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Posted on 11/15/2009 6:56:21 AM PST by KevinDavis
NASA, at age 50, is having a midlife crisis. What should it do after it retires the shuttle? Can it, should it, recreate the glories of its youth? Or should it mature into a wise enabler of technological and institutional leadership?
The 2003 Space Shuttle disaster, underfunding of President George W. Bush’s call to go to the “Moon, Mars and Beyond” and the advent of a new presidential administration have caused NASA to re-evaluate its mission at a truly fundamental level. The President’s Review of U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee, led by retired Lockheed Martin CEO Norman Augustine, was asked to develop feasible scenarios for the next steps in human space flight. I was privileged to participate.
First we asked what NASA can accomplish with its current budget. Our core conclusion is that, while the current budget can lay the groundwork for manned missions beyond earth orbit as Bush had envisioned, the present program or any other that aspires to send humans beyond earth’s orbit cannot be accomplished in the next decade. Additional funding of $3 billion per year would be needed. President Barack Obama has to decide whether it is worth it.
(Excerpt) Read more at signonsandiego.com ...
Playing with the little president playset.
If ever entangled in an annoying debate with an America-hating international, the fail-safe closer is: “We put 12 men on the moon. What have you done?”
He will mosf likely decide .... that he is present.
In my younger years no-one supported the space program like I did, then the shuttle program came along. We were told men could be put in space in almost a moments notice...
What we got was a very impressive spacecraft that couldn’t take off or land it there was a cloud in the sky. A moments notice became months or years. Did we learn from the research? Yes, but that’s always NASA’s excuse for overspending and underproducing. If we had just spent the money on technological research, i.e. Star Wars, I think we might have gotten much more return on the investment. On the other hand, space is an area we better not find ourselves in second place. What are other’s thoughts?
Giving hundreds of billions to a bunch of corrupt blood suckers is an investment but funding high tech is a money waster? Only 3 more years until this loser is given the boot.
He’ll appoint a czar, have a summit, give a lot of speaches. Outcome: nothing.
We should concede world leadership in science, technology and space exploration.
Hand the mantle to the Chinese. /s
Do we get to nominate the humans??
Michael Moore comes to mind...
Hell, yeah! It’s worth it!
I think Obama should be the first to try it. I might even send a donation.
This isn’t a very important decision. NASA has been a can that’s been kicked down the road for decades now. They do unmanned flights just fine and there’s no real need to do manned flights.
We support a moonbase, even a well developed one, prior to Mars settlement for the very reason we have procrastinated on returning to the Moon for forty years; that is, don't extend so far and so expensively that the Left (primarily female) will argue the bleeding heart priorities-at-home rant. Start relatively close-by where the infrastructure of extraterrestrial basing can be developed with less cost, while also exploiting the Moon's own inherent benefits. The latter of which includes the low energy cost of moon launching into extended realms, although admittedly the question of energy availability on and from the Moon is an essential one.
Incidentally this latter question on energy availability for Moonbase survival will inject the thermodynamic basis of economics into its proper perspective, for which The Suntrade Institute has argued all along. Just one of the side benefits that comes from man's exploration of the extended universe.
Johnny Suntrade
You wasted valuable pixels and time with the “No sarc” comment. It would have been implied. lol
The current occupant of the White House should have no say in this matter whatsoever.
Valuable pixels? Didn’t know! Wow!
Just wanted to make sure all understood...
Robots only in space are for wimps... We can do manned flights just fine..
I wasn’t being insulting. You did see the “LOL” a the end.
your post was right on and added to the comedy, though I don’t what France is. LOL
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