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U.S. Satellite Programs in Jeopardy of Collapse
smooth wombat writes "A committee of the National Academy of Sciences, headed by Richard Anthens, has warned that 'the vitality of Earth science and application programs has been placed at substantial risk by a rapidly shrinking budget.' The list of Earth-observing satellite programs affected is a long one and includes satellite programs which observe nearly every aspect of Earth's climate. A delay in launching a replacement satellite or the disabling of a current satellite without a replacement could mean that data necessary to monitor or predict an upcoming event would be severely restricted. For its part NASA says that tight budgets force it to cut funding for all but the most vital programs. 'We simply cannot afford all of the missions that our scientific constituencies would like us to sponsor,' NASA administrator Michael Griffin told members of Congress when he testified before the House Science Committee February 16."
You _are_ aware, are you not, that things like highways, fire brigades, the CDC or indeed a standing army are not covered by that constitution of yours?
You _are_ aware that our 9th and 10th Amendments allow for the States and the People to perform these powers themselves? Why should someone in California pay for a highway in Illinois? Why should someone in Miami pay for a fire in Denver?
The Federal government has no ability to perform efficiently, which was why we had the Constitution in the first place. Give the states the ability to provide competitive service with one another, and they'll compete to attract the best citizens.
Cost of missing 6 weeks worth of ocean surface temperature, a quarter's loss of micromeasurement of ocean surface levels, or a year's worth of rainforest acreage photographs: pretty much nothing.
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Cost of leaving a dictator in power: (excerpts from: http://www.weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_p
"Four months before Saddam's fall, Human Rights Watch estimated that up to 290,000 people had "disappeared" since the late 1970s and were presumed dead. The Coalition Provisional Authority's human rights office estimates that 300,000 bodies are contained in the numerous mass graves. "And that's the lower end of the estimates," said one CPA spokesperson. In fact, the accumulated credible reports make the likely number at least 400,000 to 450,000. So, by a conservative estimate, the regime was killing civilians at an average rate of at least 16,000 a year between 1979 and March 2003."
(Of course, any numbers of killings do not include many thousands of cases of torture, rape, amputation, branding, and other atrocities committed by Saddam's regime that stopped short of death.)
[Furthermore,] U.N. economic sanctions were also killing civilians. Critics regularly claimed sanctions caused 4,000 to 5,000 Iraqi children to die per month from poor nutrition and health care. UNICEF attributed some 500,000 unnecessary deaths to the sanctions in the 1990s. The sanctions remained in place as long as Saddam's regime refused to comply with international requirements. Liberation made it possible to lift the sanctions almost immediately--thus saving approximately 60,000 lives a year, if we use UNICEF's numbers.
Meanwhile in many sections of Iraq, people have their first clean water, their first reliable electricity, their first real sewer system, ever. Hundreds of schools, dozens of hospitals exist where no service was available for at least 20 years.
Yeah, what *were* we thinking? We should have saved the money and spent it on satellites!
I know it's TERRIBLY fashionable among some circles to be against the war. But I think your throwaway comment that the money was 'pissed away' is somewhat hyperbolic, if not a downright lie.
Just mod me (troll) now.
-Styopa
$400 billion for the Iraq war. All of it pissed away...
You say pissed away but it's not like that money was burned. I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of the money is still right here in the US. It's called redistribution of wealth. With Democrats it goes to their friends and the poor. With Republicans it goes to their friends and defense contractors. Really not a lot of difference between the two other than defense contractors usually pay their employees better than do the poor.
Is buying a Harley Davidson as your first motorcycle since you were 16 at age 49 a midlife crisis issue?