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Obama's Evolving Stance On NASA
mknewman writes "The Houston Chronicle is reporting a change in Obama's stance on NASA, saying his position on space exploration continued to evolve Sunday as the Illinois Democrat endorsed a congressional plan to add $2 billion to NASA's budget and agreed to back at least one more space shuttle mission."
"Obama is no more serious about NASA's lofty aspirations that Bush or Clinton. It's just political pandering for Florida. And I am tired of hearing promises from politicians that they know damn well they can never deliver on."
Usually, I'd agree with that, however, I think you're ignoring the "new cold war" aspect here. China is developing an aggressive space program, and if they say they're going to the moon, they mean it.
Frankly, I think McCain is a little more inclined to beef up NASA precisely because of that aspect, and Obama will say damn near anything to win Florida. But it's also possible that he's reconsidered his positions on space because if he becomes President, he knows people aren't going to let him slide on the space race.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Reading the article, it really just comes across as Obama trying to push the shuttle layoffs to the right so they don't take place during his first term in office.
It's unfortunate, but I would really like to see him and McCain come up with a strong vision for space to spur international and private sector investments with a corresponding push in maths, sciences and engineering.
As trite as they may be, I could get excited about a candidate that pushed:
Note that I don't say "NASA". I think NASA has a very important role to play in the development of space technology but at some point they have to be out of the business of LEO (Low Earth Orbit) operations.
myke
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
HA! Upwards of $464 BILLION in debt is just fine for Bushie, but 2 BIL for funding for NASA, that's crossing the line. Thanks for the laugh early on monday morning.
Whether or not there is some sort of god, I'm not supposed to say/god is a word and the argument ends there-Smog
but it's almost always advantageous to change from a wrong conclusion to a correct one
... science-wise, value-wise, and in all other ways before you should be talking about how you think that issue should be handled legislatively and judicially? For the record, I agree with him on being pro-choice, but I'm hugely annoyed with him (though hardly surprised) that it turns out he's been pandering on that issue for votes, rather than having a solid sense - personally - on how to think and communicate on that issue. Or worse (and this seems more typical of him), he DOES have such, and he's trying to continue to dance around answering so that he doesn't risk annoying the people who are supporting him only because he hasn't offended their sensibilities yet.
It's not about changing your mind. It's about evaluating why someone held their previous position.
Did they simply have bad information?
Have they suddenly had a fundamental philosophical change that alters how you should look at their entire world view, and every policy pronouncement of theirs that is built on that platform?
Is their value system still only half baked, and this is just a sign of them slowly getting their act together?
Remember, Obama is the guy that just the other night (in that quasi-debate-format thing he attended with McCain in Colorado) who, when asked about when "human" life begins in the womb (as it relates, of course, to the abortion issue) said "that's above my pay grade." Wow. Never mind WHERE you are on that issue, isn't that - right there - THE most fundamental thing you have to wrestle with
Why wonder about his real thoughts on space/science when one of the signature hot-button science/philosphy issues of modern times seems to be beyond his much-lauded intellect and communications skills to talk about? That was a VERY telling moment, if you ask me.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
I know this is hard to understand after 8 years of "the decider", but, this is *exactly* when you want him to open his mind and alter his positions. Right now, he is, in theory, pounding the campaign trail and, *gasp*, listening to people. Did it occur to you that, during such bouts of listening, he might've actually changed his mind on one or two things?
The problem isn't the lack of term limits, it's the seniority system in committees. The way the game is set up, the longer a congress-human has held their position, the more senior they are in committees, which is where the real power is. If you vote against the incumbent, you are voting for less power in Washington to be exercised on your behalf, while districts that vote for the incumbent get more power.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
You don't have to. All you need to do is keep it up for 8 years. Then the others will win, increase taxes and you can blame the others for the higher taxes and get elected again for 8 years.
1 step forward, 2 steps back.
You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time and that seems to be enough.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
but it's difficult to say what a good answer would have been in that particular circumstance
How about a little honesty, instead of Clintonian slipperyness and weasle-wording it? How about, "There's no point trying to pin down a day on the calender when the nervous system of a fetus is not, and then - an hour later - is sophisticated and functional enough that we'd all call it a baby human. But likewise, I'm very comfortable saying that everyone in this room has swatted a mosquito with a nervous system vastly more advanced than that of the dozen cells in an early embryo. This issue isn't about pinning down a date, it's about erring widely on one side or the other of a long period of time, and using reason." Well, perhaps a little more soft-sell than that... but isn't that supposed to be - in the absence of any other real experience - his actual main selling point?
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
You can't just wish away regulations that are impairing. It requires both legislative and executive power to do so, and the chances are that environmental lobbyists will oppose removing the regulations that make it pointless to drill on these lands.
What's kind of silly is that we look at the problem as a dependence on oil. This isn't the real issue. America has a dependence on hydrocarbons, once you get past that perception hurdle, you'll realize how easy it would be to significantly reduce our dependence on oil. There is one hydrocarbon that America has extremely huge reserves of, that's cheap, and isn't too problematic to get to.
Coal.
Did you know that South America has a gallon of gas priced under $1 USD? They're not losing money on it, and it's not subsidized. How are they doing it? Simple, they're turning coal into oil products. South Africa also buys most of their coal from the US. How long do you think it would take to get a couple coal gasification plants?
Think about it.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
If I were going to be president six months from now, I'd make sure that we returned to the Moon, in force. I'd spend what it takes to put a permanent solar power base there, lasering back to a network of satellites and delivering cheap, clean power around the world. Once the base was staffed and ample power generated, I'd start mining the rare minerals that are going to run out on Earth within the next 20-100 years. I'd give contractors who are majority American owned, and use majority American subcontractors, the highest priority for taking part in the project, and aim at creating a space launch industry as dominated by commercial carriers as are airliners, while keeping a reliable government capacity operating, just like in air travel.
The US would start to look admirable around the entire world again. Except in the boardrooms and war rooms of our worst enemies, who are using our foreign oil dependence to enslave us and the world, who'd hate us as we put them out of business.
It took only 7 years for the US to go from subsonic jets to landing on the Moon, with a nation engaged in the Cold War, a hot war in Vietnam, a much lower economic productivity, a much smaller pool of engineers, much more primitive technology, and no proven example of going to the Moon to reassure us. Even before exploiting the Moon's resources industrially, we've already benefited hugely from the scientific, engineering, industrial and patriotic rewards of the visionary investment. We could return to the Moon, and lead the world out of so many problems we've helped create and are most threatened by.
--
make install -not war
Here's a snippet of a letter I received from Delta Airlines last month regarding the high cost of oil. The letter was signed by 12 airlines. "Twenty years ago, 21 percent of oil contracts were purchased by speculators who trade oil on paper with no intention of ever taking delivery. Today, oil speculators purchase 66 percent of all oil futures contracts, and that reflects just the transactions that are known. Speculators buy up large amounts of oil and then sell it to each other again and again. A barrel of oil may trade 20-plus times before it is delivered and used; the price goes up with each trade and consumers pick up the final tab. Some market experts estimate that current prices reflect as much as $30 to $60 per barrel in unnecessary speculative costs." Here is a link to the full letter.
I would love to see the exact same story with his "evolving" position on giving telecoms immunity for spying on us. He voted for allowing it and he should change his position to oppose it and actively purse having this stopped.
Now, it may be true that Georgia was provoking Russia. But at a moment's notice, Russia launched a well-coordinated, overwhelming assault involving their army, navy, and air force, with fronts opened in South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The military assault was coordinated with computer attacks and a media propaganda campaign (see, for instance, the "2,000 dead" figure the Russian media kept repeating without ever providing any source or photographs to back up their claims). You simply cannot do what Russia did overnight. It takes weeks or months of planning. Georgia provided the trigger for the war, true, but Russia was clearly waiting for an excuse.
Russia/Georgia, Please solve this quickly.
Here's the underlying issue. Russia (or at least Putin) feels like border states, such as the Ukraine and Georgia, should be subservient to Russia, and not pursue political or military ties to the West. So as far as Russia is concerned, this is very much about the West (EU and NATO). And by invading and occupying a country that is on the flank of Europe, and with close political ties to the U.S., Russia is trying to threaten and intimidate the West. Now the West is in a delicate position- they can't really let this stand, but it's not clear how they can punish Russia either. Regardless, relationships between Russia and the U.S./EU have fundamentally shifted. It's not that a new conflict has started, it's that Europe and the United States are finally waking up and realizing that they're already in the middle of a conflict.
"President Bush opposes the $2 billion in funding, saying it would be fiscally irresponsible."
A multi-trillion Dollar boondoggle in both Iraq and Afghanistan is somehow a prudent decision that history shall vindicate him for undertaking, yet two billion for NASA is fiscally irresponsible?
We need term limits in Congress.
I was for term limits in California when they were first enacted, much for the same reasons as you. That said, they have been a plain and unmitigated disaster for this state because of the many unintended consequences they have produced.
First, there was gerrymandering. Since it was now impossible for an individual to hold a district for 20 to 30 years, the Democratically controlled legislature drew safe districts that would vote Democrat for the next 20 to 30 years. Republicans went along with this because the ones in power also got enough safe districts to hold up approval of the annual budget (which requires a 2/3 vote to pass).
Second, as a biproduct of gerrymandering, politics in the California became highly partisan. Since almost all legislative districts in California consistently vote 60/40 in favor one party, the real election became the primary. Of course, one wins the primary by appearing the fringes of his or her party. Thus, our state legislators and senators started to further toward both the left and right. Most moderates never made it to the general election.
Third, the rank partisanship, led to gridlock in the legislature, especially with the state budget. Democrats refuse to cut spending in tough times, and Republicans refuse to raise taxes, regardless of the need to do so. What should be a process of compromise, is reduced to an annual game of chicken because neither side wants to back down from their ideological rhetoric.
Fourth, these budget problems are exacerbated even further by the increased influence of lobbyist groups in the capitol. This is perhaps the most insidious consequence of term limits. Because legislators and senators are out after 6 and 8 years respectively, they often have very little time to learn the legislative process and become experts on the subjects their committees govern. Thus they have to rely on lobbyist groups for information and viewpoints. Think K Street in DC but much worse.
There are a host of other maladies that term limits have wrought on this state, like the political musical chairs our politicians play, but these four are by far the worst. Term limits is the best example of the law of unintended consequences. For every problem they solved did they created another equally bad or worse one.
The sun beams down on a brand new day, No more welfare tax to pay, Unsightly slums gone up in flashing light...