NASA SWEARS WE'RE ON THE MOON BY 2028

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman stood up at Kennedy Space Center on Friday and announced the agency is done holding meetings about the moon. Astronauts on the surface in 2028, a permanent base near the south pole, everything at Apollo speed. He said NASA will not pretend that more time, more money and flying less somehow makes the work safer. He also noted that Apollo went from the Apollo 7 splashdown to Apollo 11 in nine months. Different decade, different budget, same confidence. Then he explained what actually happens next summer. Artemis III sends four astronauts up for two weeks and never leaves Earth orbit. Three rockets launch from Florida back to back. Orion docks with Blue Origin's Blue Moon lander around day three and the crew climbs in to check the life support and run emergency drills. Later it meets SpaceX's Starship for about two hours, and nobody goes inside, because that Starship is a modified upper stage with no crew cabin. Two rocket billionaires, one docking adapter, zero moon. Nobody agrees on what it takes to fuel the real thing either. A NASA safety panel put Starship at roughly 22 tanker launches. Elon Musk says six to eight. Isaacman said six to eight is possible, which is a hell of a way to pick a side with a straight face.

Why you should give a shit: Hit the date and America owns the lunar south pole before China shows up, miss it and we paid three rockets' worth of taxpayer money to watch four people practice parking.