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Plans for International Space Station Cut Back
Sajma writes "Reuters is reporting:
NASA and its space partners on Friday approved a scaled-down International Space Station with fewer astronauts and less science so the United States can meet a 2010 deadline for ending shuttle flights, a top NASA official said. Space agencies in Russia, Europe, Canada and Japan gave unanimous approval to a NASA plan that means the orbiting platform, now about half completed, will never become the beehive of scientific and commercial research once envisaged."
Would you like your taxes low or would you like NASA funded properly? It doesn't seem like you can have both.
Does it really have to be an either/or question? Couldn't we cut funding for something else, like say nuclear weapons research/maintenance, ( i mean we could get rid of the nukes, not just stop taking care of them.)? Just get rid of ICBMs all together, i mean, is it all that important that we be able to kill someone in 4 hours instead of 8 hours with a nuclear cruise missile?
Wholly agreed. I believe (Not 100%, but pretty sure and don't feel like checking right now.) NASA's budget this year is something like $15.7 Billion, and I know next year it's getting scaled back to $15.1. But it's more or less been mandated they come up with a new shuttle, fix the current fleet to some degree, and keep the ISS and any other projects flying on the little bit of change they have left.
Meanwhile, the DOD gets about $400 Billion a year, to put the above into perspective. And I believe our national budget is something like $3 trillion.
In short, lately, our policy here in the U.S., the nation that put mankind on the moon with the support of basically the whole country only 35 years ago, is, "Fuck Space".
I mean, it's not like we'll ever need to leave Earth or anything. Without question, our star will last forever, and our planet will always been inhabitable.
Right?...
Right?
Request: ECM unit, 1000 km fullerene cable, 1 tactical nuclear weapon. Reason: Birthday party for foreign dignitary.
Yup - NASA. I love the Space Program. As a kid I had astronauts on my walls and lots of Estes model rocket kits. But one thing we need to realize is that NASA is partially a valid science program and partially an ornamental nod to "science". Now science programs have always been the red-headed stepchild of the administration (though this particular administration takes it to new levels), but NASA is the figurehead for "science".
I.e., other programs may suffer, and suffer greatly. But whenever the administration is accused of failing children by not promoting science, they send a chunk of cash to NASA and the defense, er.. space program and can then claim support of science on their annual glossies.
With hundreds of billions of dollars ($650 billion, most recently) going to Defense it's very to difficult to understand why a few hundred million is cut from the budgets to smaller research programs. And I'm not saying a few hundred million to *one* program, but rather, the *entire* budget for all smaller research programs is in the hundreds of millions. You think Microsoft is evil?
So we again cut science budgets -- not only because it clashes with the President's ideologies -- but because it just doesn't add any value to some defense contractor's stock portfolio. On top of that we make the deficit huge, in the *trillions* of dollars. Our kids are going to love us.
Stop spending so much on wars and it won't be a problem.
>> ... beehive of scientific and commercial research ..."
I'm sure the word "beehive" never appeared in any ISS prospectus. It was, and is, a facility that lacks any single compelling reason to exist.
Except for monitoring long-duration human spaceflight (mimicing the Mir experience), little, if any, of the research conducted on ISS will make human space travel easier, safer, or cheaper. Certainly, nothing will contribute to that objective in a way commensurate with the station's outrageous cost. The station itself is only marginally engaged in space travel, since it does not go anywhere.
The ISS is the product of the ill-informed and, simply, bad space policy that began with Nixon's decision to build the compromised and targetless Space Shuttle in lieu of continuing humam space exploration.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
This is just plain pathetic. There's $135 million for the (proven to be ineffective) "abstenence education" programs, but we can't seem to find the money to maintain NASA at even minimal levels. $200 billion (and rising) for a pointless war in Iraq, but a program that could give the USA a serious strategic and scientific boost gets budget raped. $9.6 billion in tobacco subsidies over the next five years, but screw NASA?
We don't need any furthur evidence that they're smoking crack in Washington people.
35 years ago a human being walked on the moon. Today the furthest we get is Low Earth Orbit. That's bullshit, total bullshit.
"Mission Accomplished" -- George W. Bush May 1, 2003
The Station is just too compromised. The decision to bring the Russians in was a nice geopolitical gesture, but their hardware requires too much maintenance (to say nothing of the fact that they stole at least half the money we sent them), and NASA had to shift the station's orbit to be able to recieve rockets from Kazakhstan, making it useless for future interplanetary injections.
Done well, it could have been an incredible asset. But it wasn't done well.
Does it really have to be an either/or question? Couldn't we cut funding for something else, like say nuclear weapons research/maintenance, ( i mean we could get rid of the nukes, not just stop taking care of them.)
The nuclear genie is out of the bottle and here to stay, and there is NO WAY that we should give up our nuclear systems while certain elements of the third world continue to work on theirs. In addition, if Russia happens to fall back into an ultranationalist stance we could be in trouble there.
If you want to cut something, cut the NON-WORKING anti-ballistic missile system that's supposedly going to cost 60 billion dollars. The system testing to date of the aforementioned is so contrived it isn't even funny. I've worked defense contracts just long enough to smell bullshit at 10 miles away.
If all nukes magically disappeared one day, world military spending would almost certainly dramatically increase as nations rushed to build up their conventional defensive forces.
Thank God for Scaled Composites. Laugh if you want by this type of Washington dickering may very well setup the type of environment we need to bring more private industry into the picture.
It's just a shame that some of NASA's problems are probably nothing more than politics over practicality.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Mir had been called that at one point, but I think Mir had much more value (and economy) than the ISS. Perhaps we could call the ISS the "Orbiting Space Boondoggle of Death." Barges have a use, after all. The ISS could have been useful, but the reality is that it doesn't *do* anything. I take that back ... it does one thing - it provides a function for the Space Shuttles. So the Shuttles and the ISS are locked in a perpetual self-sustenance loop, one supporting the other, for the sole purpose of maintaining the other's existence. Not a good thing.
While folks may note like ELVs, they're the most economical method for putting payloads into orbit. You aren't carrying around all the Shuttle mass just for the purpose of being able to fly it back.
If we expect to maintain any kind of space presence, our launch structure needs to split the hyu-mohn function apart from the cargo function. Haul the ugly bags of mostly water up in a vehicle designed specifically for that purpose, and only on missions requiring the hyu-mohn presence. Everything else goes up in unmanned vehicles. Screw the "reusable" cargo transport. It's less expensive to build the base vehicle for each launch. The crew transport could be reusable, maybe, but should be optimized for crew functions.
Unfortunately, there's a huge industry that's built up around supporting the Shuttle infrastructure. They're not going to let go of the cash cow without a fight.
If you're an ABB fanatic, NOTHING Bush does is worthy, EVERYTHING is his fault.
The truth is closer to the fact that NO administration (Republicrat or Demican) has full control over anything anymore. Congress pushes in bloated bills with a bunch of crap no one wants - except maybe one line item. And yet, if a president doesn't sign for it he'll be accused of killing babies.
What REALLY should happen is the president should explain how much pork went into each bill - what he approves of and what he does not. The problem is BOTH sides play this game and as usual, there is simply no leadership skills involved...
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
Typical American paranoia - you realize you have TENS OF THOUSANDS of warheads? You would be able to obliterate North Korea if you gave up 95% of your arsenal. This is why your country is so screwed up - no amount of killing power is ever enough to settle the raging paranoia and projected violence of your ultranationalists.
Oh please, you cant honestly think this is a viable thing to hold against the bush administration do you? that in 3 billion years when our star collapses we won't be able to escape?
At what point did I say a damn thing about the Bush admin.? Seriously. Go back, and quote where the fuck I said, "Bush is cutting NASA's budget." Go on, go and find it. Wait, you can't, because you're trying to drag presidential politics into a discussion that has nothing to do with them, you partisan moron.
While I personally think Bush is more or less a puppet to special interests and some trully fucked up individuals, I can't blame him in the slightest for this. I actually think his policy towards space is the best thing he's done in his presidency. He advocates spending MORE money on NASA, boosting their budget by $2 bil./year for the next several years and letting them build things like lunar bases and make trips to Mars. While expensive projects, the guy has his shit together on space. However, things like NASA funding (and, for that matter, basically all other federal funding) are ultimitely decided by Congress. The president can put in his say, but Congress holds the purse strings.
Now, junior, that is how you would refute my statement had I said, "Bush hates space!". Which I didn't. Which is why to me at least you just look retarded. Don't read things that aren't there, you'll save us all a lot of time.
As for the planet thing, arent you overstating the problem some?
No, I'm not. I didn't say it would not be inhabitable tomorrow or in 10 years or anything that soon. Just that someday, possibly though our own actions, possibly though just some act of nature, for whatever reason, our planet will become uninhabitable. Simple as that. Sooner or later, it will happen, and if we fail to be off of this rock by then, we're just some ruins for a more advanced civilization to find. That's it, end of story. Humanity is done. And while $600,000 million to NASA one way or the other won't be the deciding factor, it just serves as a sign to show people don't really grasp the above fact. Space isn't a curiosity, it's a necessity for all of Humanity. Perhaps it's not the most pressing need today, but one day, it will be and we had damn sure better be ready by then, and it's never to soon to get to cracking on it.
Request: ECM unit, 1000 km fullerene cable, 1 tactical nuclear weapon. Reason: Birthday party for foreign dignitary.
Does it really have to be an either/or question? Couldn't we cut funding for something else,
Not to bring up the elephant standing in the room or anything, but we _are_ occupying a (now) hostile foreign country larger than California and paying for that on future debt. (And half-ass occupying Afghanistan, which is somewhat less than twice the size of California).
Maybe we should cut local government some more? Like fire, police, schools, libraries? "Spare money" was back in the Clinton surplus. The U.S. doesn't have "spare money" now.
I seem to recall that it was the other way round a bit over a year ago - Bush (and Blair, on his behalf) going round begging other countries for help.
You'll never stop hating them for spitting in the eye of the boy emperor, will you? He said, "this is MY world", and they said "Fuck You" (with a French accent, of course). Forever after, you'll hate them for that. Funny part is that for the rest of the world, what the French did was quite heroic and inspiring.
Come to think of it, they specifically DIDN'T surrender to your warped and selfish will. Maybe that's the real origin of the surrender meme, what? Mutated and projected as Americans are wont to do, natch.
Why even get out of bed in the morning - what's the point? Oh wait I forgot - these are the people who won't do stem cell research that could cure Parkinson's, diabetes and a host of other horrible diseases because some psychochristians think it's a sin.
There was never any real scientific rationale for the ISS.
It was always a political project in search of justification.
Cassini is significant science. NEAR Shoemaker was significant.
The Mars rovers are significant. Galileo was significant.
Hubble is significant. Stardust is significant.
The ISS is a waste of money.
Bush's "Man on Mars" directive is more of the same, in spades.
Wait a minute. Didn't I say that on the other side of the record? I'd better check
Comparing NASA's $15.7 billion to the DOD $400 billion is the wrong comparison. Everything looks small compared to defence.
The budget for the National Institutes of Health is about 30 billion. They fund most of the basic biomedical research. Every university biology department in the US runs off this money.
The budget for the National Science Foundataion is about 6 billion. They fund most of the physical science and mathematical research in the US. They also pay for telescopes and most of the real space research.
In contrast NASA's budget gets us a pointless space station, a broken space shuttle and a few (very expensive) inter-planetary probes. (For example, Cassini cost 3 billion dollars!)
If you want to cut something, cut the NON-WORKING social welfare system that's already cost over $1 trillion since the inception of Johnson's Great Society. The system testing to date of the aforementioned is so contrived it isn't even funny.
Me? I'd prefer to keep our robust defense capabilities.
If we have a space elevator, then why do we need a space station? Wouldn't the top of the space elevator also serve as a space station?
I think the worlds limited resources are best spent on the space elevator, since that effort might give us an economical way of getting to space.
In addition, if Russia happens to fall back into an ultranationalist stance we could be in trouble there. Unlike the USA's ultranationalist stance, right?
While we could get a lot of money by curtailing our military endeavors, we could also get plenty by ending the war on drugs, and we could get even more by legalizing some of them (not the same thing as ending the war on drugs, which would be decriminalization, a dubious term at best, kind of like "war on drugs") and taxing them as tobacco is taxed. Half the price of your pack of smokes or more is taxes. This is true of some other things, like gasoline, as well.
We spend a bit over US$40B (yes, billion) on the unwinnable war on drugs. If I were in charge, right after I gave all the idiots a brand new religion, I'd end the war on drugs and split that money between the space program and drug rehab services.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
If the goal of the human spaceflight program is to go to the Moon and Mars, why should we continue work on ISS at all? The two physiological problems of space exploration (bone demineralization and radiation) are poorly addressed by ISS.
We already know that microgravity is bad for bones. What about 1/6 G (the level of Lunar surface gravity)? If that is also unhealthy then we will definitely need more physiological research, but if 1/6 G is sustainable than it seems that the right answer is to use tethers to spin up that level of gravity.
Radiation is the other big problem. But unless I'm way off base here, the level and character (energy spectrum) of radiation in Low Earth Orbit is very different from that outside the Earth's magnetosphere. If you want to study deep space radiation, go to deep space (initially with petri dishes full of bio-goo, then small animals, etc).
The objection I have is spending another 6 years and $50B to complete ISS, when the only scientific rationales are poorly addressed by ISS. The only rationale that makes "sense" is that we're doing it to avoid angering the international partners on ISS, who have invested big bucks in equipment that is nearly ready for launch.
But this is a poor rationale. I think our partners would be just as pleased to work on the Moon-Mars program as on a technological dead end. So what we really wind up with is that this is nothing more than a jobs program and pork barrel for big aerospace firms.
Why dont we also stop sending probes out as well, since those are *SUCH* a waste of money as well NASA?
Not NASA's fault. IIRC, Bush had existing NASA funding reallocated towards Mars work. It is not new news. Take a look at this article from 2001: Bush's budget was to:
(CNN) -- While giving a boost to Mars exploration, the proposed 2002 budget for NASA would scrap a mission to Pluto, tighten the reins on the international space station and cut programs that monitor world climate changes.
May we never see th
First off, current federal welfare costs (TANF) are 1-2% of our federal budget. Now, if you're adding in medicare, medicaid, and social security, that's another story.
BTW, the US's social welfare system is a fraction of that found in western Europe. And wouldn't you know it, but their economies have been gaining on the US's notably since the 1970s. Go fig...
SILENCE BLATHERING TOADIES! We are your new masters.