Posted on 01/08/2004 11:19:24 PM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Elaborate.
I think a friend of mine summed it up best about 10 years ago. He said "We're Americans, we should have been walking around Mars in the 1980s."
Of all the things this country has lost over the preceding decades, one of the most important, and, indeed, perhaps the most vital, is our spirit of adventure, the yearning to go beyond what we now have and know, the longing to see what is over the next hill. It is a spirit that was born in mankind probably going back to the time the first caveman threw a log in a river and hopped on for the ride. It reached a zenith in the 1960s with our moon landings program, albeit driven by a geopolitical rivalry. Now is the time to revive that spirit, and do it for more altruistic, as well as practical, reasons.
Throwing the bone to conservatives. That's a good way to put it!
Do you think we shouldn't have gone to the moon the first time?
If you could go back and make it (a manned mission) not happen, would you do it?
If it's a big waste now, then it was a big waste then.
What say you?
Yes
If you could go back and make it (a manned mission) not happen, would you do it?
Yes
If it's a big waste now, then it was a big waste then.
Correct.
Or should it not have been done at all?
Do you believe that we gained nothing of value, or rather ENOUGH value, to justify it?
I was going to make a long post about how the country has been emasculated by liberal agendas and views that have been pushed over the past thirty years and how even many Conservatives have bought into it but it's too depressing (not meant to be sexist - emasculated in the sense of "To deprive of strength or vigor; weaken." ).
We are definitely not the country nor the adventuresome and risk-taking people we were 130 years ago (or some would even say 40 years ago). These days many are more concerned with themselves and thinking about today or yesterday, and not tomorrow and their children's and grandchildren's future. The liberals push this furher with their "everybody's a victim of something these days" garbage.
I still think there are many of us who still have the spirit to go further than we've ever gone.
No not at all. Very much of what the government spends money on is justifiable. In a way even the useless manned space program is justifiable as was the project to build hydrodams to employ people during the depression. But if we are going to simply have the government make busywork I'd rather see it do something that really does have a payoff. The manned spaceprogram doesn't and all the so called spinoffs are hype.
Or should it not have been done at all?
I still vote for not at all and using the government money for something as usefull as hydro damns. Weather satellites maybe, or windmills or anything. Putting people on the moon was a multi billion in non adjusted dollars joyride. It was no different than winning a Hockey game against the Russians. It was no different than climbing mt Everest. These are fine for private enterprise but not for the government.
Do you believe that we gained nothing of value, or rather ENOUGH value, to justify it?
We took government money and put it back in the hands of people, just like the building of dams. That isn't all bad but I simply reject the spinoff lie used to continue the programs.
Ok, we have the expendables for the tonnage and the shuttle for the men.
Oops, scratch the shuttle for now. What happens when we are down to two? One? None? A "permananent" moon base really needs a permanent transportation system, and our only manned system is looking real marginal. All the plans to replace our manned system are based on the space station being all we ever do.
Looking at our expendables, I have a hard time imagining that such a modest increase in funding would cover even that end of things.
The biggest problem with the CEV is what is launching it. It doesn't exist, but would probably look like a gold plated version of an existing expendable. It will likely be Shuttle II: All the nightmares without the capability.
We have had forty years to develop a decent launcher. We are either unable or unwilling to do it. Without it, manned space is and expensive boondoggle doomed to irrelevancy.
That was disgusting, and that was when we knew old NASA was about done. New NASA is already being born.
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