Good to see that China is contributing to global knowledge. Sadly, it comes from its military, but still good.

We have others that are considered high-speed rail, so this is NOT America's first.
But, like many others of Biden's wasted $, this is another project that should not be approved and hopefully, Trump (or next president since it will not be biden) will pull the $ from this. Why? Because this is by far the single best route to put in the world's first hyperloop. It is not just ppl that move from LA to LV. There is a ton of cargo that gets sent. Hyperloop needs to be done with cargo FIRST, and ran for 2-4 years before accepting it for manned travel. And having Cargo travel at 300-500 MPH between these, at costs cheaper than trucks, would be a big deal.

For SX to set up a base on the moon and mars, they will need 2 different types of landers: Cargo and Manned.
With manned, it is easy enough for ppl and supplies to be transferred from space-only to the lander. The question becomes, what about the cargo version?
So far, SX has shown a door on the side, but I believe that there is NO WAY that is going to work. The reason is that the cargo will be pulled out and then have to be stacked directly below the door. In addition, assuming that lunar and martian cargo systems never return to earth surface, then we need a way to move cargo from the starship leaving earth to the lander, or possibly something in-between.
With that in mind, about the only system that I can imagine would be to use the nose opening, docking nose to nose, and then having containers, moved from 1 system to the other. Finally, when landed, the nose is opened up again, and a crane on the inside is used to pull the container out and place it on the side. What is interesting is that the crane could be attached to the rocket via a track that runs on the inside so that it can rotate around the lander and drop off containers directly to the ground as opposed to being forced to stack them.

Now, as to starship:
1) trivial for it to reach orbit. It was not because they are not working on orbiting, but on all of the stuff in-between such as take-off, separation, fuel pump testing, re-entry and landing on a single spot.
2) It is highly likely that SX will launch a couple of starlinks sats on this next launch. If not, it will almost certainly be the one after that. IOW, they will start using it for Cargo. 3) Re-fueling in orbit is not a big deal. They tested this in the last launch, internally. In addition, liquid transfers have been done for a long time (water, lox, fuel for ISS and other modules). They will need to build a tanker and a fuel-depot, but tanker will likely happen this year.
4) manned rating for launches will take a number of launches. Of course, that is exactly what SX intends to do with starlink cargos. Even if landings are not working yet, they will continue to use this to put up their starlinks that can not go on F9 ( though possible on FH ). The interesting item is how to test the life support. I suspect that they will be putting up 1 or more of these as space station module. Each 1 has more volume than the entire ISS (and far more than China's space station). Just by putting up the first one as a regular starship, they can sort things out for the ECLSS as well as layout, etc. Ideally, they would build several of these with later ones have multiple docking ports. That would enable these to quickly replace the ISS, while others continue to add their units to these for testing of their modules/ECLSS.

And yes, of this could be done before 2026.
Of course, that leaves the lunar lander. I would have to guess that once SX is able to land booster and starship on earth, they will have no issues landing on either the moon/mars. The only real issue will be (re-)entry into mars. The atmosphere is thin, but it is still there.

If idiots like this actually locked down systems ( offshoring makes it easy to crack these ), OR refused to pay, then these nations/groups would stop. Butâ¦.

Just like nations that trade prisoners or pay for others, makes their citizens easy targets.

Using an expendable cargo version starship, including a small rocket for launching the samples to orbit would be possible. That would also fit in with what SX wants. From there, ESA's return rocket would be able to bring them back. And this could be done in the next couple of years assuming that SX gets Starship done this year.

If we send starship to retrieve samples, we really need to send it with a small constellation of starlink sats modified to do comm, GPS, processing, etc to mars. Likewise, use the same for the moon, perhaps Venus.

For the last 40 years, china has been at work destroying manufacturing foreign nations (which is a big part of why they are the world's worst polluter of all times).
They are somewhat copying Japan's and S. Korea's approach to their build-ups. Basically, high tariffs, heavy subsidies, then once up to par or better then others, heavy exports after dropping subsidies. The difference is that when China gets to the last part, they continue to subsidize, and the government makes heavy use of controlling the companies exports, manufacturing capabilities, etc. which are then dumped so as to destroy foreign, esp. western, industries. Steel is just one of many.

What is needed is for nations to say enough is enough and to raise strong tariffs or even block ALL imported items from China that are being dumped. For example, nations really should block ALL metals that China is trying to import directly or indirectly. Likewise, I was surprised that Biden was stupid enough to relax the PV imports from Chinese companies that simply moved to Viet Nam and other Asian nations on moderate terms with China. All of that needs to be 100% blocked.
Likewise, the batteries need a growing tariff, and to block them from manufacturing in the west, if not other nations esp with their dirty/corrupt supplies ( most of the child labor issues and low pay comes from Chinese-owned mines; this is why China and Russia are pushing coups in Africa ).

Obvious troll is obvious. Buh-bye.

That is what "conversation of energy" is. You've contradicted yourself in the same sentence, which is almost impressive.

This is why we need to pass a SIMPLE amendment:
We, the Citizens of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, shall have the right to amend the constitution directly, by having a simple majority of voters of three fourths of the states OR two thirds of voters in two thirds of the states, within a 10 year period of the first state passing the amendment.

A simple amendment like that would allow us to fix a large number of issues that CONgress will not do. Why will they not do it? Because they are controlled by 2 horribly corrupt parties that are controlled by rich ppl, businesses, and even foreign governments. We need to take back our government.

????
WTF does your second url have to do with ANY of this? 2 criminals were illegally stopped, but not due to any information from above.

Fusion centers? Are you talking about information moving from local LEOs up to the FBI and DNI??
Personally, I would prefer that information to go to DNI et. al, and not FBI, but that is for judges to decide. Even if the information flows downwards, I am good with that, AS LONG as it was legally obtained and is applicable to the situation. For example, NSA did NOT tap into to Trump's calls. OTOH, they DO tap various Russian calls, of which obviously a number of trump calls BEFORE he made president was done (this is why NSA objected to giving him, his family, and certain members of his admin access to intel, but esp. to Russian intel). If NSA had learned that Trump was getting marching orders from putin to sell fentanyl on the street, that should not be allowed to be sent down. Why not? Because this is not about terrorism/spying, it is about a criminal charge, which is where NSA is NOT concerned. However, I do not know if such information IS flowing downwards. I would hope not.

So, you do not think that NSA, DIA, etc should have the ability to know as much about Americans as China and Russia legally do?
Why is that? If you had paid attention to Snowden the ILLEGAL spying that was going on, was NOT from NSA iteself, but from individuals in there using gear that was only meant to go after terrorists, spies, etc. but instead using it on their own families/friends.

And there is a lot less sharing of information in the 5Is than you realize. To ask one of the others means that you generally have to show some sort of reason for it. Not a warrant, but certainly not the wild sharing that you seem to think is going on.

As long as other nations can purchase this, then NSA, CIA and our general intelligence community should be able to access that without a warrant.
Now, as far requiring it for DoJ/FBI/local police/etc... GREAT.

They are NOT using AI to go after wealthy payers. They are using AI to figure out who to look which has a high probability to cheating the system. The fact that they are wealthy has NOTHING to do with it.

I find it interesting that the woke are the ones that scream about words having meaning/power, but then turn right around and screw with things like this BS.
I say go after these a55holes that are trying to hide paying their taxes.
But even better would be to re-write our taxes so that they are fair and near impossible for someone to cheat at.

First off, I said, bad title:

No Consent or ppl in that.

Secondly, adding "without consent" does not mean that it is a particular person's image, but could still require consent by someone else to create a totally fake one (which would be horrible, yet, governments do such BS).