I don’t know about you, but I don’t find this combination of events to be particularly lifting of the animal spirits.
Acquaman notwithstanding, it seems unlikely that it was just a jet contrail… rising from the ocean. I have the impression that the Official Story tellers in Washington are having a rough time coming up with their usual fiction. I tend to think their best bet is to blame the private space consortium with which Richard Garriott is involved, give them a chewing-out for failing to properly alert the appropriate authorities, then quietly pay them to publicly support the story.
Stratfor concludes that “everything points to a missile launched by the United States”, but they find it inexplicable that no reason for launching the missile has been given yet.