@theMOE: You're saying the government should buy us gas?

GadgetPlay

@DucatiGuy: hahahahaha omg that is some funny stuff. This is my new fav thread.

robpruitt

@Noobs-R-Us: "The U.S. should set a plan to completely eliminate foreign oil imports in 10 years. It can easily be done."

Living up to that reputation I see. Does this master plan of yours include drilling any of our own oil? Even Paris Hilton is that smart.

GadgetPlay

More truthful headline..."Iran Has the Capability to Send Men (no women allowed) Into Jannah, NOW!".

ANoel

And this from a country who's entire population literally pees and shits into a hole in the ground is absolutely - fantastic!

DucatiGuy

@baltwade:
Well there ya go. Maybe that's how we can come out on top in this whole thing...Charge 'em through the nose to refine it for them.
...Or ask if we can at least hitch a ride when they go. Seeing as I'm not sure we can still ride shotgun on any Russian trips. o.O

Miranda Kali (Desperate But Not Serious)

@Noobs-R-Us: How much of that "Half" is from Iran and/or hostile to the US countries? I'm sorry to bring facts into your blood-for-oil tirade, but the lack of firm figures in your comment raises flags.

I think what Iran has failed to mention that the man they are putting in space is Scotty.

Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity

We sent monkeys and dogs into space to make sure things were safe. However; the food chain is a bit different. I'm guessing they will send women.

robpruitt

@Noobs-R-Us: Just cuz they have the money doesn't mean that they are spending it on their citizens (spoken by somewhat who lives in a country that spends billions of dollars on a war while their own people are spending up the wazoo on gas prices).

theMOE

OK, was it just me that noticed the "FU" on the license plate?

Perfectly appropriate!

siville

I'll give them the benefit they will probably get to space in 10 years they didnt say where in space they could 100 miles above Earth thats space right.

While we'll already be living on the moon or on the way to mars

utube2007

@Noobs-R-Us: The best way to reduce our dependence on foreign oil is to use it all up. Then we'll be the ones exporting.

These days, if Iran really wants to send a man into space, all they have to do is buy him a ticket.

Gann

@Miranda Kali (Desperate But Not Serious): Actually, (this is how all smart ass comments start) Iran has lots and lots of oil but very little gasoline. Go figure. You would think that before they invested money in a go-nowhere space program they would build some oil refineries.

baltwade

They never said the man had to be alive or whole. Just get one of those suicide bombers with a backpack pointed at the sky and watch him sail into space.

whatnot22

For the sake of fairness...

It sounded pretty (%*#ing crazy when we said we were going to the moon for the 1st time. (And we had to Photoshop that too!)

Hiphopopotamus

why don't we just sell them our 're-entry parachute technology' and wish them all the best???

Kaspir

Every time a country gets arrogant about it's superior space program, 7 astronauts end up dead. I'll take the high road on this one...

Samifumi

@MrBlahBlah: Those only come in tandem rotor.

Kaiser-Machead's WALL-E fetish

Sadly, they're probably closer than we are at the moment. I'm sure they at least have the cash lying around to fund it.
Hell, they could freakin fuel the thing with super unleaded.

Miranda Kali (Desperate But Not Serious)

@theMOE: Actually, they have more money than god. They have one of the largest oil reserves in the world. Doesn't it just make you all fuzzy inside everytime you fill up your gas tank?

The U.S. should set a plan to completely eliminate foreign oil imports in 10 years. It can easily be done. We import about half of our consumption right now. About half of all of our total consumption is used up by huge gas guzzling cars. Start by conservation. Mandate all car fleets have at least 33 MPG ratings within five years. Add tax incentives for solar, wind, geothermal, and other renewables. Invest in R&D. Basically, this problem is about money. How much of it we're willing to invest now in order to reduce our future dependency on foreign oil.

I rather spend the money here than on middle eastern countries and south American dictators like Chavez.

Noobs-R-Us

for a second there, I thought that was a 92 Buick LeSabre

MrBlahBlah

Notice they made no mention of bringing him back.

DustyButt

Ah, Scaramanga would be proud to own that beauty...

Jrsy

Laughed out loud at the image. They can power it with cigarettes and black powder.

Elvisisdead

Iran can't even feed it's own people... and then they want to send a man to space? bastards!

theMOE

Is there any plan for this poor bastard to return from space?

JackHoliday

So they buy a soyuz and some guidance equipment from Russia or some other eastern bloc nation...

Whoop-de-doo (twirls finger in air)

We have private corporations starting to send people into space now...

Their government is finally mastering technology from the 50's, good for them. (dorky thumbs up!)

bpapa9013

@smartboydan has a headache: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

jewsrock

Are we sure they didn't just photoshop it again?

smartboydan has a headache

It wont be a a rainbow astronaut since we all know there ARE no gay people in Iran.

Curves

@DucatiGuy: The way I see it, there is no indoor plumbing on the moon, so these guys are already trained for the eventuality of having to dig a hole on the moon to piss and shit into.

Rabid Penguin

@whatnot22: Just get one of those suicide bombers with a backpack pointed at the sky and watch him sail into space.

Wouldn't that just drive him into the ground?
I think you need the backpack pointing at the ground.

wjousts

That image kills - thanks for the laugh.

NagChampa

Those are Hamburg( Germany ) license plates

mister_s

It'll be all cobbled together Ruso/Chinese hardware if they do it at all.

strider_mt2k

Their government is finally mastering technology from the 50's, good for them. (dorky thumbs up!)

Eh, the shuttle is 1970s tech and we're depending on Russia's 1960s tech to supply the ISS. No country has the right to get too snotty about their space technology. We're all just throwing up big dumb boosters. If any of DARPA's projects bear fruit, then we can talk smack.

A large portion of the animal launches were to see if life could even survive in orbit, now all you would really need to do is send up one test craft with some instruments to measure the internal environment, and if that worked out then the next could have a person on board.

If they can build a booster that can throw something the size of a Mercury up into LEO that does raise a real proliferation issue. An Iranian booster with a Pakistani warhead (ignore the fact that the countries don't really like each other) would make India quite unhappy.

daveNYC

@baltwade: they can't build more refineries because of trade barriers.

it makes no sense why they would want a space program, but whatever, let them waste their money.

mynameisjoe

I hope that the Iranian astronaut does not want to pray to Alah facing Mecca at the same time.

Otherwise the Iranian Space Agency will need to come up with a stick-on carpet and a GPS tracking, Butt holding Motorized Lazy Susan.

Sound funny but hey, He'll be moving at 17,000 MPH and in circles....you can't point in just one direction...

:)

aec007

@Noobs-R-Us: Why? Do you want me to explain it to you? While we're at it, we can go over "production," as well.

GadgetPlay

@GadgetPlay: Please look up the word conservation.

Noobs-R-Us

@Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity: Yes, Canada is our largest oil daddy. But the global oil price is not determined by just that. Oil prices are determined by global supply/demand. We consume more oil than ANYONE on this planet. If we enact a plan to benefit just us and eliminate our need to go foreign, there's ample evidence to show that oil will drop to $10/barrel. There's simply not enough demand in the rest of the world in the short run to take up the slack. In fact, we would probably set a great example for other developing nations like China to reduce their dependency on foreign oil also.

The fact of the matter is that we should eliminate our use of oil as fuel. We should use it just for production in items like plastics. We can get our energy needs elsewhere. It may cost a little more in the short run but it will save us many folds in the future in fighting needless wars and a damaged environment.

Noobs-R-Us

@theMOE: I'm sure that it's the Iran gov't that has the oil and the same gov't that's planning to send someone to space, not its citizens. So what's your point???

Noobs-R-Us

@Noobs-R-Us: my point is that the government should help it's people with the basics of life and not get into the "me too" space traveling thing.

theMOE

@GadgetPlay: No. I'm saying that we should stop relying so much on foreigh middle eastern oil and brew our own. And we need to stop spending so much on gas and more on more important things (no, iPHone is not that important

theMOE

@Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity:
Nope.... the head always points to Mecca.
Mecca is not in the center of the earth.

Considering that the Space shuttle and the international space station take 90 minutes to circle the earth... by the time he puts the carpet down, he's out of alignment already...

Alternatively, the Iranian Space agency can use a single stick-on carpet and use the ships computers to lock onto the GPS coordinates of Mecca and fire rockets to keep the ship aligned.

But that wastes fuel.... My GPS-tracking, butt-holding lazy susan might become a reality!

:)

aec007

do they also plan to bring him back alive?

willyolio

@aec007: Actually, since the Earth would be in only one direction from the vessel, it wouldn't be that hard. If it was flying inverted, he would just have to be on a wall facing Earth.

Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity

@Noobs-R-Us: Canada? the main provider of $ oil to the U.S. is Venezuela, and the main free provider of oil is Iraq.

VakeroRokero

10 years from now:

"And with the successful launch of Abdul al Abdullah into space, the Iranian government announces that they plan to be able to recover a man from space within 10 years! Sorry Abdul, you're just going to have to take one for the team."

Purple Dave

Woohoo! Let's extend our Iran bashing to Islam bashing and celebrate by shooting someone with brown skin and passing out after chugging a case of beer! USA numbah wun!

FSeven

Totally unrelated and off topic:

I was feeling really low the other day, and called the Crisis Intervention Hotline, and was put through to a call center in Iran. I told them I was considering suicide. They got really excited and asked me if I knew how to drive a truck.....

(OK, so it was a BAD joke, its a slow day.....sue me.)

Curves

@phantam: I have the same advice to you as I have to @VakeroRokero: Please go educate yourself at the EIA.

Noobs-R-Us

@GadgetPlay: Do you actually have a point or are you always communicating in code?

Noobs-R-Us

@Noobs-R-Us: actually your wrong, the only reason oil is so expensive is because of the commodity market and the investors security being jeopardized thats why when hush went to the saudi's they laughed when he said their was a supply issue, their was never a f*cking supply issue, the market drove its own prices up on expectations that their was going to be issues in the supply.

Thats why the hint that their might eventually be russia vs us issues has sent the price of oil back up, even though i highly doubt the price of oil has really changed considering no pipelines have been shutdown or supply routes blocked as far as im aware.

phantam

@VakeroRokero: I think you've been smoking too much weed or listening to too much propaganda. I don't know which is worse. Please go educate yourself at the EIA.

Noobs-R-Us

how is it iran win us loose, hasn't the US been sending people to space for like 50 years?

@theMOE: all what money? the US is f*cking got it good in parts of europe it can range from 6$ to 25$ a gallon!

hell in the caribbean your neighbor in the water to your south we spend on a great day 5.50$ a gallon that was before the price hike sent us north of 6$ a gallon... Im an american citizen and im really sick of hearing americans bi*ch about prices of gas.

AND NO the solution isn't "lets brew our own oil" the fact is oils a f*cking strict commodity thats dwindling away, the US had the right idea from day 1 Horde the damn oil for when the rest of the world runs out.

The real SOLUTION isn't offshore drilling, the real solution is ROLLING OUT REAL ENERGY, theirs clean burning coal now, theirs about a billion alternatives to standard gas ranging from algae based oil that would end up being 1/10th the price all the way to safe gen4-5 nuclear power stations that are clean and safe.

phantam

@Curves: with lips lie that, why go suicide? Go... oh never mind.

theMOE

@phantam: You are one angry mo-fo. Yeah, buy the "energy is the best alternative" bullcrap. Get your Al Gore magazines off from your pillow @$$.

theMOE

@aec007: Geo-staionary orbit then.

Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity

@Noobs-R-Us:

Unless we made a comeback that I am unaware of (if so, please educate me)China surpassed us in 2007 as the largest consumer of oil

TideGuy

@Curves: Lucky.

When I called I got put on hold. As if that weren't bad enough, the on-hold music was a mix of John Tesch and Alan Parsons. If I hadn't thought of all the Gizmodians I'd be letting down, that would have been it for me!

ps61318

Sigh.

Malaysia's space agency, Angkasa, convened a conference of 150 Islamic scientists and scholars last year to wrestle with these and other questions. The resulting document (.doc), "A Guideline of Performing Ibadah (worship) at the International Space Station (ISS)", was approved by Malaysia's National Fatwa Council earlier this year. According to the report, determining the qibla should be "based on what is possible" for the astronaut, and can be prioritized this way: 1) the Ka'aba, 2) the projection of Ka'aba, 3) the Earth, 4) wherever.

daveNYC

@ps61318: That would be awesome if their hold music was Queen's "Don't Try Suicide".

@Curves: So you want to commit suicide? Well, if you act now we'll throw in this one-of-a-kind, hand-made, vest. The vest is made out of 100% hand woven fabric and various other materials... and looks faaannnntastic. So magnificent and awe inspiring that it's sure to blow everyone away.

Suicide: Life's little way of saying "you're dead, no one cares, and it's all your fault."

Rabid Penguin

What's all this talk about Virgins? They do know that virgins are lousy lays right??? Perhaps they are themselves virgins and don't know this bit of wisdom. :)

Noobs-R-Us

@JackHoliday: @aec007: They could launch, orbit once, and deorbit between prayer times, but they would probably have to get the rocket blessed. If he dies, 72 virgins of an unmentioned gender.

All those chaste suicide bombers getting the 772 virgins, and no-one thought about the gender of the virgin.

Glad I'm not Muslim.

kanon

Since people don't seem to be listening when I say EIA, perhaps I'll just include a link. There [tonto.eia.doe.gov]

all better now?

Noobs-R-Us

@TideGuy: Pooooa, man, my drink just shot out of my nose! That's about the funniest thing I've heard all day, perhaps even all week! Man are you one confused individual. Dude, where do you get your information from the National Enquirer?

May I suggest that you take a gander over at the EIA for some better data.

It will be a cold day in hell before China consumes as much as our hedonistic, gas guzzling, energy wasting citizens.

Noobs-R-Us

"Repeat..there are no virgins on the moon, I repeat...

ajcali08

Getting a man in space is not hard. it's having him return from space without being obliterated. Being Iran, i am sure they can find plenty of suicinots to go to space. as long as there promised many virgins.

aeroworks

This isn't the first time that Iran has said it wants to send a man into space. Back in the late eighties they were talking about it. In fact, they are 10 years behind their first announced goals which was towards the end of the nineties. This is the first time that they could financially pull it off, though.

At least they are not wasting their sky rocketing oil profits on ridiculous sky scrapers like Dubai.

FandZ

@aec007:

They've had rulings on how to pray in space for decades. I forget the exact directions but I think it is you can pray in any direction. Oh and it is Allah. Two LL's. Wouldn't want to insult 1 fifth of the worlds population.

FandZ

@phantam:
Are you aware that the mandated "clean-burning" coal provides proportionally less energy when compared to the dirty stuff? Yes, to get the same amount of BTU out of clean coal, you produce just as much pollution. Well, actually, you produce more. See, you're mining _more_ coal out of the ground, you're processing _more_ coal at the plants, you're driving _more_ loads of coal around the country...

Ethanol is just as bad a solution. Not only do corn prices skyrocket, but it takes more energy than what you can get ouf of a gallon of gasoline to produce a gallon of ethanol which produced _less_ energy than a gallon of gasoline. However, unlike the coal thing, at least with ethanol you can pick your fuel, and if you produce it using wind, hydro, or solar power it's a net gain. If you're burning fossil fuels, well, hopefully you're not dumb enough to actually use gas.

@phantam:
There are always four components to the oil price-chain. Supply, transport, refining, and the market. We lost a lot of refining capabilities when New Orleans got practically scrubbed off the map, and while we've probably recovered some of that, I suspect there's still less now than there was five years ago, and there might be new transportation issues involved. All of that would still be creeping the prices up, even without the market side of things.

Purple Dave

@Noobs-R-Us:

If that's the funniest thing that you've heard all day then that explains why you are so angry. Although your EIA bible contains data through 2006 I'll concede that it is highly unlikely based upon those numbers that China has exceeded the U.S. in consumption of oil. See what an open mind will do for you?

TideGuy

@TideGuy: Hey, if I sounded angry it's because I'm sick of the citizens of this country listening to propaganda and then repeating it like it's the truth. At least YOU have an open mind which is to be commended. There are lots of others who will refuse to listen or look at facts staring them in the face.

If I offended you I apologize. I just didn't know if your were the former or the latter.

Noobs-R-Us

@Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity:
HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAA!
Did not think of that one!... That'll work.
It's a hell of a way out there...(22,236 miles) but it'll work.

Note to Iranian Space Agency: Pack additional cans of beans for return trip propelant.

:)

aec007

Once I wrote you but you don't publish my comment.
Making these stupid jokes about other nations really isn't fun. Dear Gizmodo admins you have closed your access is some countries like Iran but be sure that it is not the way to feel secure and make stupid jokes about other nations and races.
if you have doubt about my objection check the following links:
[gizmodo.com]
[gizmodo.com]
[gizmodo.com]
[gizmodo.com]
I highly suggest you to change your policy of making stupid posts about other nations.

Definitely we have the right to make lawsuit against your insulation.

rezar

Shoudn't be their first priority.

chadchadchad

@Kaiser-Machead's Apostrophe's Power: Tell you what - if they can reverse-engineer a Pacer, we should at least get ready for them to unveil the next-most fearsome war machine - the Gremlin!

redw0rm