US Manned Space Flight Taking a Budget Hit

An anonymous reader points out that Congress has quietly begun dismantling NASA's manned space flight program. "Other recommendations contained in the bill include a $77million reduction in NASA's proposed space operations budget, which includes the space shuttle and international space station; a $6 million reduction in science; and a $332 million shift in funds from the Cross Agency Support account to a new budget line-item included in the subcommittee's mark. Dubbed Construction and Environmental Compliance, the new account would be funded at $441 million. Congressional aides said the new line item and accompanying funds are aimed at consolidating NASA's various construction efforts into a single pot of money."

Comments

Re:Time for gubm't to step aside and let others le

[damburger]

Right, lets leave it to private enterprise, so they can do for spaceflight what they've done for the financial services industry.

Your invisible hand is superstitious bullshit. Market equilibrium is a concept entirely at odds with empirical reality. Get over yourself, and stop ramming idiotic libertarian pop economics into every argument.

Robots all the way!

[Joce640k]

Manned space flight is a complete waste of money right now. It achieves very little and makes everything an order of magnitude heavier and more complex. We need less astronauts and more Mars rovers.

Re:Time for gubm't to step aside and let others le

[damburger]

What you have blurted out of your noise hole is directly contrary to the consensus amongst professional economists. It is also contrary to logic - if these institutions were flawed because of government intervention why did they fail when government intervention in them was reduced, not when it was greater?

As for the computer industry: Bletchley Park, APRANET, the World Wide Web, Linux, the Apollo Guidance Computer - all developed without your beloved profit motive. Suck on it.