Ok I think I found out what might be the problem on my end anyway. I just opened up 2142 and on the EA account log in page it still says "v1.40". So basically I'm going to have to assume that the second patch I downloaded for 2142 didn't work. It's not the first time that this has happened.
It's a miracle that the FS team was able to make this mod with EA's excellent (yes~I'm being sarcastic) programming and support. So anyway, for you guys having the same issue; you might want to start up a game of 2142 just to see what version it says. As for myself, I'm going to try to download 1.5 for the 3rd time. WOOOO! I love crap-shoot downloading!