Jack Black, I have never seen any satellite pictures of Earth with a bulge in the atmosphere. Also if the Moon's gravity creates a bulge in the water so close to Earth's gravity I would think it would have a much greater effect on gases in the atmosphere which are lighter, further away from Earth's gravity and closer to the Moon's gravity. Not to mention the force of the Moon's gravity combined with the vacuum of space.
Have you done the mass to see how much it would be bulging?
I doubt it.
I have never seen a satellite picture of Earth that shows the eccentricity of Earth or the tides.
This is because of how small it is compared to Earth. You would need a reference circle/ellipse to compare it to.
Then you have the issue of viewing the atmosphere and deciding where the arbitrary cut off is.
No. The vacuum wont effect it, because it is the same in all directions.
You also claim it is closer, this depends on exactly where you claim the edge is.
The moon ranging between roughly 350 000 and 400 000 km away.
One common arbitrary line in the sand saying the edge of the atmosphere is 100 km. That would put the edge of the atmosphere at roughly 0.025-0.03% closer. Not very much, so I would say that distance difference can be ignored.
Yes, it is lighter, and much thinner, especially at altitude. This makes it much harder to see and gives rise to less noticeable effects, and would make the apparent edge quite blurry.
However, as gravity accelerates objects the same regardless of their mass (the mass of the object being accelerated), its lower mass doesn't help either.
Yes, it is further from Earth, by a more significant amount, however again, that is the same in all directions and thus doesn't give rise to a tidal force.
So at best, you are looking for a distortion of a few m in a blurry line.
You would stand pretty much no chance of seeing that, so it isn't surprising that you don't.
From that Wikipedia link..."Atmospheric tides are also produced through the gravitational effects of the Moon.[4] Lunar (gravitational) tides are much weaker than solar (thermal) tides and are generated by the motion of the Earth's oceans (caused by the Moon) and to a lesser extent the effect of the Moon's gravitational attraction on the atmosphere." So the Moon's effect on the ocean creates a greater Lunar tide than the moon's direct effect on the atmosphere? WTF! How does that work?! Who writes this stuff?! Again I ask how does the moon have a greater effect on heavier water close to the Earth than lighter gases further away from the Earth? You can put on a lab coat and call it science but that makes no sense.
But that isn't what it says.
It is saying the sun has a more significant effect on the air than the moon does.
Quite different.
This is because the air has pretty much no thermal mass and thus can easily be heated up by the sun, while the Ocean is much harder to heat up by the sun (to the same extent) and has evaporation cooling.