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Big Changes In Proposed U.S. Space Budget
Guppy06 writes: "CNN has this article on some of the effects of Bush's budget proposal would have on the space program. To make a long story short, funding for the manned space program is being trimmed (there's talk about outsourcing the shuttle program) and some high-profile missions to the outer solar system have been cut (say good-bye to the Pluto-Kuiper Express). On the flip side, nuclear propulsion research is getting a boost. Love it, hate it, some big things seem to be in store." The Planetary Society has their reaction to the budget proposal. And because it's been submitted several times: the ISS suffered a computer outage but all is well now.
I'm sorry, there aren't any trimmings left. They're seriously digging into the budget. I wish the politicians would wake up and maybe put some money into our future instead of the military.
Unless, of course, they feel the military is their future.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
I don't know why presidents proposed budgets get so much press. Presidents don't really make the budget congress does.
Until our children are no longer molded into castrated sheep democracy remains a fake and a danger. -A. S. Neill
Pics (of Pluto, that is)?
:-)
Why can't we get a friggin' fly-by of this last unphotographed planet in our Solar System? I don't think that's too much to ask. Christ, even just three or four would do it for me
If you celebrate Xmas, befriend me (538
According to an @discovery.ca segment a month or two ago, NASA is already falling seriously behind in its responsibilities in the International Space Station. Not to place blame anywhere, but I think the United States needs to realize that this is an international project and that they have to keep up with the other countries involved. Cutting funding for international projects like the ISS isn't really their call... although I'd be interested to see what action the other countries would take if NASA's non-compliance became a serious problem.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Right now Bush is primarily focused on increasing military spending.
Some people think it's due to patriotic causes, like the war on terrorism. Other people (conspiracy theorists) think it has more to do with the Carlyle (sp?) Group (a private investment group with high powered politicians from around the world as members.)
So if you expected a manned mission to mars by 2015... you're probably not going to see it. Not to sound overtly political, but Republicans have always hated the space program seeing it as wasteful of their money. So for every year republicans control the house, and the presidency you might as well add one more year onto the space programs mission to mars 2015 goals. (You should start counting with the year Republicans took over the house during the second year of clintons first term.)
The Generation
I'd say something witty here, but I'm not that bright.
President Bush seems to forget that pure scientific research has been the most productive driver of American prosperity in the last 200 years. So many of the technologies we enjoy today are a result of research that, at the time of funding, could not be directly justified. Hopefully, universities and research institutions will be able to get through this budget crunch time intact, but the blow to students and scientists seeing their field attacked may be much more severe, I'm afraid.
I think that the most astronomy that's going to get done in these next few years is astronomy by the Air Force, with satellites that are pointing down at the Earth, instead of up at the skies. There never seems to be a shortage of funding for those projects, even though diverting 1% of that money would probably save NASA and the US space research program.
Nice idea, but unfortunatly anonymous page widening cannot be stopped like this. And somehow changing the anonymous "bonus" to -6 doesn't help either.
*SIGH* when will it end...
No security through obscurity: my password is goatse. Stop me before I troll again.
as privatizing airport security.
In the 60's astronaughts were heros on the same level as athletes and entertainers. Now it's like "Oh, another shuttle launch? YAWN"
Here is a space.com news article which details exactly that. The US military does believe that space is their future, and they want to control it. There's talk about creating a new space force division, though for now it looks like the air force will control space missions for the near future. Given this one may ask, why are they killing off manned flight? I think it's because they realize that automated systems, not manned flight, is where both terrestrial and space flight is going. Humans have far too many physical limitations which automated systems don't share. Everything from very limited acceleration to supporting basic biological needs go against the requirements for "controlling space". To further this policy NASA (along with whatever scientific projects are ongoing and/or planned will be eviscerated.
Cheers,
--Maynard
We had peace, now war.
We had budget surpluses, now budget deficits.
We had a 'peace dividend,' now we have the largest military budget.
We had a strong economy, now a recession.
We had a fair tax system, now a tax system favoring the rich.
We had an 'Alaska,' now we have a 'Drilled Alaska.'
We had a blow job scandal, now we have a 'jobs' and billions of $ scandal.
We had liberties, now we have virtually none.
He dosent want any new fangled hydrogen fueled vehicles to cut into oil revenues. Now if the shuttle ran on crude oil......
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
I didn't think it was as bad as could be, really. Losing the Pluto-Kuiper probe is a bummer, but there's still pretty strong (in relative terms for today's financial climate) support for basic science.
More to the point - Nuclear Propulsion - Hooray!. This is an utterly fabulous development, and I'm probably going to get flamed for saying so. It's still the truth, all the same. Decent nuclear propulsion is the only way to reduce the current long flight times around the solar system.
The missions to the outer planets, I think, are very important and should receive full funding. They may not be very efficient, but travel to the outer planets takes so long and is subject to so many constraints that we really need to get these projects going now. It's a shame that they are being cut.
Nuclear propulsion in space is a hot potato because it's potentially dual-use. If this research is conducted completely openly and in an international framework, then it may be acceptable. Otherwise, it will be perceived as simply a way for the US to militarize space and put nuclear technology into space, and, domestically, it would be little more than a ploy for transferring NASA funds to military research.
Perhaps the Feds are hoping that the "Space Tourism" wave will grow. If you get a *few* more bored multi-millionaires to cough up the cash to take a joy-ride in space, we may be able to actually turn the space program into a money making venture! (yeah, right!)
The space program has been one of the major sources of technological advancement in our country, and it would sure be a shame to have to depend on the dept of defence to fill this void!
My sig hates me. That's ok, I never cared for it much anyway.
Well I was one of the people who submitted about the ISS going down...
Basically, the whole station was adrift for some time due to a hard drive crashing. My question was; what effect in space cause a HD to crash more often then here on earth? I thought of Zero Gravity, but really don't think that would have any effect... Now Radiation would. But wouldn't the amount of radiation to cause problems with a hard drive, be more then enough to cause problems with a human being?
Exomorph
http://www.rocketrynews.com/
He can pretty much do what he wants right now, since Congress is swept up in the "rally behind Bush no matter what maniacal things he says and does" craze.
Why is Grand Theft Auto a much more serious crime than Reckless Driving?
Makes sense to me. If you're not going to allow anyone with a history of drinking, lying, or cheating [Slashdot] to fly you don't need a big budget for manned spaceflight.
"Good things don't end with eum, they end with mania or teria." - H. Simpson
So I guess that they will be spending more on "Toilet Seats" instead...
Evacuate the ISS, let it burn up on re-entry, and use the money we save to fund real science.
- Have a picture
The US Shuttle program is already largely outsourced. Some 5 years ago, NASA wanted to consolidate many of its contracts in the program, and a company called United Space Alliance (unitedspacealliance.com) was formed. This company now largely operates the Shuttle, from vehicle maintenance to crew training. USA was supposed to be getting a 2-year contract extension, but now the Bush administration is talking of rebidding the contract.
It gives a whole new meaning to the Blue Screen of Death :-)))))) ROFL!
Is your company running tools written by ma
Each shuttle flight costs $x, there are $n per year.
There are $m rich guys willing to pay $y each on average to go into space.
if($x*$n<$y*$m) {
$nasa{'selfsustaining'}=true;
}
stipe42
cutting out social security, governement funded health care, and welfare? How about letting our government do what it is supposed to do - national defense and the federal courts, that's it...
a) Not only they are going to cut into environmental protection (which, if you ask me, has more impact on people's everyday life and health, than space research), but also
b) there is no article specifically about it in the news, showing that environment is, for all intents and purposes, irrelevant to the great majority of american society
Sigged!
The planet needs new propulsion for space missions, with it we go forward, without it we stagnate. Manned missions are getting trimmed because the Space Shuttle is a huge white elephant and noone is willing to admit it (the russians put the same size payloads into orbit for FAR cheaper than the Shuttle). If we go back to the basics (researching new propulsion), then everyone wins, including (ultimately) manned missions elsewhere.
Go Lakers!
... is certainly an option for long duration missions, currently we have little to no technology available for long range missions to the outer planets and beyond, aside from chemical thrusters and gravity assists, which tend to lead to extremely long flight times. And I haven't heard much about ion propulsion since DS 1, anyone have news on that?
Maybe it's just wishful thinking on my part but with all the emphasis on new propulsion technologies, I wonder if NASA's gearing up for expanded missions or maybe even the long delayed mission to Mars?
-- Your local friendly mad scientist-in-training
Don't tell me Bush is thinking of bringing back Project Orion. It's almost a good idea, except for the bad PR and the possible nuclear contamination. Not that I'd object to Bush getting some bad PR, of course.
Apparently, there were plans to build a high-atmosphere sky base above the USSR during the cold war using this technology. Makes you wonder just what our government is capable of.
I'm hoping we get some matter/anti-matter couplers in stock so we we can put some nacelles on the back of the shuttle.
yeee-haw!
Sorry, been watching TiVo'd eps of Enterprise the last few days.
The world has been going to hell for a while now and its getting worse. We need to deal with our problems here rather than gather some pictures from a planet a billion miles away. What good is this scientific information if the people that it benefits are dying at the hands of terrorists? People need to wake up and realize the space program should not be spending money like crazy at a time like this. Bush gets my ok on this. This is the right thing to do, the responsible thing to do.
Mobile Suits anyone?
It's me.
US government actively looking for aliens. Rumsfeld from Mars.
Who killed JFK? Elvis alive?
Only time will tell...
get off this planet before idiots like bush ruin the whole damn place. Who wants to come up with ideas on how to escape?
Whinny liberal.
Bye.
Here we go again...
/.'d.
so, if someone has some free web space, I suggest they start a 'pool' page for the date and time ISS hits the water. Maybe there's a catchy domain name that could be gotten.
We have
Now, we can have 'skylab'd' - man made space objects that return to earth early due to leadership failings on the part of U.S.: presidents, congress, and NASA.
We won't get into space in any meaningful way as long as a government employment program is sucking up and destroying the engineers who could make it happen. Gut NASA like the beached whale it is before the corpse explodes from the pressure of its own decomposition.
The Wright Brothers (or pick your own early aviation pioneers)did not require a 15,000 man ground support crew to fly.
Lindbergh made a solo flight from the US to Paris so he could win a $25,000 prize.
If Bush really wants to get into space (and yes, the military does - they are not really stupid) he should get Congress to set up a series of prizes. Five billion tax free for the first resuseable spacecraft to make three round trips to the vicinity of the ISS in a thirty day period carrying say three people and two tons of cargo on each trip.
Rather than controlling the development of spacecraft, the government should just promise to buy a bunch of them that meet a certain price performance criteria. And, if Bush with his noted tendencies towards such things can not make it happen, it will probably happen somewhere else (India, China, Japan - hell maybe even France - (those arrogant little snots still miss Napoleon))
You either believe in rational thought or you don't
If I could trust the Bush administration to have a legitimate interest in science and nuclear-based propulsion, I would be happier about this budget-shuffling. The ISS has been a slapped-together fiasco, a victim of politics and bureucracy - a perfect example of what NASA and space exploration shouldn't be.
Nuclear-powered probes have been used for, literally, decades. It's actually something of a misnomer to call the Voyager, Cassini, et al probes "nuclear-powered". "Decay-powered" might be a better term, since their energy source is radioactive decay generating heat. Putting nuclear-powered rovers on other planets might be a good idea, allowing rovers to run longer. I wonder how much longer Sojourner and Sagan Memorial Station could have run with a decay-based backup. Of course, there is always a concern about radioactive materials being exposed to the environment; not much of a problem in interplanetary space, something of a problem if the probe is on a planet suspected of having life.
The point of decay-powered power generation is to run electricity-based devices for long periods of time at distances from the Sun too great to make solar generation effective. If the Bush report refers to nuclear reaction-based power generation and propulsion, I'm a bit lost. The best reason to use nuclear-powered engines and generators would be to support manned flights that require much energy for life support, emergency power, pushing along its own bulk, et al. There's also the issue of fission- vs. fusion-based generators and engines.
Perhaps I should find a copy of the report, but that one little bit rubs me wrong. The Bush administration seems hell-bent on reviving Cold War-era defense programs that were never actually proven, and dropping or evading weapons treaties, some of which dealt with the development of nuclear technology for space use. I just can't shake the feeling this is a wedge to finally move the nuclear race into Earth orbit; one proposal mentioned by Sagan in 'Cosmos' was Project Orion, a propulsion system based on the detonation of fusion bombs.
I'm pretty sure it's paranoia... but it's a nagging feeling, and it creeps me out.
Someday, you're going to die. Get over it.
Now he wants to give those same friends a huge tax cut with the idea that the will all run out and build factories to employ us all. Hah!
During the whole anthrax episode, five people died, and an additional ten got sick and recovered. Ten people got sick at a post office when a ream of copier paper was irradiated to kill anthrax.
Now Bush wants to spend an additional $11bn on anthrax.
How much do you suppose is in his budget for AIDS research (or cancer, or the slew of other diseases which kill many more people than anthrax has)? Certainly no $11bn.
Why can't these politicians ever have cronies in worthwhile industries? Because worthwhile industries don't have the money to bribe the politicians blue. Why not? Because worthwhile industries don't get kickbacks and deals from the gov't. Why don't they? Because they don't have buddies in the gov't. Lather, rinse, repeat...
Ultimately, there is no incentive for the companies that actually get funded to do anything except whore for more funding and pretend to spend what they already got while pocketing it.
Sigh!
Why is Grand Theft Auto a much more serious crime than Reckless Driving?
The shuttles and the ISS are rotten programs.
It's blazingly obvious to anyone who's taken a good look at the shuttle program that they should never have made a second one. They were supposed to learn from their mistakes making the first one, and make better shuttles, but instead they basically copied their first attempt at a reusable vehicle to make a small fleet and kept it in service even after it was obvious that it offered no benefit over single-use rockets.
People wondered what the point of the ISS was from day one. It's just a huge money-sink in the sky.
The best justification for these manned missions is that they are paving the way for future manned spaceflight, but they are somehow both bloated and unambitious: so costly that their failure could not be tolerated, so only "established" technologies are used for the functions they are supposed to be developing, merely spending resources on accomplishing these non-accomplishments rather than taking chances on potentially revolutionary technologies.
NASA is increasingly an organization of frightened bureaucrats, desperately avoiding failure, rather than bold explorers, risking much to gain much.
Thanks President Bush-for-Brains, you just saved the american taxpayer 0.001% of the the budget, what are you going to do now?
I'm going to disneyland!
What an idiot.
so, how do we plan to get people into space without the shuttle? begin a whole new launch program, and on less money? Not yet.
What NASA needs is a budget increase so it can go on doing what it currently plans on doing, and activly fund research into cheaper ways to get into space.
This is so short sited for so many reasons. Nothing would bring this country together more then putting a US citizen on Mars.
Spin off development is huge. If this is privatized, all spin off technology will be patented.
If you think the shuttle has no payoff, why would large corporation be pushing for its privitization? Has a corporation, ever, pushed for something they can't benefit from?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
We gotta start making some MONEY up there damnit.
It is not like it cannot be done, the main issue (and granted a huuuge one) would be to build the initial stations in space for handling of various extracted resources.
Hell there are 8 other planets in this solar system, why do we have to tear apart ours? There are some darn valuable resources up there, *taps lycos on the head* go get'em!
Seriously though, hhhuuuge startup costs, but scaled, not likely too much more then the initial startup costs of getting resources from the "New World" way back when.
Need help treating your acne? Come here!
Bush wants to cancel the mission to Europa for good reason....
All these worlds are yours, except Europa.
He got that message last year, after he discovered weapons in a fax paux involving hitting Cheney with a chicken bone after a White House dinner.
After all, I'd rather see logged in troll goodness than AC crap.
I totally agree.
My point was, that somehow setting AC's to -1 (or -6 for that matter) doesn't work. (try it)
my guess is, and I'm not going to bother to look up the source or anything, that first the ac modifier is applied, so it gets kicked to -5 or so, then it's made -1 because that's the lowest it can get, and AFTER that, the +1 bonus for long comment is added, so it's back at 0
Basically it's the same discussion as for the karma cap : roundoffs/caps/etc. should occur last, not halfway a calculation
No security through obscurity: my password is goatse. Stop me before I troll again.
The GOP has hated the space program since Kennedy; it's a proven winner for the Democrats.
Sounds like they can finally kill it (in the name of fiscal responsibility); outsource everything and absorb what remains of NASA into the military.
The emphasis on nuclear propulsion... hmm... There are a lot of very hot, very promising technologies out there just dying for research money. The one they single out sounds suspiciously like a barely disguised weapon's program. Be prepared for double-talk like: "defensive weapon" or "humanitarian bombing".
=brian
This proposed budget gives with one hand and takes away with the other. I hope that we will someday go to the only other solar body with an ocean. (Europa) It should be pointed out that we have used nuclear power systems since 1961. http://nuclear.gov/space/space-history.html
Sounds like they're getting their act together, or at least moving in that direction.
>> I firmly believe that the military has to be the future of where all the power is centralized.
A quote, forget from whom, but seems poignantly relevant: The easiest way to get shot is to carry a gun.
Bush seems the stereotypical spaghetti western cowpoke, speaking softly and carrying a big gun, and, in the spirit of late Hollywood arrivals, lusting after a bigger gun. I wonder who (in the figurative and collective sense) among us will get shot as a result of this.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Not only do they feel that it is our future (ie safety and security), but perhaps their political future as well. Modern war shows immediate results (just turn on CNN or Fox to see for yourself). The space program, on the other hand, hasn't really capture much attention since the moon landing. And failures abound going to Mars. Spending on the military goes twoards something the American people do see. Besides, do you think theres more former astronauts out there, or soldiers?
...is the electronic medium that slashdot is published on and everyone is using to read my blathering. Remember, the Internet got its start as a little known US Defense department research project.
"You get what you pay for after all." --
The mix of systems isn't necessarily a bad thing since each system was (ostensibly) chosen for its particular task. I was unable to find any information on the systems running avionics or which OS the attitude control system that went belly-up was running. I'm curious - any project managers out there know the answer?
Some of these systems are Russian in design, which has hampered my search since I don't grok the language. The Russians have long experience with putting stuff up that works forever - be nice to know what sort of hardware/software they use. Their systems are home-grown on the ISS - except for a few boxen for Russian crew. BTW, all PC-type boxes on the ISS are ThinkPads with an odd terminal or two floating around for good measure.
Anyone interested in picking apart the station would benefit greatly from International Space Station Evolution Data Book (PDF), which can also be viewed in it's google-rendered HTML format.
Space age toilet seats! Get your bid in now for these ANTIQUE babies from the time when pople actually flew beyond the clouds. Each comes with a certificate of authenticity.
The problem is that he's toting the party line... Reganomics all over again.... Sigh...
The regan and bush years made our space program as bland and worthless ever. Now we have little bush showing that he is as short sighted as daddy.
I have always said that the only way to get the space program properly funded we need to declare war against another planet better yet another solar system.. (Alpha Centauri, you're going down....)
politicians will spend on research only if that research is important to security or getting them re-elected.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Do ANY of you people manage your own money? The budget is NOT CUT. What they've done is reduced the rate of increase. Yes, from the first paragraph, NASA is getting what it got last year, plus $500 million MORE.
What NASA, and the rest of our federal government, needs to do is eliminate the sheer waste of money that is going on... Focus on products that produce science, not kickbacks (*cough* ISS)
Write to the President and your Congressional delegates and tell them about it!!!
. html
f m
Their staff is there to listen to your comments and respond to them. They do take your voice into account.
They like email more than letters since the anthrax scare.
Here's a like to this years budget in HTML and PDF: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2003/index
Send your comments to the President at this address: president@whitehouse.gov
Find your Senator at this page: http://www.senate.gov/senators/senator_by_state.c
And find their email address here: http://www.senate.gov/contacting/index.cfm
You can find, then write to your Representative here (this is very slick): http://www.house.gov/writerep/
Please, please, please take a more active role in the direction our national technology policies take. Keep an eye on http://www.eff.org/alerts/ for issues of which you should be aware. If we don't do it as technology professionals and enthusiasts, no one will.
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
It is an obscene waste of resource to support these manned spaceflight missions. They are about 5% science and 95% subsidies to aerospace contractors. Lets use those funds for real science. Lets de-orbit the ISS, and use the money we save to fund fundamental research in robotics, AI, and MEMS. Then we can send up real missions with weather balloons. When the weather balloon reaches burst altitude, a small propulsion package boosts it the rest of the way.
We could have thousands of missions a year, not just 4 or 5.
The economy is in a slump and we need our resources here at home. I don't have any problem with deep-space exploration missions being cut right now. Frankly, they are of little value to begin with (other than providing us with pretty images and giving theorists some data to play with.) On the other hand, technology focused research, which is the primary goal of shuttle missions and also the side-benefit of military research, is of immediate practical value.
And then there are the idiot Dem's (not that all Dem's are idiots), that believe every piece of propaganda and Bush consipiracy theory they hear is naked truth. These are the people who go spreading around nonsense like "Bush just wants to make a giant military to blow everybody up" or "Bush just wants more Nukes." Check your facts, folks. Bush has thus far made drastic cuts in our nuclear arsenal, attempting instead to focus on defensive technologies. And no, a "missile defense system" doesn't mean Reagan's hair-brained StarWars being resurrected. (although then again, who are we to judge what the latest military satellite technology is?) As for the rest of the military, there seems to be a general trend towards precision and tactical weaponry, which from the perspective of maintaining peace with minimal collateral damage, is a very good thing.
Unfortunately, it's a fact of life that sometimes peace requires war. US participation in WW2 is a perfect example. The only alternative to war would be to turn the whole world into a one-government surveillance police state. And we all know that would not work, nor would we want it.
It's time to think about going to Mars. It's time to start building the right tools for that job.
.eu (ESA), .ca, .au, .nz, .za, .jp, .br, .ru and other friendly countries and make this a true collective effort.
In ten or twenty years, it's time for each and every one of us to do our duty for humankind, and volunteer for a one way trip to Mars.
Humankind needs to hedge its bets, and spread our spores to other worlds.
There will be huge costs for our society, and huge personal sacrifices for the first settlers, but it's an investment (the first of many) we as a race can't afford to not make.
Bush should make NASA join forces with
At about $20 million a head, it would take about 500 visitors a year to meet NASAs budget.
Man boobs.
Congress specifically added the Pluto mission in response to public interest - and we believe that public interest is important to the program."
Of course they did. That mission was never presented as an 'either-or' scenario, where funding would be drawn from some other budget to pay for the mission-- because no congressman wanted to appear as 'anti-science'. A true campaign would be to ask us plebes 'which of the following missions do you want see funded? a) Mars b) ISS c) Europa d) . . .
I applaud the fiscal responsibility in this new budget. The reality of the situation is that we are at war, and money is tight. Nothing is stopping these scientists from going to Tokyo, London, Paris, or Moscow to plead their case for the mission.
davejenkins.com |
In this conflict, there is no neutral ground. If any troll sponsors the crapflooders and page-wideners, they have become crapflooders and page-wideners themselves. And they will take that lonely path at their own peril.
No security through obscurity: my password is goatse. Stop me before I troll again.
Pardon me, if you will, but I do not really understand why posts containing truthful (but dissenting) statements are marked as 'troll' or 'flamebait'... Is the average Slashdot reader so mentally infeebled that they would be harmed by a dissenting opinion? Would the Open Source community crash and burn if honest debate was allowed in the confines of its advocacy forums?
Please people... Slashdot is damaged every time crap (FUD, lies, misinformation, re-written history, etc.) is celebrated as 'interesting' or 'insightful'. Open your minds a crack... you might be surprised at how much good it will do.
Of course I don't know jack about these kind of operations, but you would think constantly reorganizing the Nasa budget would result in untold amounts of wasted cash. Many projects take a long time to go from development to realization. When you are constantly cutting back and reorganizing resources, you are wasting the moeny and effort already invested. Nasa needs smarter, better, cheaper, but they also need to have guarantees that projects they start will be funded throughout their proposed duration.
Or is that the plan ..."You mean we filled that one with purified plutonium and it blew up on impact??? How did *that* happen???"
I would suggest outsourcing the shuttle to the people who run airport security. They know how to get very cheap labor.
Microsoft - Where would you like to go today, Maybe Jail?
I'm totally serious. NASA's manned program is still mostly using 70's technology, it's pathetic. They were on the moon over 30 years ago, but haven't left near-Earth orbit since, or managed to decrease the cost of putting a human in orbit.
Little science gets done and the greatest expenditures go to aerospace contractors. This gives legitimate programs within NASA a huge black eye.
...doesn't mean they're not out to get you.
Enron will be running NASA. The Shuttle will be covered with advertisements and astronauts will have to carry coins to purchase oxygen from an onboard dispenser.
The Russians launch payloads cheaper because their scientists work for pennies on the dollar compared to US scientists. One reason for that is because it's much cheaper to live in Russia/Kazakhistan. Another reason is, there aren't any other opportunities for brilliant scientists to earn more money, without going to work for organized crime.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
The federal government's most important priority is to maintain the infrastructure which makes the US possible. Things like operational costs of the three branches, minting money, foreign relations and maintaining a military (what good is all the other stuff if anyone can take it from us at whim?). In the middle area, you see things like HUD, Dept of Education, SSI, etc (stuff which they don't have a constitutional mandate to create but which people have become reliant upon). Way down at the bottom of the list, you'll find things like most of NASA, fluff research grants( did we REALLY need to spend $45k to find out how many people rinse their dishes before putting them in the dishwasher? ), etc. Things which are nice to have but aren't critical.
Now that you have your priorities, you only have a fixed amount of money to spend. An outside force has made it necessary to increase spending on one or several of your highest priority items. Nobody is going to die if NASA's budget gets reduced for a year or three to shore up our more important needs. If pure space research means that much to you, donate from your own pocket to one of the non-profit groups out there promoting research.
Don't leave your mind so open that your brain falls out. Don't close it so much that you cut off the blood.
Nuclear propulsion won't help to get you into space. It might help you travel from planet to planet, but ion drives and antimatter can do that too.
me too can parrot rhetoric without applying any critical thought or applying same criteria of judgment to myself and others. Forgive english. I too busy standing in bread line to learn... what a great system we have here.
I'm european, english is not my natural language, so give me some slack.
Enron is bankrupted, Bush is involved, what does he do? Call Iran a terrorist country, and starts
military training, threatening Iran, just to drive attentions elsewhere. Get real, Iran is walking slowly to democrary and
individual freedom. The only anti-americans there, are tired war veterans. Students from the university of Teeran, are
not fundamentalist Islamic. They drink boose (hidden), they go to disco at night, some of them are computer nerds. THEY ARE
TRYING to become a more modern country because they are TIRED of WAR and they oppressive regime.
With this, you are making NUCLEAR RUSSIA and CHEMICAL/NUCLEAR/FUCKEDHEADED middle east very nervous. Your republican party will destroy economy
and disrupt world peace. The europeans (I mean the people, not the politicians), are aware of one thing
about you american people: some of you tend to be brainwashed and become closed minded when the republicans are predominant.
Please, get out of CNN hipnosis, Republican Party Bullcrap, and think:
-When was your country's economy growing like mad?
-When was a chance for middle east peace, at least negotiations where in progress?
-When was the money used to provide better social security, instead of weapons? Man, your social security system sucks bad, compared
with even southern europe ( where I live ).
-The list could go on and on, but don't know much about your REAL everyday life. I don't like stereotipes
How come everybody is firing people, blaming on the September 11th ? Why must the individual make a patriotic effort,
when the corp doesn't care, even when they get compensation from the State (I mean your pocket)?
The way I see it, you are being suckered by bastards like some of guys that were on the World Economic Forum. Only money is
important. Only power is important. Beware american people. You are not considered as bad people. Don't think that nobody
likes you. But your politicians (most republicans and some democrats) and business people are considered on Europe horrendous
bastards, and we see clear as water that you're fucked because Bush *won* the elections.
Is it just me, or is it that everytime we get a republican president, space funding gets slashed and defense spending gets a huge boost? Why does our nation always get warlike and defensive when a republican cons his way into office? I guess this is great if you work for a defense contractor...
Uhhhh the space shuttle uses hydrogen fuel for its main engine, what the hell are you talking about?
For some time it's been apparent to me that NASA's space agendas have become driven by PR (hence the obsession with Mars) while those of the ESA have been driven more by science.
It would seem to me that, particularly with the heavy-lift capability of the Ariane 5, that ESA should grasp the nettle and send its own probe out to Pluto, thus gaining a march on NASA. It is, after all, the only planet not to have been visited by a probe and considerable positive PR for ESA could be made out of that. It would also be a symbol of Europe's growing technological strength vis a vis the US.
How about it, ESA? All the other firsts for visiting planets have been done by the US or the USSR; here's your big opportunity!!!
DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) is not a project, it's part of the Department of Defense and did much more than just research computer network. ARPANET was one (of many) different projects that DARPA did, and didn't get much widespread public notice until well after its inception.
But of course, you knew all that already.
So, how about an Open Source Space Mission?
Really.
But... if memory serves, the original NASA shuttle proposal called for a fully recoverable platform, with a 747-size manned booster being flown to a nice, quiet landing on an ordinary runway, while the equally recoverable orbiter went on with the mission. Budget cuts and all the other unholy weirdness that afflicted the Nixon White House morphed that design into the expensive bastardization that flies today.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Well, it seems that from now on the focus is on terrestrial aliens. Kinda E.T. (Extinguish Terrorists, no matter what) paranoia.
We all know that the shuttle program and releated space programs cost extraordinary large amounts to maintain and develop. There is one person who could easily by the program and have the funds to support it. Bill Gates! Now I know most of you are saying "Bill Gateswould never do that he's a cheap bastard". And your right normally he wouldn't do it, its a huge money hole. However, there might be a way to convince him to buy it nonetheless. Perhaps if you damn linux zealots would shut up about how much better linux is than Windows, closed source developers might ACTUALLY listen to you. Now if you guys chose to support Bill Gates and throw all your influence (sarcasm) behind him and microsoft he might return the favor and make our nerd dreams come true.
A rabbit in the hand is worth 4 in the cage
Look, I used to love NASA. I grew up in Florida, it's hard not to have NASA-worship. When I graduated from MIT, our speaker was NASA's bigwig. I love the ideal of the agency.
:]). Some form of NASA will continue to do pure research into the cosmos, but it will be smaller.
They blew it, big time, with the space tourist issue, and it will cost them.
Look, dating back to the Civil War the United States has a fascinating history of the military industrial complex. The military traditionally funds research until it meets their needs then turns it over to the private sector to exploit.
Recently (past 20 years) this process had some very vocal whining about giving the research to business, but in general it has produced significant benefits to the nation.
NASA, however, has really got problems.
Look, their PR blows. They don't do a good job of convincing people that they matter. They haven't provided much of a connection. Since the Challenger, they've been scared to do much. When an American paid the Russians to take him into space, it wasn't NASA's place to throw a temper tantrum.
They are government employees. They forgot that. The second they decide that they are better than the American people they lose their defenders. Nobody in America likes elitists. As a nation, we are comfortable with people buying their way to the top, its the American way. When a bunch of scientists decide that they know best because of their intelligence and education, the American people get fed up.
The religion of America is capitalism. Good or bad, it forms the cornerstone of modern America. Americans worship wealth. It makes sense to a degree... If the market decided that you were successful, that works.
Academic and intellectual elitists are universally scorned in this country.
NASA has shown themselves over the past two decades to have no interest in serving Americans. Their believe that their work will continue because they are smart and important was the downfall.
The military has a strong ability to play the system. A bunch of scientists don't.
Congress will open up space as NASA found it to commercial interests. The space forces will grow naturally from the air force (like the Army Air Force became the Air Force, the Air Force Space Division will become the Space Force, or Star Fleet
NASA hasn't openned space up to the people. They've become more and more ivory towerish because of their one failure at putting a civilian in space.
People would like to go into space.
People don't like to bust ass paying taxes to support a group of people that tell them they are too stupid (or drink to much) to go into space.
Sorry, if you want to feel that you are better than the American people, do it without their money.
Alex
Well guys let's face it - there's a future in space science and US is the only country to have budget to support it and keep it open to others at the same time. It's the same story as the Internet. Funded by the Americans (the military sort), then folks at CERN in Geneva came up with WWW, and out of a sudden tens of thousands of people around the world can make their living from it.US can't become a bastion closed to the outside world, it will never pay off. The poor bastards in Afganistan are no good excuse for US to freak up, close up, and just arm up.
For a good example, check out the MIT Radiation Lab series of books for the work that was done during WW2 and eventually spawned a huge amount of the technology we use today. Used your microwave oven lately? e.g. Another example, Gallium Arsenide integrated circuits used to be the bread and butter of military applications, now they are used in most cellphone handsets, WLAN cards, etc.
I dunno, can a Proton loft 50,000 pounds? I know we don't have anything unmanned that can do that...
As for using the SHuttle vs. a cheaper Russian rocket, sometimes there are things you do that require a person to do; Hubble is a great example, and for that matter most of the ISS assembly so far was done by Shuttle astronauts.
okay, everyone who doesn't hate the hell out of george w. bush: raise your damn hand. this guy's a complete dope, and has yet to do anything right in office. impeach!
Lack of eloquence does not denote lack of intelligence, though they often coincide.
Znnn..... Znnnn.... Znnug! OK. I'm awake now. .
Now, I'm not saying this couldn't be done, and in fact many facets of NASA do run on Windows. However, I'm not gonna buy a ticket for the moon tour if I'm riding on a shuttle using Windows as the OS for flight control. Not even Unix. Nope. I want something crafted just for the task. After all, once you hit the ground at 35,000 Mph, pressing reset doesn't do you any good.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
Yes, nuclear propulsion CAN get you into space. Do a Google search on liquid-fueld nuclear rockets. Even if the reactor and shielding weigh as much as a loaded O2 tank on the shuttle, the nuke rocket will still put out more power.
A fission reactor can put out more heat than any form of chemical combustion. More heat = more vapor expansion = more pressure = more thrust. If a reactor can push an aircraft carrier the size of a small city over the ocean at 27+ knots through steam expansion, it can use a similar process to throw a much smaller rocket into orbit.
And while both ion drives and anti-matter are interesting technologies, they're relatively new and will take a while (decades) to pan out. On the other hand, the US has been using nuclear propulsion since the 1950's.
Please note that he cutting the shuttle budget, but is RAISING the budget for a 2nd GEN reusable launch vehicle. In fact he is increasing it by over $300 million. Also, he is increasing the funding for a Mars project. Finally he is increasing the overall NASA budget. So all you f*cking dorks need to actual read the budget before you start talking sh*t about bush.
If you're looking for dividends from research, military research is without a doubt far more productive than general scientific research. Take for example...the internet. Or GPS. Or half a dozen other things you use every day. If its "spin offs" you want, you should be jumping for joy over this budget.
...for the human race to enter the solar system. (As gwb said himself)
Are you kidding? You blame Nixon for cutting a single stage to orbit (SSTO) concept? Venturestar was fully funded and only cut this last year when it became readily apparent that SSTO is not currently possible. So Nixon was wrong to realize we couldn't do it with 60's/70's technology either?!
I think your getting optimistic, there might be something on venus, but with mars' thin atmosphere, mercury's closeness to the sun, and Jupiter so far away, it looks kinda dim.
I'm really interested in the exploration of Jupiter, and saturn moons, so far away from the sun, yet they're warmer than mars (some of the time), and bigger than mercury.
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
Did anyone else read this as "After being linked to from Slashdot today, the computer systems aboard the International Space Station mysteriously failed."?
Entrepreneur : (noun), French for "unemployed"
when the sky is filled with NMD killer sattelites....
Buckets,
pompomtom
"There's an exception to every rule. Except for some rules"
Lets face it folks, government is always the least efficient mechanism for accomplishing any given task, and the space race is no different. It's almost 3 decades since we last traipsed around the moon, and we haven't been back since. Why? Because in spite of the vast resources available "up there", the government has no vested interest in exploiting them. Private companies, however, are already performing satellite launches (something most of the worlds countries still can't do yet), and are busily talking about space tourism. The *smart* thing to do is let government do what it's supposed to do (provide for the defense) and let the private sector do what they're best at. After all, it wasn't government that rediscovered the America's for Europe.
Nuclear propulsion research is getting a boost...
Soon there will be Greenpeace activists in space.
This gives a new meaning to "Little Green Men".
Here's the way into space...
Have a lottery each month, with a guaranteed winner per drawing. Each ticket will cost $5. If 20 million tickets are sold for the drawing, the pool is $100mil for the launch service, be it NASA, the Russians, or a private company. I don't know how much extra it cost Russia to send up the billionaire, but I'd estimate 5-10 million. So that would generate $90mil/month of profit, less the expenses of setting up the lottery.
If you set a minimum of $30mil in ticket sales for each lottery, you would could predictably generate $20mil profit. If the winner was unable to pass the appropriate physicals, he/she could sell the ticket.
Over a year, this could generate in the area of $1 Billion for whoever decides to do this. The ancillary benefits would be more launches, more interest in space, and mankind eventually getting off this rock.
BLAME BUSH CUZ HES THE DEVIL! Look at how much was accomplished during the Clinton administration with Nasa! I mean hell we had a manned mission to mars! WAIT! NO WE DIDNT! Thats right...WELL THEN I BLAME CLINTON! Really though, in all seriousness, WE ARE IN A WAR! The budget has to take priorities DUH! You Star Trek nerds need to realise that there are people flying planes into buildings and we need to focus on stopping that. Also, WE ARE IN A RECESSION! Maybe once that is taken care of we can then focus on finding ET, which I'm sure is so eager to welcome our screwed up customs. Priorities people, there's not much purpose in space if we can't survive on this planet.
The PKE was cancelled more than a year ago. It's New Horizons, now. Unfortunately, I've deleted the emails I've recieved with details of the NASA budget (from NASA, my research institute, and the Division for Planetary Science), but I'm pretty sure the New Horizons is on, not off. When I read the first email, I turned to an officemate and commented that they'd cut Europa for Pluto. Given the budget cap they already expected and the fact that Europa was going to be over that cap anyway, it was an expected and logical move to make.
Okay...how many wrecks have we made on the Martian surface?
/. has it been posted about some probe around this or that moon/outer planet being coaxed into doing more than it was ever designed to do, beyond life expectancy?
Yet, how many times on
Still, I suppose they need to scrap the Europa mission - imagine if they did find proof of life there...and I don't mean the Russell Crowe flick.
There seems to be a lot of fear about the new budget killing off science and killing off the manned program. Think about what is being done here for a moment:
In the unmanned space programs, missions are being put on hold so that nuclear propulsion technologies can be dusted off and put to practical use. This would cut down on mission time, and in doing so allow us to get probes to their destinations faster, and possibly with more power when they get there. That would have the net result of 1) cutting down on the money spent monitoring the probes during their cruise phase and 2) potentially extending their time at their destination spent gathering science. If you look at it from a business perspective, this makes sense-you want to invest money in the project for a gain (in this case, knowledge).
Aside: would be nice to see them develop a general purpose class of probes that they could basically shotgun to the outer planets (and unlike the Voyager probes, orbit their destinations). That may be more practical with this propulsion and power system. Any thoughts? Probably not going to happen until NASA has enough cash and confidence from the White House. No time soon.
Now, on to the manned space program. The Shuttle and ISS costs are way, way out of line. Take a look at the findings from the commitee last year. They're expecting its going to cost many more billions of dollars to finish the ISS in the plan which was comitted to. This on a project that is already considerably over budget, and suffering from numerous technical, engineering, and managerial problems (eg incompatable water purification systems, maintenance panels with the procedure for replacing the panel on the inner side where it can't be read while you're reinstalling it, and so on). If those costs aren't brought under control, it could easily swallow up the more productive unmanned program. The shuttle program is very much in the same boat, since the shuttles cost a huge amount to launch, and are only just barely reusable (they have to rip out large parts of the propulstion system, and refurbish the shuttle between launches, at a huge cost). I would be much happier to see them put yet more funding into developing a next generation system, but first getting the current manned space program under control is important.
If the costs aren't brought under control, and new technology developed, it is very unlikely we will even have NASA in a decade. It is very hard pressed to keep the budget it has when there are other programs (such as fighting this little war thing we have right now) are getting the lions share of the money available. Like anything else, a little wise long term investment could reap huge benefits (such as a better unmanned program that allows us to have many more probes in operation, including the much needed additional communication equipment). It would be great to see some long term planning that results in a return to the Moon, or a solid plan to go to Mars. That will require that the NASA administration take the initiative and plan out a program that won't break the budget, and that NASA also earn the confidence of Congress that money invested won't become part of another horror story of misused funds. Its a hell of a challenge, particularly for a government program, and I would be interested to see NASA step up to it.
When you look to the mob for affirmation, expect to be disappointed.
I've been reading the posts and replies on this thread and I can't believe how stupid the VAST majority of you are! Don't you read and SCIENCE? Or History? What you know about Nuclear physic's, wouldn't fill a thimble, you know even less about the Space Program, it's history and current status (beyond the hype).
GO READ A BOOK YOU MORONS!
Makes me wonder what they teach kids in school these days
Never. He lives in his mommy's basement. He does nothing & produces nothing. He will never have a family or children because he will never get laid.
Whahh, whahh, whahh. My favorite welfare program is not getting as big an increase as I would like.
Whahh, whahh, whahh. I live in my mommy's basement & will never get laid.
I hate to see the space program diminished,but the
sad truth is were not ready for space.
This is evolution's way of keeping us out.
We are squandering the resources that are required
for such an endeavour on war and greed.
The human race will colonize Mars, but not til we
get our act together.
Techonology isn't the problem.
We are.
well, if I had to choose, I'd say asta-Plut and hello Europa! I can't believe that he would cut a mission to this moon...the thought of the possibility of life is enthralling!
/. frequently argue about for onw...
Finding even a microbe there would be awesomeness - as if I need to mention that. It would prove many things about evolution and such (after all, Genesis didn't mention moons orbiting other planets, now did it?) that people on
i think missions to Europa are about the single most important missions - I really want to know for sure, beyond doubt, that life assembled itself elsewhere besides this rock before I die.
We need one to take pictures, another permament craft to map the surface, guess at ice depth, and pick landing sites, still more to land, drill and possibly bring back samples, still more to drop submarine-like craft into the ocean...
Of course, we don't even know if there is liquid water there - another reason to send at least one mission! Just one, that's all I ask!!!
Nuclear propulsion is "wow", and "cool", etc., but lets face it - this is Bush!! If this ASS gets re-elected, you can bet that this research will help the military and not fast missions to mars...because mars will still cost out the gazoo with nuclear propulsion...
On that front, they need to increase the funding into cheap anti-matter creation and storage 1000 fold, and increase funding for NASA at least 10 fold, asap. Then, they need to phase out the shuttle and spend money on MULTIPLE reusable launch craft, like the clipper, etc.
If only I were king of the world for a day...cliche upon cliche...
I'm sure privatizing the shuttle fleet will be more *ahem* profitable and efficient if we outsource it to someone like...Enron.
It's like Dubya and Ashcroft are both so pissed off at losing their respective elections that they really want to fuck the country over.
Amen! In the last 10 years, NASA has done more to delay practical spaceflight then to move it forward. Like the way they drove Beal Aerospace out of business, by offering their competition government subsidies. Or like the way they took over the DC-X program, which had achieved impressive results on a relatively tiny budget while under DOD control, promptly crashed the test vehicle through their own error, and then dropped it for X-33, a fiasco-by-committee that spent two billion dollars and produced nothing but a hanger full of variegated parts.
I think an argument could be made that even the Shuttle program was a mistake that set NASA back two decades. Shuttle never made good on any of its promises, from lower launch costs (it's the most expensive thing that flies by a wide margin) to frequency of flights (it takes months to turn a shuttle around) to landing on existing airstrips. If they'd kept the Saturn V in production they might have been able to cut launch costs far more, and maybe they'd have been able to stick to their original timelines for exploration (in which case we'd have a permanent moonbase by now).
Good example: the Wrights were a model of sensible scientific experimentation, achieving success on a fraction of their competitors' budgets.
I'd prefer a slightly different approach.
We should just say: if anyone can get payload x to orbit y for z dollars, we'll buy 10 launches. That's enough guaranteed return on investment to let the market take over from there. Don't specify reusibility, number of stages, or anything else that you don't have to: let the market try out the variations and wild ideas, and see what shakes out. Even if you have to pay for 5 different working systems, it'll still be cheaper than the 2 billion that was spent on X-33, and you'll have five working launch systems.
Bingo.
Jon Acheson
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
why must you make it difficult for me to read the other less wide yet still very worthwhile that reside at -1?
maybe if you could widen not quite so wide next time?
NOS! the space program needs more NOS!
I live my life one quarter pounder at a time -Vinh Diesel
My question is this: why doesn't NASA start embracing the space tourism industry? I am sure that people would rather pay NASA to fly up to the space station than Russia. People like to buy American for these sorts of things. Sure, it is a sacrifice to use the room they have on old billionaires, but at $20 mill a pop, I'm sure the extra money for their budget makes up for it.
omnia tua castra sunt nobis
Seriously guys, which would you want to live near, a coal fired plant that is mismanaged and pumps out a lot of nitrous oxide, or a nuclear power plant that is mismanaged and leaks radioactive material.
and that's all I've got to say about that.
I remember reading something about China's intent on going to the moon. Pity their space programme isn't up to it yet. If China went and landed on the moon that might get Bush to put more money into manned space flight.
"Information wants to be paid"
What the hell is everyone here smoking?
It's not NASA that wants to keep us out of space. Who funds and owns NASA? (Jeopardy! theme...)
The @#$%ing government wants to keep us out of space. NASA has to do whatever the government says, because they will lose their funding in an instant.
The Air Force (or "Space Force", as someone else here mentioned) is who wants us out of space, just like they bought all the damned land in Nevada and kicked people out of their homes. They want us out so they can do all the experimenting they want with no one knowing.
It's the only place left a sleazy Washington Post reporter can't get to!
Sorry everyone, but it's just so patently obvious that the U.S. military would have far more reasons to prevent space tourism than NASA.
gameDB
Seriously, break the organisation up into 5-6 independant and completely commercial organisations and encourage them to exploit space and space based resources fully.
It's the only way.
Deleted
I find it very coincidental that the same energy companies that gave him a large percentage of his electoral campaign funds have been chosen as preferred candidates to receive large cash grants to conduct research into nuclear (and other) propulsion devices.
More prove I guess that the supposed American 'Democracy' openly supports what can only be described as total corruption via campaign fund donations.
Um, no. "productive" means the price/benefit ratio, not the total output. It's no surprise that military research amounts to a larger total output when the military's budget has always been 10 times or more larger than the public reasearch budget.
The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a little longer.
--Henry Kissinger
And Pluto.
And the Kuiper Belt.
And the ISS.
And the Shuttle.
Attempt no landings, well, anywhere.
Federalizing anything is usually a good way to screw it up. The federal gov't is good at a few things, most of which are detailed in Article 1 8 of the Constitution.
Constitutionally Correct
How sad that most people don't know that Congress' law-making abilities are severely limited. Does anyone read Article 1 8 of the Constitution any more? Education, AIDS research, stem cell research, etc...should not get any federal funding at all.
Constitutionally Correct
The effects of any drilling in Alaska (if it's even started) are no where near affecting gasoline prices.
The Wright Brothers worked with what they had. I am not requiring a reuseable manned spacecraft to be built using technology, materials and knowledge available in a bicycle shop circa 1900. If you want to point out what they did not have to acccomplish, you should also point out what they did not have to work with. (everything that comes with another century of tecnological progress)
1> yep, you do have to go fast to get to orbit - but in the century since Kitty Hawk, we have had multiple "proofs of concept" starting with Sputnik that it is possible to go that fast.
2> dangerous? by what definition? I invite you to consider the actual energy content of various rocket fuels (bearing in mind that gasoline and kerosene derivatives (jet fuel) are also useable in rockets) hard to handle? You can pick up LOX from any number of suppliers, or make it yourself from condensation using liquid N2.
3> 30 days of life support? stop pulling numbers from nowhere. The requirement I suggested was for 3 round trip flights in thirty days. 48 hours of life support would probably leave a fairly comfortable safety margin.
4> 99.4% success? well you are pulling numbers from nowhere related to the proposed task (which would actually require 100% success for three flights)
5> "one of the most complex machines..." I suggest that it may be possible to go into orbit in something a heck of a lot simpler. Actually I suggest that if we are ever to go into space in any significant way, simpler implementations are necessary.
Could the commercial sector do it better? We will never know if there is no incentive to find out. Proposing a prize costs absolutely nothing unless someone actually manages to claim it.
And 99.4% is not a very good sucess rate when you are defining "non success" as the death of everyone on board. You might also consider that it was only a 75% "success" rate as one of four shuttles experienced a "non successful" flight. If six out of every 1000 commercial airline flights resulted in the complete loss of life for everyone on board, I doubt you'd be crowing about the airline's "success rate" (lets say 10,000 flights a day with 100 people on beach flight would result in 6,000 deaths per day, or over 200,000 people per year).
You either believe in rational thought or you don't
Seems to me that's one of the only projects in the budget worth funding. Sure, scooping comet dust is pretty cool, but not compared with the possibility of discovering non-Terrestrial life in our solar system.
Right now, the programs I would want my tax dollars spent on would be (1) Probe to Europa (2) ISS upkeep/expansion/habitation (3) Mars missions with the eventual goal of manned missions
I don't think NASA should be _primarily_ concerned with military issues.
-- Adam
The US military is perfectly set up so as not to be a kingmaker.
The Army and Navy are of equal size and almost equal political power, and both hate each other with 200+ years of animosity. The Marines (honor guards of the President) hate the Army and Navy, and the Air Force, the most powerful branch of the military is disliked by all the other branches.
In Rome it was different, you couldn't be Emperor later on unless you had lead the Legions to victory, or just lead the Legions, but in the United States, military leadership is rare for a President, generalship even more rare (Washington, Jackson, Lincoln, Eisenhower).
The United States military is independant and independant minded, there is no percived role of Kingmaker there.
using 50% of the Space budget to give your primat^H^H^H^H^Hresident a proper brain, the one he have today is clearly defective.
The budget is huge this year. Defense spending is double. And we're spending into deficit. And Bush is still pushing tax cuts for business in the name of 'economic stimulus'. So he trims some money from the space program, except in areas that are either markedly inexpensive or have direct military applications. Yeah, that's a great plan. Like we need to militarize space to stop terrorists from attacking the US.
2002-02-05 00:03:43 Bush Jr. decides to cut tech research grants. (articles,money) (rejected)
Remember "Bring 'em on"? *sigh
The power system of the little Sojourner rover consisted of a solar panel on its roof, that charged some batteries.
The rover died after what, about 60 days?
You can get cheap rechargeable batteries at Radio Shack that are good for a lot more than 60 charge/discharge cycles. 500 cycles is more like it. So I don't understand why it died after only 60 days.
That that is is that that that that is not is not.
And it would be real nice if we could mine uranium from asteroids -- getting around the problem of having to launch the fuel for these spiffy nuclear propulsion systems up through our atmosphere.
That that is is that that that that is not is not.
It's a shame that we'll have the expense of rebuilding the 1960s NERVA capability. If that ball hadn't been dropped, we would have had powerful, efficient nuclear propulsion in the 1970s.
That that is is that that that that is not is not.