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Does Obama Have a Problem At NASA?
MarkWhittington writes "Has NASA become a problem for the Obama transition? If one believes a recent story in the Orlando Sentinel, the transition team at NASA, led by former NASA Associate Administrator Lori Garver, is running into some bureaucratic obstruction." Specifically, according to this article NASA Administrator Michael Griffin made calls to aerospace industry executives asking them to stonewall if asked about benefits to be gained by canceling the current US efforts to revisit the moon; we mentioned last month that cutting Aries and Orion is apparently an idea under strong consideration by the Obama transition team.
... but if I were Obama, Michael Griffin would be so fricken canned.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
Sounds like a lot of backbiting rumors spread by someone with a bone to pick.
It's pretty easy to tell how much money would be saved by cancelling Aries and Orion outright. Just look at how much money they have outlined in budget projections.
The harder question is whether there is some cheaper alternative, and how much it would cost. But that's not something that can be answered accurately in response to a snap question. And saying so is not stonewalling.
It's hard to believe that NASA would be against their program being cut. While I like the space program,if it's going to be cut spending on nothing or cut spending on the space program I would pick the former. While I'd prefer to cut other things, NASA spending is probably one of the easier things to cut, from a political standpoint.
What is with the entitlement mentality within government? I am sure the article blows what actually happened way out of proportion, but if there *was* any sort of conversation asking industry partners to stonewall, resist, camoflage or otherwise derail the effort to understand the risk/reward of future space efforts, everyone involved within the government should be canned. If I did anything of the sort at my place of work, I'd be out on my ass so quickly!
This post brought to you by your friendly neighborhood MBA.
If he has a problem at NASA right now, I suspect he won't have one there after January 20.
That means we need to axe a lot of programs, or (a) face potential bankruptcy of the whole country or (b) face the reality that we have to cut Medicare and SS benefits to a needs-based program rather than an entitlement. We have a huge amount of Baby Boomers about to retire, and don't have the money to support them all unless we start saving immediately.
FOX NEWS.com should be BANNED from television and internet. Have the Congress take it over and give us Truespeak.
For some reason the submission goes to a site that mentions the original articles appeared at the Orlando sentinel, but doesn't link to the articles. So here they are:
December 11: NASA chief Griffin bucks Obama's transition team
and
December 12: NASA chief insists he's cooperating with Obama's team
Obama has nothing against NASA. He has EVERYTHING against Mike (global warming is a myth) Griffin, a known Bush lackey and a incompetent manager. Ask anyone in the know about Orion and Ares and they will tell you while it WILL work, it is horribly designed and way over budget for what it is and its DIRECTLY contributed to Griffin, unlike other unmanned programs that where running before he took over and lost funding due to him and Bush's "lets get a American on Mars without spending any more money" ploy.
Griffins job is canned, he's just drawing out the hanging right now and trying to wrap it in a Obama hates NASA spin, not a Obama hates incompetent Bush republican flunkies spin.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
It is unfortunate that we've come to this point in American history, but the truth is probably that we can't afford a grandiose space program right now.
NASA will still exist, but the bureaucrats running it need to go. NASA will have a chance at manned space flight, but they need to figure out a way to do it cheaper. The rest of the nation has tightened its belt, the rest of the nation is concerned about the ballooning debt, NASA isn't exempt from the changes.
If I had my choice, I'd much rather see the billions spent on a shuttle launch go toward turning children into future aerospace engineers.
If we can put a black man with a funny name in the White House then surely we can put a man on the moon again!
Well, thanks to the Internet, I'm now bored with sex.
The "moon mission" thing is a red herring. Think instead "rebuilding the void in our launch capabilities left by the shuttle".
what about the billions that will come back to us when we magically pull our troops on 01/21/2009? oh, that's right...
Sorry, but I have taught kids and the best way to turn children into future aerospace engineers is to launch some new rockets. I have shown 3rd graders poorly drawn CGI of a Ares 1 launch and it was enough to garner "oohs," "aahs," and "I want to do thats,"
What exactly is to be gained by stonewalling? Obama is not the president yet, but in 40+ days, the stonewalling will be a moot point. Griffin could be out on his ear and replaced. And from the industry's point of view.... You stonewall (at the behest of Griffin) for the next few weeks. Then when the new person comes in you say what?! Sorry. Yes, we would still like to be considered for future rocket contracts.
We can't just "un-retire the shuttle," mainly because it is a bloated, out-of-date, foam-shedding death trap. Besides, with everyone talking about creating jobs, how does it make sense to cut NASA hard and put tons of people who are working on Ares out of work?
Using that logic would clearly negate a bailout of GM, Chrysler and possibly Ford. Ford Execs have willingly taken huge (comparatively) pay cuts. But GM is the worst for fat cats that line their own pockets while taking public assistance. Why should the people give money to an industry that has failed... failed itself, it's employees, it's investors. The only people making money off of cars are the guys at the top.
Sucking off the Federal teat and pulling on people's heart strings does not work for a guy in the street with a sign and it sure as hell should not work for a man wearing a $1k suite and having parties in his Michigan ranch for $1million (Yes GM, YOU).
But in 10 years the Auto industry will be dead. Harvesting the moon and moving into the solar system will happen. The US can either be part of the party or ask for public assistance later on from the colonies on the moon.
This was an easy article to find, that's following up this story... Being on Space.com, it was on Slashdot's side bar... ;)
http://www.space.com/news/081211-nasa-obama-transition.html
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
And the problem is that NASA/etc. focuses so much on inspiring the 3rd graders, yet don't seem to care so much once those kids get to high school and can actually develop that interest into something useful towards their future.
But any investment is a matter of directness of money getting to people. In the case of investment in high engineering salaries at NASA, all that money gets used somehow. It eventually goes to teacher salaries, firemen, roadwork, groceries etc. Because they are engineers, and I will stereotype for a bit, you might also say that some portion of the money you spend goes to fund other high tech development first, from computers to games to fast cars. Eventually the $1 you spend at NASA likely gets spent on the same things that a $1 invested in Detroit does. However the money you spend at NASA moves us further along our technological timeline, whereas any money spent in Detroit keeps us in the automobile age.
This post brought to you by your friendly neighborhood MBA.
fixed that for you
If Obama really intends to go through the federal budget line by line as he claimed during the campaign, this will be a good test to see whether he has the balls or not. This is a variation of what's going to happen with everything he tries to cut.
I also taught high school, and you are right that high school kids get left out. But I think it's less the fault of NASA and more the fault of high schools. High school is so rigid and change-adverse that any attempts by an outside agency to come in is usually shot down. This is even more evident with the focus on high stakes testing.
Someones gonna get brained with a keyboard
I think someone really needs to sit down and say "the unfunded mandate has to go". With the current timeline, manned space flight will account for more or less NASA's entire budget within about ten years, and there are projects being slashed left and right already. A NASA which forgets about landing humans on the moon and Mars for a decade or two would be a cheaper NASA with a much wider variety of science missions. (IMO, of course, and I'm welcome to any new information on their funding situation and where the budget's going).
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
I suppose we can keep the bits that do the rovers, satellites, etc, but we really need to kill the manned space exploration bits. It's a colossal waste of money. Don't even start with the "They developed x, y, z technology while trying to go to space." Who cares? Do you seriously believe they wouldn't have been developed more efficiently and cheaper in the private sector?
If you spend billions on a shuttle launch you ensure jobs for people who want to go into aerospace. Take the money away from that so you do not have any shuttle launchings and you have pretty much removed it from most people's minds. I remember growing up in the 80's and the shuttle launches were a big thing. Now it hardly receives any coverage. It would be great to have a president with a mind for the future like JFK. Granted he wasn't perfect but it is better than a rehash of FDR ideas that have put us in the place we are in. That's my $.02. Go ahead and mod me down now.
I eat Karma for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. That's why I don't have any.
Just an aside, I think you should leave monospaced fonts on MySpace.
The only people making money off of cars are the guys at the top.
Uh, sorry, I don't buy it. That guy in Ohio making 6 figures to drive a forklift in an auto plant is "making money off of cars." Lots more than I'm making of off computer software.
so how does it make sense to employ a relatively small number of people at a relatively high salary
Besides, I hear North Korea and Iran are looking for well trained rocket scientists.
You know... for their... SPACE... programs.
Coding with assembly is like playing with Legos. Coding an application in assembly is like building a car with Legos.
Because you don't have much time, left do you?
BTW - how's the impeachment coming along?
Ha ha ha!
Forget Griffin. The real decision Obama is going to have to make with NASA is whether or not to tell people the big secret: that the chimps they sent into space came back super-intelligent.
UTF-8: There and Back Again
Funding is limited. We have to choose one or the other.
Here another article I found on the weather topic. http://www.usatoday.com/weather/hurricane/2007-06-12-quickscat-satellite_N.htm
If I had my choice, I'd much rather see the billions spent on a shuttle launch go toward turning children into future aerospace engineers.
Why would you want to do that?
When they graduate how are they going to find a job?
...sadly, I think many slashdotters are going to be disappointed as NASA funding under Obama takes a backseat to a number of other programs that are targeted at much larger domestic constituencies.
-Styopa
NASA's budget is a tiny fraction of the federal budget. There are many more projects that would have a much greater impact on the bottom line than NASA.
But I agree with your sentiment that the Space Shuttle is a boondoggle. Hopefully SpaceX and other companies can provide a cost effective and safe alternative soon.
Remember, You are unique...just like everyone else.
You're doing a heck of a job, Griffie!
Obama's transition team isn't asking NASA programmes only about cutting their budgets to zero. The review is also asking them about accelerating those programmes, increasing their budgets so their benefits are delivered sooner.
Griffin, the Star Wars scientist / CIA "entrepreneur", is stonewalling any change by the new Chief Executive (Obama). Which is of course threatening those projects even worse, because there's going to be less time to evaluate and save the worthwhile ones, as the economic meltdown accelerates and Obama's busy leading the nation fulltime. And of course the stonewalling shows an agency that will need an even more radical makeover by the new administration.
But why should NASA be any different from the rest of the government Bush built? Hey, over in Congress, a minority of the minority Republicans in the Senate (next month their numbers shrink to a nearly insignificant count) are stonewalling even a bridge loan from money already allocated to Detroit. They destroyed New Orleans and New York. Maybe if a Christmas Earthquake hits California they can have laid waste on every coast except Alaska's - which they maybe managed with drilling in ANWR.
--
make install -not war
Griffin's comment on Global Warming was excellent and probably the only thing about him to like. He simply expressed the biggest issue standing, we don't know what the optimal climate is. If anything the comments of the those who didn't like his remark were more akin to the right wing religious nuts. It is a religion now and will always be one because anything which is brought up to disprove it is immediately derided regardless of merit. If anything the whole GW document is nothing more than a new age Bible
Oh, as to his remark in 2007
"I have no doubt that global -- that a trend of global warming exists. I am not sure that it is fair to say that it is a problem we must wrestle with. To assume that it is a problem is to assume that the state of earth's climate today is the optimal climate, the best climate that we could have or ever have had and that we need to take steps to make sure that it doesn't change.
First of all, I don't think it's within the power of human beings to assure that the climate does not change, as millions of years of history have shown, and second of all, I guess I would ask which human beings - where and when - are to be accorded the privilege of deciding that this particular climate that we have right here today, right now is the best climate for all other human beings. I think that's a rather arrogant position for people to take."
Sorry, but I have taught kids and the best way to turn children into future aerospace engineers is to launch some new rockets. I have shown 3rd graders poorly drawn CGI of a Ares 1 launch and it was enough to garner "oohs," "aahs," and "I want to do thats,"
What about if we cut Nasa's rocket design and manufacturing but keep the department that produces poorly drawn CGI?
Just throwing out ideas here.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
There are a couple of fundamental problems.
1. Chemical rockets are expensive and have low energy density.
2. Humans in space require ridiculous levels of life-support that steal much of what precious little energy we are able to cram into a chemical rocket.
Lets not have a repeat of the automobile engine. Lets move on to a new engine. The vast amounts of money being used to prevent astronauts from dieing in space could fund a whole lot of propulsion R&D that might well result in a drive system that would be safer and actually make human space flight practical from a both an economic and a safety perspective.
In the meantime, robots in space are cheaper and can go further than any human. No human could take the radiation exposure implied by a trip to Europa or Enceladus for example.
heh, that reminds me of the old joke:
If "pro" is the opposite of "con", what's the opposite of "congress"?
Karma: NaN
If i was an American i would be much more concerned with military spending than with NASA. The various spy organizations and domestic surveillance programs alone makes the NASA budget look like weekly allowence. Add the military spending and NASAs budget is just silly in comparison.
If there is one area where money is spent for nothing its in the military.
HTTP/1.1 400
Here's the thing. The economy ain't so hot (I gno, rite!) so how does it make sense to employ a relatively small number of people at a relatively high salary when that money (one BILLION dollars!) could go to some other project that could influence thousands more workers?
Yes, in these difficult economic times, the only way for us to lead this great nation into a 21st century economy is to fire all of our highly skilled science and engineering jobs, and instead funnel that money into low-paying government work resurfacing roads and changing light bulbs. Yes we can!
And, oh yeah, we also need to send some more billions of dollars to support the fatcat CEOs in Detroit. I have heard they've cut back so much that they don't even serve champagne on their corporate jets anyone! Que horrible!!!
OK, the USA did not defeat the Soviet Union... The Soviet Union defeated itself because communism is a flawed system that cannot work in the long run... If anything, the rivalry between the USA and the USSR _delayed_ the fall of the soviets because they wanted to prove to the US that their system was superior...
Communism doesn't work, ever, that's the only reason why the Soviet Union collapsed.
Lol that's what I was thinking. Congratulations! You're an aerospace engineer, but because of NASA's cut funding there's a minimum amount of jobs that laid-off NASA scientists with more knowledge and work experience are getting over you.
Do we really need NASA to do anything but put satellites up there. They need to keep our GPS and cells working, but the moon seems kind of stupid. Can we forgo national pride in favor aid in light of these economic difficulties? I think that someone needs to take a great big hatchet to the NASA budget, it would free up between 6 & 7 billion dollars
So, when Bush wants to cut NASA or funding to observatories, he's obstructing science and progress and a disaster.
When Obama wants to cut NASA (who knows what he'll do to observatories), he's cleaning house and that somehow isn't anti-science, anti-progress, and an amazing reinessance of thought.
It is unfortunate that we've come to this point in American history, but the truth is probably that we can't afford a grandiose space program right now.
NASA will still exist, but the bureaucrats running it need to go. NASA will have a chance at manned space flight, but they need to figure out a way to do it cheaper. The rest of the nation has tightened its belt, the rest of the nation is concerned about the ballooning debt, NASA isn't exempt from the changes.
If I had my choice, I'd much rather see the billions spent on a shuttle launch go toward turning children into future aerospace engineers.
Um, I'm mixed on NASA. There is a strong part of me that wants the entire governmental body redone from the ground up. I think that it needs to be more like the FAA for space than how it currently exists. So I'm not really against it being made of "regulators"/mangers, I'm against all US space development being controlled and sponsored solely through NASA.
I'm not worried about future aerospace engineers or education at all. Why? Because if the only source for those jobs is directly through the government financing of an entire industry, then it isn't really worth it to push. If every air line industry was also interested in building space planes or mining orbital resources, you'd see students shift where they study to tailor themselves for those companies. It'll happen despite the government not because of it.
Here's the thing. The economy ain't so hot (I gno, rite!) so how does it make sense to employ a relatively small number of people at a relatively high salary when that money (one BILLION dollars!) could go to some other project that could influence thousands more workers?
Easy, pull troops out of Iraq. Amazing, I just increased NASA's budget by well, well over 100 fold per year.
In other news where is the rival Jupiter delivery system that scientist and engineers were working on after-hours?
Besides, with everyone talking about creating jobs, how does it make sense to cut NASA hard and put tons of people who are working on Ares out of work?
Because those people work directly for the government. Which means you or I indirectly pay for them. Now if they were doing it because a space transport company was paying the bills, it would be much more impressive and more likely to be real long term jobs that don't need political support to survive.
But in 10 years the Auto industry will be dead.
Maybe the current US players. Maybe the whole industry in it's current incarnation. But the auto industry as a whole (even some US component of it), will not be dead in 50 years, let alone 10. This country is far to spread out for public transportation to serve everyone (not to mention the negative feelings towards it simply due to the lack of privacy and the need to adapt to the public transport schedule). There will be a need for personal transportation vehicles for a very, very long time.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Well considering that the FY 2007 budget total NASA was .62% of the budget whereas the DoD was 16.1% of the budget, I think you should look somewhere else for your money first. And don't bail out the douchebags on wall street.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Fy2007spendingbycategory.png , graph requires a lil graph reading abilities.)
Sadly, griffin is trying to protect the system directly as they have it. They are under pressure to drop development of it, as well as by others, namely direct, to change it. Quite honestly, Griffin probably fears Direct more than having it axed. Few congressman are willing to see NASA's manned program killed. And as to direct, it took those idiots nearly 2 years to finally get their web site right. I am not certain that I would trust them to a rocket in the correct fashion.
Let the corporate initiatives lead the way on this endeavor for now. SpaceX is a reality not just a pipe dream. The government must develop realistic budgets to underscore the economic meltdown and focus on rebuilding our economy.
You want to encourage our youth to go into aerospace engineering by shutting down the aerospace companies? Good job.
That's about as insightful as saying that we should encourage people to buy more iPods by shutting down Apple.
NASA funding needs to continue - especially if America wants to retain its relevance in an age where even the Indians are launching shit into space. The Chinese, re-emerging Russians, Indians, and the EU are on the verge of overtaking the US in space technology, and this is unacceptable. If the US is to remain competitive in the coming decades it needs to keep up with the space race.
I got into programming because the work of other companies in my field inspired me, and made me go "man I wanna do that", not because of some dry government-run course on the joys of code. The best way to inspire kids to get into a field is to show them the results.
The problem is that 3rd graders don't want to know *how* to get there, but high school kids do, and we don't tell them that. We show them all of these cool jobs that they could do when they grow up, and then we don't tell them what they need to do to get there. Oops.
I got into code because I saw some really, really cool stuff being worked on at a lot of companies, and I had the resources to play with it at home. To get people into aerospace you need to do the same - inspire them to get into the field, and then give them the resources to play with the technology.
There are two problems with this argument:
1. The "tons of people" involved are probably paid even better than GM employees, so cutting 100 NASA jobs will allow give money for employing perhaps 200 other people.
2. The "tons of people" involved are most likely more than 50% Republicans, and the out of work people employed with the money saved would be mainly Democrats. It's a win-win option for the new administration.
who say they refuse to cooperate with the incoming administration make me laugh. What part of a 79% disapproval rating for their, that is, Bush's administration and their work do they not get? It has been de rigeur to clap their hands over their ears, say nah-nah-nah-i-cant-hear-you, and ignore reality for years in their places of work, but the reality train is about to run them over and they better get the hell out of the way.
Obama doesn't seem like a vindictive guy, but absolutely pissing off the incoming teams at NASA, NSF, and all the other agencies that fund research and buy big dollar systems with these antics is a 100% sure-fire way to kill your career dead, dead, dead. What company, university, or lobbyist is going to hire a guy who is persona non grata if not dickhead #1 with the only game in town, aka the federal government?
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
I'm sorry, but I can't take anyone with the last name Griffin seriously...
Griffin is dead-set on Ares because it is his pet project. He brought it with him from the university think tank that Bush pulled him from. It is not a good architecture, and even now NASA engineers are fighting basic laws of physics to get the thing to fly.
The ESAS committee rubber-stamped Ares because that's what Griffin wanted. It is not the best approach. Especially when they decided to drop the Space Shuttle Main Engine in favor of the RS68 engine due to cost. The RS68 is cheaper, but much less efficient than the SSME. Once they dropped the SSME, they should have convened another committee to re-evaluate all options using the RS68 numbers.
The DIRECT project is where we need to be. Check it out, check the numbers. NASA has been sitting on this for almost three years now. It's ridiculous.
www.directlauncher.com
"The only good windmill is a tilted windmill."
That is the point of the checks-and-balances thing, after all.
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
Read the no frills version here.
Government, by nature, can't be "trusted" - at least in the sense that individuals allow it to decide what's "best" for them.
I view it as more of a "necessary evil" than anything else. A total lack of government is much like a vacuum on a planet with an atmosphere. It's not going to exist permanently or naturally.
(I've always thought "anarchists" often have the wrong idea about things. Anarchy is a "government changing device", not a sustainable way of life.)
Many nations put together "Constitutions" specifically to outline the duties of their governments (and to ensure they govern in a fair and limited way). Even the USSR had a Constitution (that echos quite a few similar "values" to the U.S. Constitution). Look it up online sometime! The problem is, the lazy and the power-hungry, and sometimes just the misguided, work to ever expand government's "sphere of influence". Given enough time, most "good and just" governments wind up only paying lip-service to their Constitutions, and violate much of it in practice.
is a cartoon character.
Easy, pull troops out of Iraq. Amazing, I just increased NASA's budget by well, well over 100 fold per year.
No kidding. Every two months spent in Iraq is equal to a year of NASA's budget. You wanna cut costs, get the hell out of the war that's costing a fortune and making us look like asses.
A student I knew did a story on Obama and NASA. I can't remember all the specifics, or his resources, but some of the report was that Obama favors social programs over space exploration. Here[LINK] is a link to the first report I could find on Google given back in 2007. It basically says that Obama wants to delay the space program for 5 years and put the money into education.
I too believe that general education here in America has a lot to be desired, but there are so many life saving and other useful technologies that have come from the program. For a simple example, NASA came up with the first prototype of creating Velcro. Who would have thought.
I don't believe that Obama has some affinity to keep the program around, and he never mentioned prior to the speech given last month that he grew up on Star Trek, or loves what they do at NASA. My worry is more then changing management, it's that he will try and take this out of the budget completely.
To cut NASA is like amputating body parts. First you need to cut out the cancer. Here's where America's biggest tumors reside:
1. Oil industry
2. Banking industry
3. Military industry
Try cutting out the tumors first.
Griffin may be, as you say, 100% correct here but telling contractors and others to "support Constellation and not discuss alternatives" as well as demanding "mid-level executives from not meeting with the transition team" is INTOLERABLE (from TFA). Considering this comes from an accredited journalist from a reputable news organization (at least I've heard of them previously), their claims of having witnesses, documents and e-mails to back them up should be taken seriously.
Perhaps Griffin is one of the few Bush appointees who isn't corrupt, incompetent or so politically/religiously biased as to commit criminal acts (justice department I'm looking at you). On the other hand considering the absolute disasters this administration has led us into regarding war, international relations, energy policies, the economy, the environment, civil/human rights, politicization of science, corruption of the judiciary, (oh and did I remember the war on terror?) I think anyone with half a brain would look upon anyone Bush would pick with extreme skepticism.
The shuttle HAS been a disaster for the last 25 years. If his plan has decent merit hopefully it will be allowed to continue. Hopefully Obama's team will consider not just the plan itself but the costs of any delay/change to a new one and will make the best choice accordingly. Of course there is a risk that they may not but we did not elect the president of NASA, we elected the PRESIDENT OF THE USA to make these decisions for us. Even as an avid space buff I have to respect that there ARE things more important than NASA. Considering Obama's top level appointments so far I have confidence that they'll do a good job.
If Griffin's plan is good, he will always be known as the one who got the ball rolling and pushed it through difficult and uncertain times. (Maybe he feels so entitled at NASA because under Bush everyone around him WAS an idiot). IF THE ALLEGATIONS from the newspaper ARE TRUE though, he, with his resorting to tactics reminiscent of his other Bushies, has proven that he does not have the character to lead NASA. Let Ares go without him.
...we must make every effort to "lean forward"....
Isn't "leaning forward" the exact opposite of bending over backwards?
"You saved 1968." - Ms. Valerie Pringle to the crew of Apollo 8
I wish I could say I am surprised by this unfortunate turn of events. Having (briefly) worked for NASA at Marshall Space Flight Center I can attest to the gloomy attitude which was begotten from a culture where major programs get canceled every 4 to 8 years coinciding with a presidential election.
As an example see the program called Venture Star, during which several major breakthroughs in spaceflight were made (such as its linear aerospike engine). The "media concensus" is that this program was cancelled due to its composite fuel tank failing. Technical challenges seem like a good reason to cancel a program, but it should come as no surprise that George Bush took office two months before the program was officially cancelled. During my tenure at NASA I was afforded the opportunity to speak with one of the engineers who was a involved with the composite tank's design. It was his opinion, not surprisingly, that the design flaws in Venture Star's composite tank were quite overcome-able.
While this particular engineers insights may be defensive in nature, those of us who are engineers know that overcoming difficult challenges require a long term strategy. Politics in this country, unfortunately, do not offer this long term view. This is why NASA needs to be reinvented to more heavily depend on private industry for funding and execution. Only then can the people with real vision and inspiration take control of the program and take it to the next level.
In other words, if these guys were privately employed, you'd advocate using tax money to keep them employed through hard times, but since they're publicly employed, they should be let go because they're paid with tax money.
Play Command HQ online
We will never get out of the solar system using rockets.
NASA should stop fooling around with rockets and instead focus on fundamental physics that will alow us to invent a space drive that will allow us to escape.
This is possible, because the UFO space aliens have obviously done it.
Play it like a bridge hand. That is assume the cards are so placed that it is possible to make the contract, and play it that way.
Scientists already assume the "Anthropic principle", that is "if it were not true, we would not be here".
I believe that in addition we should assume the "forward looking Anthropic principle" which states "if it is not true, then we are all dead anyway".
Physicists should be told to assume that it is possible to build a space drive break the speed of light and exit the solar system. They should be assigned to go and find out how.
If they can not, we are all dead.
In other words, if these guys were privately employed, you'd advocate using tax money to keep them employed through hard times, but since they're publicly employed, they should be let go because they're paid with tax money.
No I don't support that either, but those autoworkers do and they happen to be voters so their reps have to push the issue regardless of what I'd like.
Wonderful idea, thats just what we need, tons of aerospace engineers with no jobs! Create good paying jobs for these engineers and the education part will take care of itself. Ok a bit of an oversimplification, but if keep our engineering departments strong and make sure there is a good math/science base, students will go to where the jobs are.
âoeIf you are looking under the hood, then you are calling me a liar,â Griffin replied. âoeBecause it means you donâ(TM)t trust what I say is under the hood.
I trust him about as much as I trust a used car sales person when he/she says I don't have to look under the hood of the used car I'm buying. Hello Mr. Griffin, TAX PAYER money you are using there, not your own personal funds.
~~ Behold the flying cow with a rail gun! ~~
Look, I like Ares / Constellation but, Obama will soon be the President and NASA works for him. If Obama says no Ares, then, there is no Ares, and if anyone at NASA doesn't like it, then, they can pound sand or find another job.
Two wrongs do not make a right in this matter. I know there are some Republicans who are furious over the various insubordinations in government that took place under Bush. Well, just because they did it does not give us a right to do it. What's more important is to preserve civilian rule of government, elected by the people and for the people, and the people chose Obama. Everyone in the executive branch now has to do what he says, not just Democrats.
This is my sig.
The void in our launch capabilities left by the shuttle is mainly a void in our manned launch capabilities. Since that's a void in our ability to senselessly blow money for nothing, it would be nice to let it slide.
The "moon mission" and eventual mars mission are indeed red herrings. They prevent us from serious discussion of NASA priorities, and probably will for years, all to provide a few days distraction from bad news Bush didn't want to deal with years ago. I can't even remember what the thing he wanted to distract us from was; all that's left is this rotting herring.
You are absolutely right. The key word there is "play." The best education comes when kids do authentic projects they are interested in with support from teachers who are willing to let the spotlight be on the student instead of the teacher. This, you'll note, is NOT the way most high schools work. We need to get away from "testing" kids and move towards letting them "play."
but does anyone else sending human beings into space is any way to spend tax dollars??? what possible benefit could this have? lets colonize the moon? because we overpopulated the earth??? lets not and say we did, then fix the problems we have with CASH in THIS planet.
earth to slashdot, nasa (manned) is a waste of money. send the robots they dont need oxygen.
Right! One of the reasons those 3rd graders oohed and ahhed so much was that they probably had never watched a launch of any kind. I also showed them a shuttle launch in HD and you would have thought it was Star Wars from the reaction I got. I really can't wait to see how students react when the first Ares test flight goes up next year (if it does). I think people will be surprised by the public reaction, especially young people.
Conventional wisdom right now is that Garver et. al. will recommend the short term replacement of the Ares I with Delta IV or Atlas V EELVs for ISS missions, and the longer term (and far less certain) replacement of the Ares V with a 2-launch Jupiter-232 style launcher for lunar missions, if the administration decides to fund a return to the moon.
The Jupiter team is still active, and appear to be patiently waiting for mid-January to arrive. As you might expect, they've been actively conducting behind-the-scene discussions and working on firming up aspects of their plans.
If you really want to know about what's happening with Jupiter, the team leaders regularly post status updates on this very active discussion thread:
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=12379.3165
I would say Obama could kill the Army's Future Combat System, the F-35, the DDG(X) (or whatever it is), the hopelessly mismanaged Littoral Combat Ship, and come out far, far ahead of killing anything NASA does.
FCS is stupid, replacing the M1 tank, with, what, a tank that sucks? The F-22 is a better aircraft than the F-35 for Air Superiority and its flying right now and the Navy already just bought a bunch of SuperHornets. The DDG(X) is just a colossal procurement disaster and the Littoral Combat Ship is so bad even the Navy condemns it.
This is my sig.
Print money.
*sigh* back to work...
"Using that logic would clearly negate a bailout of GM, Chrysler and possibly Ford. "
Sounds like good logic then.
"Harvesting the moon and moving into the solar system will happen."
Seems unlikely. I mean, sure, space colonies sound wicked cool to geek like me who have read too much scifi, but realistically? It's fantastically hard to get to. It's vastly more hostile to life than any of the huge number of places on earth considered too unpleasant to live. And there's nothing there.
I mean, wake me when the Antarctic ice sheet and the entire ocean floor are populated; we can talk about the lack of air in space...
One more issue that we face is, as you said, the over-focus on the teacher instead of the student. Many of my peers in high school had *no curiosity* whatsoever, and IMHO this is bred by years of having a one-way relationship between the student and knowledge - i.e. knowledge is fed at them, and all they have to do is sit there and absorb. They don't know what it's like to go out and seek the knowledge they desire, and as a result simply aren't curious about how things work.
If teachers became a guiding role instead of the "educator", then I think we can inspire a lot more great things from our young people. Students should be encouraged to figure out *what* they need to know, and teachers be a guiding conduit to that information.
It's almost comical how little people desire to learn, despite the fact that we are without a doubt living in an age where learning is trivially easier than it has ever been before in history.
I do agree that much more needs to be done to make sure our education system is inspiring and challenging children to excel and to have aspirations and goals, not just at passing tests and meeting standards, but at exceeding commonality, being uncommon and exceptional. We need to invest more in gifted and accelerated learning for the brightest and gaurantee that they can skip grades and progress as far as they wish. We should not squander the resource we have in talent in young people and discourage them from excelling and exceeding expectations and working at a their own much faster pace.
As far as the mars mission or a moon mission, these should be on the back burner in my opinion. I am not sure if they are worth the enormous cost and expense when we can often get quite a bit accomplished with unmanned probes.
I do think that ares or orion needs to be fixed or we should have some sort of manned system for servicing the ISS.
I do think its also important that we address health care and nutritional needs as well and poverty and those are also high priorities.
Our economy has been deeply wounded by capitalist greed and corruption and that is a major problem that threatens all objectives at science and humanitarian goals. We need to make sure the system works for the public benefit and we need to strengthen the middle class, our main economic driver rather than continue to allow the income gap to widen and the middle class to shrink. This can be done by stimulating new jobs in the area of clean renewable energy and science and technology, and preserving Americas technical and industrial capabilities.
Why should he?
And if the engineers stonewall, then they'll take decisions based on what they feel like rather than the science.
It won't save Ares OR Orion. And if things go wrong, the new team will have a damn good excuse: the engineers stonewalled.
I always recall reading good things about Griffin when he was first nominated for NASA chief, replacing the much-reviled penny pincher, Okeefe. Was this not the case? Am I missing something? Why all the late armchair criticism for the guy and the cries of being a Bush lackey?? Looking at Griffin's background listed in Wikipedia... seems like he's got a pretty solid background in science (and a little business flavor thrown in). What gives? I completely agree that any sort of chicanery or obfuscation regarding the Orion program originating from his office should be met with the harshest punishment. Barring conclusive evidence of that... why make the assumption based upon circumstantial evidence? Oh, wait... I forgot. This is \.
Jupiter is still very much alive, and the team is busy making presentations to and reports for all the interested parties in this situation. Take a look at this thread over at nasaspaceflight for the latest rumblings: http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=12379.3250
I have no
That's really not true at all. Not everyone who works on Orion\Ares is a government employee. In fact, more are contractors vs. civil servants. I worked Orion, and you didn't pay my salary, my company did.
NASA is good for the economy, and the economy needs all the help it can get. It creates jobs nation wide, and actually provides return on the dollar (read: it makes a profit).
When the incoming administration sends their representative over to see if your programs should continue, stonewalling is a really bad idea. Pissing them off isn't too smart, either.
In the first case, funding will get cut due to ignorance. In the second, out of spite. Either way you are out of a job in a bad economy. More likely, Obama's people wil just figure that NASA management is full of blow hard morons, replace them and put someone else in their place that they can work with.
Have gnu, will travel.
That is my argument also. 700 billion to prop up failing banks who screwed themselves? Or 700 billion for NASA and other science agencies to develop research programs fuel marketable ideas that would create jobs? Billions for the broken, decrepit auto industry (which, thankfully, does not appear to be happening any time soon) that has failed to provide valuable products for consumers (other than mechanics who repair them). Or billions spent to develop new technologies with companies that are trying new things (like Tesla).
No sig for you!!
Mike Griffin has already sent out a NASA wide email, discrediting these claims. In fact, he wrote everyone in NASA should fully cooperate in every way with the transition team. I guess just don't find yourself alone in a room with them.
Then build and launch some actual rockets. Nothing beats hands-on experience.
They've already seen men walking on the moon, Mars won't be any more inspiring. The video game generation is just as easily impressed with high technology and telepresence. The military knows this, their recruiting campaigns are focusing on it.
If you want to realize the dreams of science fiction, we need a lot more engineers than aerospace.
Me, I'd just assume wait for the so-called singularity. I'll never see space, and the only way my descendants will is to make them much lighter (ie. intelligent machines), or have an energy output so large that we are essentially living in a post-scarcity economy.
No, they do not. They were originally supposed to be run like airliners, with a cost much lower than expendable rockets. They utterly and completely failed at that goal.
Such stories as Post-its demonstrate that though something may, at the outset, have an intended goal, it's actual best use may be far off that mark.
I hear this argument a lot; "x sucks because it was supposed to be y and it's not". The question is really; is there any utility to x? For what it did, the shuttle program was successful. What it did didn't happen to be what it set out to do, but only a very narrowly defined vision will see that as a failure.
The real tragedy here is how much of the taxpayers' money has been wasted on this lobbyist-driven boondoggle over the decades, and what we could have achieved in space, had we spent that money wisely.
This is also a common refrain, "Think of what we could have done if we spent the money wisely!" What is never included is what else is needed. Money may be a necessary condition, but it is not sufficient - unless you spend orders of magnitude more. Does that seem like a familiar pattern?
NASA has a $17B 2008 budget. Ten times that was dropped by Congress in a tax rebate early this year. More than forty times that was given to the Administration as discretionary bailout spending. Neither of these expenditures is guaranteed to achieve the goal they set out to do, and even if they succeed have no direct permanent benefit to society; forestalling economic collapse is all well and good, but only if you also go in and fix underlying issues.
On the other hand, NASA provides tangible benefits to science, and science has always, in the long run, improved society both culturally and economically. Knowledge gleaned is not lost. As a tax payer, I will far more readily spend $17B a year, even if it's vastly inefficient, for small, tangible scientific advances, than spend ten times that much to cover up major problems in the economy. Nothing is gained by axing NASA, and even less is gained by claiming that NASA is totally and irrevocably useless and has always been.
Long story short: our resource investment in NASA is low, and the claims of it's inefficiency are entirely out of proportion to it's actual inefficiency, meaning that such claims are inherently deceptive.
[Ego]out
In a period where we are writing out checks for a trillion dollars to Wall Street, and $15 billion to the Auto industry, I fail to see why they would cut back on NASA.
NASA's yearly budget has already been greatly constrained over the last decade, and you think this would be a great program to maintain in the current time. We can point to this, that despite our troubles we're still looking at stuff bigger than ourselves, etc.
I dunno, I just always think it's sad we keep asking NASA to work on a shoe-string budget, but get disappointed when they have a failure.
Or does anyone else notice how close Ares is to Arse? Why would they waste taxpayer money trying to force a circle to fit properly in a square hole? If Griffin has nothing to hide then he should welcome a review. If the project is just wasting tax dollars then pitch it out and build a new technology that makes more sense. Sometimes you have to start from scratch. More initial cost but better returns in the long term.
how much of this inefficiency is exposed to us because our press is in no shape or form afraid of the government... yet.
Now when they start lining up for bailout money (and they will) some of our press might become more beholden to the government. There is one thing I have always noted about foreign press, they will dig more into US dirt than dirt on their home turf.
I don't have to wonder why.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
sack the idiot, and cancel contracts of any 'stonewall enthusiast' corporations, with penalties if possible.
its as simple as that. what you reap, you should saw.
Read radical news here
So you're saying that our network of telecommunications, our satellite net, the ability to look anywhere on Earth, our advanced computing knowledge, biologic knowledge, chemistry knowledge... all of these are worth nothing to society now?
What the study of history really shows us is that regardless of our motivation to get serious about the science, getting serious about it has netted us huge rewards to every aspect of society. This was true during the Space Race. It was true during WWII. It was true during the Industrial Revolution. It was true during the Renaissance. It was true during the Classical era.
Spend the money on NASA. Stop spending it on bailing out antiquated industries.
[Ego]out
Ha! As if anything happened for only one reason, ever. You can't even get water to freeze with just temperature. You also have to have the right pressure! Nothing in this world is single variate. Any argument depending on a single reason is bunk.
[Ego]out
That is crux of the issue. What about when grapes were grown in Great Britain? Was that an optimal climate? Who decides? Those with the most money or the loudest voices? It obviously was warmer then for a good part of the world, so when was it right?
Plus nature has always been a harsh mistress. It has wiped out more species than we will ever know about. We find examples all the time of species that existed but are gone now. We can have one volcano explode and affect the environment more than man can in a year yet who do we think has the power to change the environment? Ourselves, boy do we kid ourselves or what!
We don't know and anyone suggesting that twenty years ago was more right than one hundred is nothing but a religious nutcase. Yes religious because this has taken on every facet of a radical religion.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
The USA defeated the communist Soviet Union by outspending them in the specific industry of aerospace technology.
Wait, what? Did I miss a piece of history somewhere along the way where the Soviet Union was "beaten", rather than fizzled out?
What you missed was the widespread mainstream American adoption of the section of Republican talking points in which they yelled 'pwned!' after the Soviet Union tripped over itself.
We're not a science country anymore. More Americans believe that Jesus rode his dinosaur to church with Adam and Eve than believe in cellular chemistry. So let's just end this farce once and for all.
There will only be so much money available for NASA in any event, and for the amount of money we spend on manned space exploration to the moon (or gawd help us - MARS) we could send robotic spacecraft to look for life on Europa AND Enceladus AND build space telescopes, etc. etc. Let's talk about science vs. flag waving here. Not to mention: "A rat done bit my sister Nell. (with Whitey on the moon) Her face and arms began to swell. (and Whitey's on the moon) I can't pay no doctor bill. (but Whitey's on the moon) Ten years from now I'll be payin' still. (while Whitey's on the moon) The man jus' upped my rent las' night. ('cause Whitey's on the moon) No hot water, no toilets, no lights. (but Whitey's on the moon) I wonder why he's uppi' me? ('cause Whitey's on the moon?) I wuz already payin' 'im fifty a week. (with Whitey on the moon) Taxes takin' my whole damn check, Junkies makin' me a nervous wreck, The price of food is goin' up, An' as if all that shit wuzn't enough: A rat done bit my sister Nell. (with Whitey on the moon) Her face an' arm began to swell. (but Whitey's on the moon) Was all that money I made las' year (for Whitey on the moon?) How come there ain't no money here? (Hmm! Whitey's on the moon) Y'know I jus' 'bout had my fill (of Whitey on the moon) I think I'll sen' these doctor bills, Airmail special (to Whitey on the moon)" -Gil Scott Heron
That has always been a "hands-on" way to interest kids in spaceflight technology. And in the past, NASA used to have a lot of model rocket stuff available on their kids/educational webpages.
Unfortunately, the US government is now in the process of regulating model rocketry out of existence in the name of fighting terrorism...
Remember "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters"? Help make it a reality again! http://soylentnews.org
...you of course mean "Social Security". Right! Right?
Over-the-top Response Guy! Giving "Over-the-Top Responses" since 1970.
Right, because so many companies out there are willing to invest billions into Space and not get any sort of profit back from it for decades right? Long term R&D is something that corporations know nothing of in this day and age, only government can support long term R&D.
What do you think is a primary requirement of lunar rover/colony design? Let me give you a hint, clean renewable energy. A lot of the technology that NASA will be developing for Moon/Mars missions will be directly applicable to real world problems we face now. Healthcare/Nutrition/Poverty will always be problems. Some people are born lazy and stupid, throwing money at them won't fix it.
This is true. In my school district, programs like FIRST (http://www.usfirst.org) are denounced, underfunded, and/or ignored. The district has no problem financing $20,000 trips for cheerleaders to attend national competitions, but can't spring $5,000 for team registration to inspire students into science, math, and technology fields. Many of the students in FIRST actually do go on to colleges and universities to become engineers or scientists, and most of them do so as a direct result of their involvement. How many cheerleaders graduate high school to become professional cheerleaders?
For years, until they canceled it, I would drive home during "News and Notes from the African American Community" on NPR. It was basically AA political pundits sounding off about whatever was the issue of the day. Anyway, one common theme on the show was how many AA political pundits hate NASA. It seemed to have become some sort of symbol of misaligned priorities; we send rich white dudes to space will inner city kids are being shot at school. It seemed to be singled out more than any other thing except how much everyone hates Bush. I live in Detroit, so I've asked a few coworkers and neighbors about nasa over the years, and it is commonly hated. I asked a few ultra liberal white folks too, but they usually want to spend more on nasa, not kill it.
Summary: Someone, at some time, in the AA community decided to use NASA as an example of everything's that wrong with government, and it seems to have struck a cord with many people.
As someone who grew up in the Soviet Union, I can tell you that the only reasons any reforms started happening there in 1985 is that the Party leadership realized they were losing the arms race. Gorbachov' first slogan was not "Glasnost", it was "intensifying technological progress" (which was simply not happening in high-tech).
There was absolutely no way the Party's dictatorship could have been challenged by the people. North Korea and Cuba have not "fizzled out", have they?
This whole fuss has grown out of a single post on the Orlando Sentinel blog. Granted it's a professionally written blog, but the post was based on third party reports about a conversation that those passing the rumors on about weren't involved in.
Griffin steadfastly denies obstructing anything, and has pointed out that every requested document has been provided on time. Garver refuses to comment on it.
I'd be willing to bet she went in with an attitude that Griffin was going to feed her everything that was wrong with Constellation, and she was going to take that back to Obama and get the program cancelled. Then we can return to using the shuttle and the Obama administration doesn't have to face the risk of overseeing a new and ambitious venture. Save the shuttle jobs (Florida voters), save a little bit of prestige of spaceflight, be the lady who stopped a broken program (Constellation is not broken, BTW. It can be fairly argued that it's not the best option, but it's well on its way to succcess), and as a result the US throws away 5 years of development work and sits on its butt for the next 4-8 years making freight runs to the ISS.
When a political science appointee jumps on a rocket scientist on the topic of rocket science, what do you expect to happen? The rocket scientist is going to get pissed. Griffin probably isn't the easiest guy for a politician to work with. There's been a lot of criticism directed his way, especially from armchair engineers not on the program who think they know something he doesn't. If a politician came his way and spouted the same things, I could definitely see him getting riled up.
This is a mess, based on hearsay and little more. Unfortunately, the Sentinel has blown it into a national story without documented sources. I'm not even worried about Griffin. He's a skilled engineer, but a mediocre administrator. NASA will easily survive if Obama gets rid of him. But if he sinks Constellation, mark my words, you won't see NASA accomplish anything front page news worthy until at least 2030, unless there is another accident.
I read the early plan from the Obama campaign on shifting funding from NASA to social programs. Since then something rather important changed that stance.
He won Florida......with not that big a margin.
And as NASA is one of the biggest .gov programs in FL, I'm sure Obama wants to win the state again in 2012. He will keep up funding for the manned programs, just exactly how is the question. I for one think this is an excellent chance to give a second look at Constellation and consider the alternatives. The promises that Griffin made about keeping the Shuttle infrastructure seem to be slipping more and more (no SSME, 5 segment SRB, redisigned Ares V tankage). Obama needs to pick an administrator who manages to develop and launch a new manned lifter AND keep most of the workforce employed. Constellation as it exists might not be able to do either.
and would have lasted for another 10-20 years or more, while being just as wasteful and inefficient. The people would have had to "sacrifice" instead of dreaming of "no two families having to share an apartment by 2000", but so what?
North Korea is still going strong, in fact they are getting back to the ration system and banning food markets. So lots of people died -- and who cared? Who would dare protest, and for how long would they be able to do it?
It was fear of losing their cushy lives that drove the Party apparatchiks to support some reforms, in hopes to persuade the US to stop the arms race, which the US was winning, thanks to Reagan. If the US agreed to yet another round of bullshit "Soviet peace initiatives", the reforms would have stopped way before "Glasnost".
And as to direct, it took those idiots nearly 2 years to finally get their web site right. I am not certain that I would trust them to a rocket in the correct fashion.
Yes, as we know, a good web site is a sign of how competent someone is in any field.
... but why are we all dead if we cannot get out of the solar system? Strictly speaking, surely we are all dead whether we get out of the solar system or not?
Reality is defined by the maddest person in the room
They have proof that he is really an alien!
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
I've seen estimates that for the approximate cost of a shuttle service mission to the Hubble, we could have simply launched a new one.
Ah, but therein lies the problem. The shuttle estimates weren't particularly egregious, either. F(known cost, unknown cost) = [True cost], and in the shuttles case we now know both the known and unknown costs. However, in the 'ideal' case we're comparing against, we don't know the unknown costs. Sometimes even hindsight isn't 20/20.
[Ego]out
How this gets modded insightful is beyond me. Going in to Iraq was not the correct move, but that isn't a point worth debating at this point because we are there. An exit strategy needs to be created, and quickly but to just pick and leave would just create an environment ripe for the next Saddam. We've made a terrible bed, and now have to sleep in it.
You can't get out of a depression by cutting taxes and spending, because it doesn't stimulate demand. And since there is no private demand in a depression, you have to make up for it with public demand.
This is the time to INCREASE, not decrease, federal spending. You want to see a short recession, bring back the 91% marginal tax rate, pass universal health care, 2 years free community college, and spend a trillion dollars on national infrastructure.
Less government for the sake of less government as is asinine as more government for the sake of more government - see: Katrina, health care, Wall Street implosion, etc. The real issue isn't "more" or "less", but what is the right amount of government.
We need space exploration. We need to learn about our planet, our solar system, and our planet's function and relative essence of existence in that system. The more we learn, the more we can adapt knowledge to far reaching places. By hindering NASA's progression, you are hindering our future in ways you are not willing to acknowledge. Why is this? Please, get on track with Universe around us and our mission objectives of exploring it and learning from it in order to grow ... as human kind. You have a good plan for the people, but take it this necessary step further. Thank you.
We are all dead if we can not figure a way out of the solar system. (Read any newspaper.)
If you believe your personal immortality depends on escaping the solar system, I have a religion I'd like to sell you.
He said he was going to cut NASA's budget to fund preschool businesses & cancel the moon program. He's a traditional social reform president. What do U expect?
"What use is a baby" is a semi-famous answer to the question of what use is electricity back from the early days of electrical experimentation.
"...if asked about benefits to be gained by canceling the current US efforts to revisit the moon..."
Obviously the only benefit would be availability of funding for something else.
What would be lost? Anything that might be gained by that mission, as well as all the benefits that would grow out of it.
(A farmer never eats or sells all of his crop. If he did, he wouldn't be a farmer any more, what would he plant next year...)
NASA exploration missions are valuable, even though we find it difficult to place a $ on their benefit. It it wasn't for NASA the modern world would be very much like the 50s still. Their advances and experiments and projects have resulted in advances to computers, electronics, mathematics, communications, health & medicine, agriculture, travel, and well, just about everything except politics.
We explore because we don't know, if we knew, we wouldn't have to explore...
News for nerds, flamebait that matters.
Obama has no "problem" at NASA. He's not even the President yet, Timothy -- you moron. If he wants to change things at NASA when he *is* President, he can.
What a stupid political stunt of a Slashdot posting. Not too surprised it came from "Timm-ah", though.
+++OK ATH
We need the space program, and the expeditions to the Moon and Mars. It is a great way to develop technology and maintain our leadership in this one of the ways we have global leadership. It is an inspiration to all Americans and to all people of the world. We all feel the excitement and benefit from the personal growth we exhibit as we try to be better than we ever have been. It also helps to ensure that our human race has more options than that provided by a single planet. Granted, it is not a giant leap to distant stars, but it is a great step outwards to new worlds, bringing with it the great advancements in society and technology that comes with a forward reaching civilization.