How To Beat Congress's Ban Of Humans On Mars

An anonymous reader writes "Earlier this year, the House of Representatives passed a bill that would ban humans on Mars at NASA: "Provided, That none of the funds under this heading shall be used for any research, development, or demonstration activities related exclusively to the human exploration of Mars." The bill is held up in Congress and the anti-Mars language may be taken out. But in case the Mars ban becomes law, the Space Review has a handy guide on how NASA can beat the ban and continue its research and development without breaking the law."

Comments

Congress?

[rossdee]

Somebody please tell congress that they don't have jurisdiction on other planets.

Re:Congress?

[Pantero Blanco]

This is one of the many reasons I don't like sensationally-worded headlines.

Congress did not "ban humans on Mars". They stopped NASA's funding for a human mission to Mars and told it to concentrate on other things. Other nations, or private citizens of the US if I understand correctly, are free to shoot for it.

Re:Congress?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is one of the many reasons I don't like sensationally-worded headlines.

Congress did not "ban humans on Mars". They stopped NASA's funding for a human mission to Mars and told it to concentrate on other things. Other nations, or private citizens of the US if I understand correctly, are free to shoot for it. The US is allowed to shoot for it as well. They just can't pay for things that apply exclusively for Mars for the next year. This will barely affect anything. Only if NASA was researching human landing sites or actually building the Mars spacecraft could they say that their research was *only* for human exploration of Mars. And this would have to pass every year in the foreseeable future to ban NASA from human exploration of Mars (since it is a funding bill).

Could the headline have been more misleading?

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no 'ban' on Mars. It just means that no funds from the current funding bill can be used for funding potential human exploration on Mars. Future bills (every single year) would have to include this 'ban' every time they were passed.

Re:Could the headline have been more misleading?

[Pantero Blanco]

A culture of machismo where the first thing Spanish explorers did when they reached the New World was rape women and steal?

Like the Aztecs did to the other tribes, but without the human sacrifice?

A nation that tries to deal with its social problems completely before tackling expansion and technological progress will be destroyed by the nations that don't.

Not quite...

[igotmybfg]

From the article:

"The House of Representatives version of HR 3093, the bill that determines NASA's funding for 2008, effectively bans the study of an entire planet: Provided, That none of the funds under this heading shall be used for any research, development, or demonstration activities related exclusively to the human exploration of Mars.

As you can clearly see, the language in that bill does NOT "ban the study of an entire planet" - it just says that any research done must have other applications besides the human exploration of Mars. For example, a weather study wouldn't be "banned", because that would also be related to the Mars Rovers. So basically, as long as NASA can show that any R&D activity is related to something else besides humans on Mars, the ban won't apply to it.

Every dollar spent on Mars...

[Nova Express]

...is a dollar that can't be used to provide pork for John Murtha's district.

Or defense contracts for companies owned by Nancy Pelosi's husband..

Or billions in subsidies to Fortune 500 agribusiness companies.

There can be no funding for frivolities like the human exploration of space when so many of the needs of the Permanent Bipartisan State of Porkistan remain unmet...