Posted on 10/20/2010 5:09:57 PM PDT by KevinDavis
Congress may have put the kibosh on NASA's plan to return astronauts to the moon, but that doesn't mean the agency is giving up its lunar ambitious. The new plan? Pay others to go.
There's a rich pool of partners to choose from, thanks to a Google-sponsored competition offering $30 million in prizes for landing and operating rovers on the moon. So far, the contest, which is based on the 2004 $10 million Ansari X Prize competition for privately funded human spaceflights, has drawn 22 contenders.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.discovery.com ...
LLS
A prize for the first private ship to reach the moon would be cool. Less wasteful than putting on plays about global warming and free condoms in gay bars.
Government Grant from National Aeronautics and Space Administration
http://www.topgovernmentgrants.com/grants_gov_display.php?program=NNH10ZEA001N-SFW1
I’m not sure how I feel about this; if NASA were providing the prizes, instead of wasting money going nowhere, then I could say it’s a good idea. If they aren’t researching or doing missions themselves, then paying for results makes sense. If they are going to continue their make-work projects, too, then neither public nor private will have enough mission clarity or money to accomplish anything.
This is totally aside from the Constitutional question of what an appropriate expenditure on exploration might look like.
Perhaps we can pay Mexican astronauts to do the flights that American astronauts won’t do. After all, just remember “Jose Jimenez”.
S-T-U-P-I-D!!!!!
The UN position that all space is the common heritage of mankind is guaranteed to slow progress, through lack of incentive.
Maybe pay the Muzzies to go? All of ‘em? One way trip?
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