEN those nefarious types first started mentioning it, not about when the white-hats actually found it.
Did those blackhats find it by reading the code, or accidentally stumbling upon it in some way?

I suspect it was the former, but I think that discussion is more important than when Google detected it. After all, the implication is that
google discovered nothing, but simply heard about it in the hallway or something.