Russians Want U.S. to Send Them to Mars (My title)

Associated Press ^ | 07/05/02 | Mara D. Bellaby

[hedgetrimmer]

It wasn't "lost". It was MURDERED by a coalition of leftists, united largely by their hatred of the US (and themselves). That coalition was fostered by the Communist ideology, and has outlived the state Communism that financed it--becoming self-supporting through "tax-exempt foundations" like the P-yew (Pew) Foundataion and similar.

This is the absolute truth! Question is, how do we turn this around and save our children, our progeny? How do we shame, goad, prod, encourage, force our government to 'git goin'"!

[Billy_bob_bob]

I hate to tell you this, because I'm an engineer and I've been working for over twenty years, but I constantly advise the young people that I meet to avoid engineering as a career. How can you compete against a billion people in India and a billion people in China?

Silicon Valley has a new caste system, it's Chinese and East Indians for engineering, Caucasians for marketing, Hispanics for food service, groundskeeping and janitorial, and Black people get to work in Human Resources. This is the caste system of the future. The only professional jobs left for Caucasians is marketing. If you can minor in engineering while majoring in marketing then your job prospects are wonderful. If you want to work as an engineer realize that you are going to be competing with someone who is here on an H1-B, who is willing to work for $35k a year (with a six year degree!) and is expected to work unlimited free overtime, sometimes up to 70 hours a week. Gee, I can't imagine why more American kids aren't interested in learning engineering? Maybe because if they put the same amount of time into a law degree they can make ten times as much?

I've had a good career, and I'm glad I got in when I did, but there is no way I would want to become an engineer today.

[John Jamieson]

A few billion was 30 at my last recollection, also over .6 billion per service flight. The Space Station is not a gas station or assembly area, never was; that was propaganda. Serves no useful purpose for a Mars mission. The present 3 man crew will barely be able to keep it running. It is major blood sucker in the NASA budget.

[Tourist Guy]

>>>>The Chinese get there first<<<

Why not? They've got the dough

[anymouse]

President Bush knows that the power of free enterprise, not government largess will open up space access for all missions, including going to Mars.

By allowing a competitive marketplace for Earth-to-orbit launch vehicles, the price of launching everything into space will come down significantly. When that happens, then Mars exploration (and lunar exploration) missions become politically (and even privately) financially viable. If you don't drive down that cost, anything you do in space will continue to be prohibitably expensive and non-starters beyond plans and viewgraphs like this latest Russian fantasy.

Unfortunately there is always a segment that believes if you just find the right mission or technology to do in space, you can find the money to fly the mission. But the Cold War is over and neither the Russians nor the US (or even the Chinese) can bully their taxpayers to put up the Trillions of Dollars necessary to do it with existing expensive launchers.

So let us focus on realistic solutions to build a robust and cost effective launch infrastructure (market-based), so we can do all of the amazing missions in space that we desire - including making money, so these missions help not hurt the terrestrial economy.

[Wonder Warthog]

A few billion was 30 at my last recollection, also over .6 billion per service flight. The Space Station is not a gas station or assembly area, never was; that was propaganda. Serves no useful purpose for a Mars mission. The present 3 man crew will barely be able to keep it running. It is major blood sucker in the NASA budget.

Still a pittance. And 30 billion over WHAT PERIOD OF TIME?? Of course the current space station is not a "gas station or assembly area", but it is the core of one. What else are you gonna use???

The major "blood sucker" in the NASA budget is/are all the non-essential missions tacked into NASA at the behest of powerful congressmen. Eliminate THOSE and focus on EXPANDING the space station and getting a cheaper SSTO capability, instead of the expensive "government charity" to the aerospace industry that is the "spaceplane" project.

[RightWhale]

There is a worldwide surplus of launch capability. Partly that's due to cost since only high-value projects get launched. In the commsat business, the launch costs are only a part of the business plan, and it's not a stopper.

If you want to launch a Winnebago complete with family and dog, the cost is way too high. But that's where we want to be: cheap launches and cheap payloads that anybody can afford.

[irv]

>>>>The Chinese get there first<<<

Why not? They've got the dough

And plenty of tech the Clinton's sold them. But I'd still rather we got there at least close enough to them, to preclude them owning it.