SpaceX efforts are "private" and "commercial" only through the loosest of characterizations. They have received well over $ 1 billion dollars in federal money over the years, mostly from DoD and NASA. Moreover, their promises greatly exceed their accomplishments -- to date, their Falcon 1 has two successes out of five attempts (and since rapidly dropped in favor of its successor) while the Falcon 9 has flown twice, not entirely without incident. No SpaceX launch vehicle has yet delivered a single paying commercial (and only one government payload, for Malaysia no less) to orbit.
SpaceX is one of three "high-tech" companies started and owned by Elon Musk, an Obama contributor. His other two companies make an electric car (Tesla) and solar power arrays (Solar Cities). Both of these companies have received DoE grants for development. Three companies, each taking federal dollars -- the grifter's trifecta.
The most egregious part of this bogus "commercial" New Space scam is that it is being marketed to the public as a new direction in spaceflight. In fact, it is merely another form of government contracting and the vehicles go nowhere beyond low Earth orbit, where we have been already going for the last 50 years. This fraudulent portrayal by the current administration and their lackeys is designed to deflect attention away from the fact that Obama has quietly and systematically dismantled the American civil space program.
Another voice of reason from somebody who "gets it". Thank you.
NASA doesn't have rocket factories. They never did.
But the tax-payer is paying a hell of a lot less with Space-X than with Lockheed or the others.
The 'big boys' had lots of failures, spectacular public failures on the launch pad, during the cold war with NASA trying to run the show.
/johnny
Yep, but what ya conveniently left out is and he also contributed to the Republican party and Tea Party people, such as Rubio, among others.
Actually, it is new. NASA is buying a service from a company that made all its own decisions concerning hardware (with a lot of expertise from NASA, no doubt). Traditional aerospace has the government selecting a hardware design, funding it, and making every critical decision. We are long past any need for that model.
Obama's vision fails because he ultimately denies SpaceX a market by defunding any real space exploration, as you point out.