The return flight was absolutely flawless, everything happened on que and all of the systems worked as advertised, even the thrusters. Where is the recognition of that?? It's time to look at some aspects of this other than the hardware.
We have been driven by a media induced hysteria and contemporary cultural norms, to expect failure, not just in Starliner but in many aspects of our lives. Optimism is gone.. The media was filling front pages with this pessimism because there are no hurricanes or shark attacks to dwell on so far this year. Hell, they've even run out of tornadoes.
It is obvious that NASA was afraid to make a decision that wasn't 100% guaranteed. They were more afraid of the political fallout than take the chance for success. John Glen knew his ride on the Atlas was about a 75% shot at success. He had seen too many blow up to delude himself otherwise. Still, he went.
Neil Armstrong landed the LEM on the moon even though his computer gave out on him. Standing NASA instructions were to abort the mission if this occurred. He made an informed decision based on his risk analysis.
I admire the people who know the risks of spaceflight and despite those risks, go anyway. That is the America I grew up in and hope to see again before I die.
I have been saying for a while is that China is going to own the Moon.
Why?
Because they don’t care how many people die in Moon missions.
They don’t care how many of them fail.
American bureaucrats and politicians could never take the heat that piles of dead astronaut bodies would generate.
Space is not safe. It is dangerous.
Indeed, and that applies to every aspect of our society.
The utter mediocrities in media and politics can't stand to see other people succeed at all, much less succeed spectacularly. Therefore, they tear people down at every opportunity.