Posted on 06/29/2009 6:19:21 PM PDT by KevinDavis
"Perhaps worst of all, we were (are) hearing an incessant drumbeat that the world was running out of room and resources, that we faced a world of limits, a zero-sum game in which our children would have to settle for less in life than we had. Many young people who picked up that message-that success would be elusive--concluded that study and hard work might not be the kind of blue-chip investments they were a generation earlier. The space program itself was viewed by many as a too-expensive series of stunts that would be unaffordable in the bad times ahead. It was certainly not seen in terms of an investment in breaking out of those limits and into new and better times."
(Excerpt) Read more at spaceref.com ...
We need a space based gold rush.
The United States squandered the opportunity for fantastic wealth it was given in the early 1990s when it canceled the Texas supercollider, cut back fusion research to be little more than a jobs program for dull-thinking establishment scientists, and made the space station an "international" effort in an inferior orbit, so money could be reallocated to social programs.
One day some people might inherit the stars, but they won't be Americans. At the moment, it is hard to say who might be the rightful heir to humanity's destiny, but it certainly isn't the socialist country with 30+ year old obsolete launch equipment that the United States has become.
Actual defined property rights in space would be a good start.
You can thank Clinton for that..
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