H.R. 3057: To the Asteroids, Moon and Mars

apsmith writes "Democrats have just introduced the Space Exploration Act of 2003 to the U.S. House of Representatives; the author is Nick Lampson of Texas, with 26 co-sponsors. The bill sets a vision and goals for the future of NASA, beyond the Low Earth Orbit of the Space Station and Shuttle, outlining a series of incremental steps for human spaceflight. These include development of reusable spacecraft for carrying people around in the Earth-Moon vicinity, including to the nearby Lagrange points; sending people to an Earth-crossing asteroid; establishing a lunar base, and sending people to Mars with a base on a Martian moon by 2024."

Comments

Now the important question...

[MagPulse]

Does it have a chance? Have any senators commented on it yet? At the bottom of the bill it lists $50 million for 2004 and $200 million for 2005. Are these on top of NASA's budget? If it is, with the deficit we're running now, this looks more like a political stunt. I hope it's not.

Re:Now the important question...

[SydShamino]

Well, keep an eye on the bill. If the cosigners cross party lines but are almost all in aerospace districts (and no, I haven't checked if they do and are), then I would categorize the bill as A), "a good idea, which passes only because it provides pork across the country."

If the cosigners are all Democrats, then one of two things will happen. B), the bill is scuttled by the current congress as "more pork barrel legislation on idealistic goals, when we instead need to deal with the real world and real issues." Or, C), the bill is modified to specify that only Haliburton can receive any of the funds, all Democrats end up voting against their own bill, and congress points out how Demos "vote against pushing the boundaries of science, technology, and human achievement that made this country great."

Option D) is that the bill is entirely Democrat backed, but it is embraced by Republicans and passes overwhelmingly. Personally, I'm not optimistic. :)

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The above post is to be considered Funny +1 and/or Interesting +1.

Re:Now the important question...

[hpulley]

Well, $50 million and $200 million are not a big slice of even NASA's current budget so they will be easy to slap on today. They won't accomplish much with that money, however, aside from some initial planning and research. To really do what is proposed will add much more, at least an average of $2 billion per year more according to most estimates of what it will take to get to Mars.

Hopefully some new technologies like nuclear electric propulsion will turn out to be fit for this sort of purpose to cut the travel time to Mars down to a reasonable level so we can survive the largest problem with such a mission, radiation. Since Bush likes nuclear technology, this one might even fly.

Re:Hmmm-

[Anonvmous Coward]

"You are aware, Congress, that you can't legislate the advace of technology right?"

You mean like Digital TV by 2006?

Very Dangerous Legislation

[Grendol]

It is ALWAYS very dangerous to legislate must do goals like this. Whole beneficial programs can be scrapped to enforce some Idealistic Goal. Look at what Title 9 did to mens sports for example. This may blow up in our face. As much as I would love to get us out of LEO and on to greater things, this sort of legislation may hinder more than help.

Wow, an actual plan?

[timeOday]

Having a vision for our space exploration makes a lot of sense to me. So much so that I wonder if NASA already had something like this, which a lot of us just didn't know about.

I know many of us tend to be skeptical about mission statements. However, it seems like a good idea because unlike a business (universal business mission statement: "Make Lots Of Money"), it isn't that obvious what NASA is trying to do, or should try to do. And I think it should be more specific than "explore space, and earth from space."

Re:Hmmm-

[The Old Burke]

I would'nt say that you could directly contribute the success of the moon landing to Kennedy.

A lot of the innovation and technology that made it possible to send people to the moon can be traced back before Kennedy. For example the breaktroughs in within rocket science came from scientists that we hired from Germany. They helped us develop the first stages of our rocket program.

So legislating advamcement in technolgy is hard because of the timespan. Luckily our great nation has lately acquired a lot of high tech rocket technology from Iraq. Rumors about their infamous program where true. Their advanced weapon programs contained powerful rockets capable of shuttling us to Mars and back.

Finally!

[ENOENT]

The government wants to spend money on something I like!

Maybe they can reallocate some money from ongoing projects such as propping up totalitarian regimes to a space colonization project. That would be nice.

Out of curiosity

[Timesprout]

Given the recent trends we have seen from the US (Pax Americana, attempting to control the Gulf, the intention to control technology etc). I am curious to know how people think the US would respond were China for example to make sudden huge breakthroughs in space technology within the next 5-10 years and begin establishing Lunar/Martian bases and exploring deeper space?

Re:Hmmm-

[Manitcor]

true, however having top-down support for the big chief himslef along with the neccassary funds allocation helped make it a relaity.

Of course all this was motivated by the cold war ultimiatley.

We may have gone to the moon eventually however we have never been back since the orignal missions as there has never been a push like that in the past. I would love to see the goverment put some goals on NASA and give them the funding to match.

Pretty cheap too...

[Bendebecker]

"(e) AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS- There are authorized to be appropriated to the Administrator for carrying out this Act--
(1) $50,000,000 for fiscal year 2004; and
(2) $200,000,000 for fiscal year 2005."

Heck, M$ could pay for the bill. Why not get some sponsorship? Good PR for the company, a mission that wouldn't have been for NASA. Just as long as the given company didn't try to patent any organism it may/may not find on Mars.

As for the bill itself, all I can do is appluad. Finally, some ppl in washington with vision. We fucked this planet up to the point where it is going to take 1000's of years to fix it (if ever). The current attitude that is mostly 'let's fix earth's problems first' simply isn't realistic anymore. In addition, we have wasted enough time in low-earth orbit. Let's really start exploring space now. The space program has been asleep since the end of apollo, the sleeper must awaken. Plus, if an asteroid pulverizes earth, at least any colonies on mars we can set up mmight survive. The time for the future has come!

"...a person needs new experiences, it touches something deep inside us allowing us to grow. Without change something sleeps inside us and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken!"
---Dune (The Movie)

Your forgot to list ...

[burgburgburg]

some of the things that the selected President has gone all flowery on but has inconveniently left underfunded like

Americorps

No Child Left Behind

AIDS help for Africa

Homeland Security

Rebuilding Afghanistan

Halliburton

Oh, wait. He made sure to properly fund that last one.

on manned space missions

[kipsate]

Almost all manned space missions are a prestige matter and hence a waste of money for as much as science is concerned. Yes, in the sixties the U.S.A. put men on the moon to show the world how advanced they were, ahead of the rest of the world. It was a political statement in the cold war: look, Russia, we can walk on the moon, we are technically superior to you.

But what is the use in 2003 to start planning a mission to put men on Mars? Such a mission would cost billions of dollars, money that could much better be used for more interesting things, such as:

- Is there life on Venus? Although surface temperature at Venus seems to hot for live, there might well be cooler spots where bacterial life may exist. Bacteries are found alive and multiplying on earth at temperatures of 120 degrees celsius under high pressures. Who knows, there are live forms possible at higher temperatures and more, what we would call, extreme circumstances, than we so far imagined to be possible.

- More missions to moons of Jupiter and Saturn. There are hints that liquid water exists at some of the moons. Let's try to land on a few of them.

- A bigger space telescope. Yes, I know, another space telescope is already being build. But why not make it a little bit better, bigger, more advanced, more versatile?

- More budget for research on rocket ion-engines or other ways to propel a spacecraft. The speeds that we can reach with current technologies are not very impressive.

All this and more can be done for the costs of a manned Mars mission. In the name of science, lets forget about manned space flight for a while.

why space exploration == NASA budget?

[BigGerman]

It seems to me much better way to actually get space exploration going is to make it profitable for a business.
Is not it what a well-behaived capitalist government supposed to do? Promote good things, guard against the bad things but generally stay away?
Giving more money to large government agency that was flying shuttles mostly "because there were there" would not get us any further.
Congress needs to come up with a major incensive for businesses to go to space. Like a super Xprize. (or tax-free lifetime for any corp or individual participating in a Mars shot ;-)

Note the Congressional Districts

[ketan]

Note that Nick Lampson is representative from the Texas 10th District. From his web site (emphasis added):

This site is a resource for and about the Ninth District, which serves areas in Jefferson, Chambers, Harris, and Galveston counties; including Johnson Space Center, NASA's astronaut training facility and Mission Control.

Note also that 11 of the 26 sponsors are also from Texas. I'm not making a comment about this bill's worth. However, Lampson's district would probably benefit from a beefed up space program, and the state of Texas itself would also benefit. The line between worthy project and pork is a very fuzzy one. My representative (D-Texas 10th) is not on that list, but I'm sure he was asked, since Lampson seems to have made an effort to get Texas representatives on board. I also note that House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas 22nd) is not a co-sponsor. His district includes parts of Harris County (Houston) and Galveston county as well. Maybe just a political thing, since the other sponsors are Democrats. I wonder if one of the California Democrats has Vandenberg in his/her district. Nobody from Florida, though, so no direct connection with Cape Canaveral. Food for thought.

Operation or Research

[chrisatslashdot]

Keep in mind that NASA was not putting men in space as they developed the shuttle. The last Apollo astronaut launched in 1972 and the first shuttle launch occured in 1981. Are we willing to put another hold on human space flight for 9 years to develop new vehicles and technologies? What about the ISS?

Currently it takes most of NASA's budget to operate the shuttle. Ending the shuttle program would free lots of engineers, scientist, and dollars to develop the next generation of vehicles.