Well, the first piece of the redesigned, stripped-down International Space Station went into orbit last night, launched from the Baikanor Cosmodrome in Kazakstan. It's a year behind the newest schedule, and many, many years behind the original plans for the US-only space station.

I can't decide whether I'm happy that we're going to get a space station and that the "real" work (i.e. the launching of pieces) has finally begun, or upset because this version of the station will be a stripped-down shell of what was originally planned, and won't really be good for much more than what the Russians used MIR for, which was mostly political grandstanding.

Any thoughts?