According to organizer Jason Kessler, those are some of the ground rules for this weekend’s Unite the Right protest in Washington – his big opportunity to recover from last year’s disastrous Charlottesville, Va., rally that shook the nation and shattered the self-described alt-right movement. No criticizing African-Americans or Jews. “And that human desire to be together, to be with our brothers and sisters, is a thing that I think about all the time.”Now, as in 1968, the marvels of space – of ingenuity and childlike awe – can help us out of ourselves somewhat, to hold home and humanity just a little bit dearer. “All of us wanted fellowship in the evening being alone and working hard all day long,” he said at a talk at a church in Wharton, Texas, last year. Often, the crew would sit in the window and talk. Then the astronauts returned with the first photo of Earth from a distance – the iconic blue marble of “Earthrise,” which kindled a deeper appreciation of our miraculous home and inspired a nascent environmental movement.One of the new Artemis II astronauts, Victor Glover, served on the International Space Station in 20. But on Christmas Eve in 1968, the crew of Apollo 8 beamed back a message of goodwill heard by a billion people – a quarter of everyone on the planet. All amid the context of a nation in turmoil. Next year, the crew of Artemis II will go to the moon but not land on it, preparing for further exploration in years to come – an orbiting space station and a base camp near the south pole.This, too, is the cusp of a new age – a first practical step to living on other worlds. Information Agency concluded that many worldwide questioned “whether the vaunted American system might be on the verge of decay and disintegration.” This week, NASA announced the astronauts who will in some ways reprise Apollo 8. But as Apollo 8 wheeled around the moon – the first crewed flight to orbit our cosmic neighbor – the United States was in disarray. Within a year, two men would walk on the moon. In 1968, humanity stood on the cusp of a new age.
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