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Next-Gen Mars Rover In Danger of Cancellation
OriginalArlen writes "NASA's next-generation rover, the nuclear-powered, laser-equipped Mars Science Laboratory is reported to be at a serious risk of cancellation due to budget and schedule overruns, including non-delivery of vital parts by a subcontractor. Costs are running over $2B so far, and the already thin schedule of Mars missions planned for the next decade — with budget ring-fenced for an outer-planets flagship mission — is in danger of further cuts."
I am truly ashamed that my generation will be the first to leave the country in a worse state than what they received.
I take this to mean you are a baby boomer, and I appreciate that at least some boomers realize that the world will continue to exist after they're gone.
Bureaucracy expands to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy.-Oscar Wilde
..."The dinosaurs went extinct because they didn't have a space program"...
Best argument I ever heard for cancelling the space program.
You never really know how close to the edge you can go until you fall off.
Well lets see,
Private industry developed the new solar cells featured on this site in a recent story. Private industry is deploying wind farms. Private industry is attempt to make coal even cleaner to adhere to new regulations and then some - in other words they are trying their best to sell it to a public buried under FUD.
If anything it is when Government gets involved that it all goes into the shitter. The banking industry is proof positive of this. It was Federal meddling in the mortgage industry which encouraged practices no one would dare take if they were on the hook. The under the table deal which basically insured bad lending with public money set off this firestorm of lending to people who should never have been considered and would not have been without political pressure. Look, when a bank wants to grow or get into new markets they should not be coerced into making bad loans as the price of admission yet that is essentially what the government did to them. Then toss in a market which saw the advantage of knowing it would be bailed out and what do you get ? A disaster.
Lets look at private industry again, who is leading the charge to lower costs of getting into space? Definitely not NASA (read FEDERAL GOVERNMENT) whose next BDB isn't exactly winning accolades. Before people say they have different standards of getting people into space safely I disagree. See, if people die on a NASA (Read: Government trip) who loses out? NASA is still in business. Yet if Rutan/Virgin Space or whatever has a fatal accident they will be shut down if not bankrupted.
The difference is that private industry comes up with interesting if not unique solutions that tend to fly under the radar because they are so common. There are many efforts across the board to insure our environment because it is profitable. It makes good press. We only see crazed reactions to environmental accidents because they are so rare. Go overseas, for all the harping people make about our issues and the environment you should see some of the former Warsaw pact, what happened there and in some cases still does would make you hurl
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.