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Former Astronauts Call Obama NASA Plans "Catastrophic"
krou writes "Talking to the BBC at a private function held at the Royal Society in London, former astronauts Jim Lovell and Eugene Cernan both spoke out about Obama's decision to postpone further moon missions. Lovell claimed that 'it will have catastrophic consequences in our ability to explore space and the spin-offs we get from space technology,' while Cernan noted he was 'disappointed' to have been the last person to land on the moon. Said Cernan: 'I think America has a responsibility to maintain its leadership in technology and its moral leadership ... to seek knowledge. Curiosity's the essence of human existence.' Neil Armstrong, who was also at the event, avoided commenting on the subject."
Since insuring everyone can actually save money, we can do both.
Play Command HQ online
Bringing men to the moon currently wouldn't add anything of value. It was possible in the '60s, doing it now would not bring any advancement. Space money is better spent on research for new propulsion systems and ways to get off the Earth. When that is done, THEN go to the moon.
Cutting NASA with respect to the deficit is like putting a bandaid on your finger while ignoring the sucking wound in your chest.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
With modern CGI techniques, surely faking moon landings should be getting cheaper?
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
Access to health care is still a big problem in the USA. But huge swaths of modern medicine are the result of human space travel. It's hard to find anything today that isn't in some way reliant on space-related research.
Further Research.
I'm not saying that postponing a manned return to the Moon is catastrophic by itself - but we depend on space travel for so much today that scaling back our efforts there amounts to saving pennies today (NASA's budget is a tiny drop in the federal budget!) by throwing away potentially massive results tomorrow. And this is aside from how important exploration is in purely human terms.
We face no external threats, militarily speaking. It's time for us to discard our empire.
And what "empire" is that exactly? Do you demand we let go of Puerto Rico?
Other than that we have a number of military actions in areas where we are supporting democratic governments - Iraq and Iran - that are not in any way part of a U.S. "empire" (for better or worse).
As for the lack of military threats, I suggest to tell that to the people attacking our military and citizens. Perhaps they will stop once they realize they do not exist.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
You do realize this argument is really stupid. The basic argument goes that doing something difficult and useless is really helpful because you solve all these engineering problems along the way that are helpful for other areas. If true, then doing something useful and difficult would be much more helpful. Why not develop super efficient engines for various modes of transportation? Why not build great high speed rail that could connect cities at super sonic speeds? Doesn't sound possible? Not really, but neither did putting a man on the moon. Difference is, this one would be something when we were done.
I think you're missing all of the collateral benefits that came from the space race. You're probably typing on one right now.
The richest people in the U.S. have, on average, shorter lives than those in nations with universal health care. And these people have access not only to the insurance policy of choice, but to the doctors and hospitals of choice as well.
It's rather interesting that Buzz Aldrin has a completely opposite view of the new plan:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/buzz-aldrin/president-obamas-jfk-mome_b_448667.html
... The President courageously decided to redirect our nation's space policy away from the foolish and underfunded Moon race that has consumed NASA for more than six years, aiming instead at boosting the agency's budget by more than $1 billion more per year over the next five years, topping off at $100 billion for NASA between now and 2015. And he directed NASA to spend a billion per year on buying rides for American astronauts aboard new, commercially developed space vehicles-that's American space vehicles. Other NASA funds will go into developing and testing new revolutionary technologies that we can use in living and working on Mars and its moons. ... For the past six years America's civil space program has been aimed at returning astronauts to the Moon by 2020. That's the plan announced by President George W. Bush in January of 2004. That plan also called for developing the technologies that would support human expeditions to Mars, our ultimate destination in space. But two things happened along the way since that announcement, which became known as the Vision for Space Exploration.
First, the President failed to fully fund the program, as he had initially promised. As a result, each year the development of the rockets and spacecraft called for in the plan slipped further and further behind. Second and most importantly, NASA virtually eliminated the technology development effort for advanced space systems. Equally as bad, NASA also raided the Earth and space science budgets in the struggle to keep the program, named Project Constellation, on track. Even that effort fell short.
To keep the focus on the return to the Moon, NASA pretty much abandoned all hope of preparing for Mars exploration. It looked like building bases on the Moon would consume all of NASA's resources. Yet despite much complaining, neither a Republican-controlled nor a Democratic-controlled Congress was willing or able to add back those missing and needed funds. The date of the so-called return to the Moon slipped from 2020 to heaven-knows when. At the same time, there was no money to either extend the life of the Space Shuttle, due to be retired this year, or that of the International Space Station, due to be dropped into the Pacific Ocean in 2015, a scant handful of years after it was completed.
Enter the new Obama administration. Before deciding what to do about national space policy, Obama set up an outside review panel of space experts, headed up by my friend Norm Augustine, former head of Lockheed Martin and a former government official. Augustine's team took testimony and presentations from many people with ideas on what way forward NASA should take (that group included me). In October, it presented its report to the President and to Dr. John Holdren, Obama's science advisor and a friend and colleague of mine. The report strongly suggested the nation move away from the troubled rocket program, called Ares 1, and both extend the life of the space station and develop commercial ways of sending astronauts and cargoes up to the station. And it suggested a better way to spend our taxpayer dollars would be not focused on the Moon race, but on something it called a "Flexible Path." Flexible in the sense that it would redirect NASA towards developing the capability of voyaging to more distant locations in space, such as rendezvous with possibly threatening asteroids, or comets, or even flying by Mars to land on its moons. Many different destinations and missions would be enabled by that approach, not just one.
But with the limited NASA budget consumed by the Moon, no funds were available for this development effort -- until now. Now President Obama has signaled that new direction -- what
Better go look at the budget. Obama's budget *increases* NASA spending while removing its most visible mission. Basically, he plans on creating the next Lockheed or Boeing at taxpayer expense.
Quite the opposite, actually. The current Constellation program favors cost-plus non-competitive contracts, while the new plan uses fixed-price commercial contracts with multiple companies competing and developing in parallel, with companies only getting paid for meeting milestones. For example, a number of companies are currently under "CCDev" contracts for developing commercial crew vehicles and technologies, and only get paid the full amount if they meet all of their milestones by the end of 2010. You can read more about this in the budget documents:
http://www.nasa.gov/news/budget/index.html
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/428356main_Exploration.pdf
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/428356main_Exploration.pdf
Okay braintrust, here is the fact. Bush kept the Iraq and Afghanistan wars off of his budget the entire time he was in office. A HUGE chunk of that total is Bush's wars that Obama put on the budget for the first time since we invaded. No more emergency war supplemental bills. They're on the budget now.
And thanks for clearing up why you're so uninformed. Glenn Beck is a self-proclaimed "rodeo clown", and the fact that you don't think you look like a fool for parroting his absolute bullshit puts a smile on my face. Tell me, how did that interview with Massa go? The one that had the potential to "change the course of this nation"? LOL
That and a GIGANTIC FUCKING OCEAN! The only reason we can afford to fight so many wars is that it is very hard to invade America.
You may not have heard, but we've developed these things called "ships" and "airplanes" over the last couple centuries. You should read up on them - they're really kinda cool! Some 70 years ago, they allowed forces from the US, Canada, and Australia to successfully invade and defeat enemies in several nations, even though there were oceans in between!
I know, I know, it's hard to believe. Don't take my word on it - I'm sure if you google "World War 2" you should be able to come up with some confirmatory evidence.
When the pension systems were implemented, typically a man would work for 45 years, paying into the system, and then live for maybe 5 years past retirement, drawing on that same system.
It worked simply because the life expectancy past retirement wasn't more than a few years.
Now people are living longer after retirement than they ever worked, and drawing more from the system than they ever payed in. The pensioners now are using the current working populations contributions. So what will be left when today's workers reach retirement age ?
That IS a pyramid scheme, whether you like it or not.
It has nothing to do with "great outlook", it's got everything to do with cold hard reality.
It got modded troll, but it's 100% true.
No, it's one 100% troll. For one thing, the war in Iraq has nothing to do with NASA's budget. For another, picking on wars is like shooting fish in a barrel - you could just as easily argue that getting involved in WW2 was unnecessary for the US.
It has wasted a trillion dollars, and we have nothing to show for it but a bunch of fresh graves.
First off, that's the (estimated) combined cost for both wars, so you're wrong right off the bat. Second, the figures provided by the various "counter" sites are, for some reason, never sourced. If you can provide the raw data to support that claim, I'd very much appreciate it - nobody else seems to know how to find it. Third, there are plenty of things that you can "show for it" - the problem is that you apparently don't think they've been worth the cost.
We wasted enough money in Iraq to pay for universal health care, AND a trip to the moon.
Canadian healthcare - for a population one tenth the size of yours - costs $120+ billion per year. At a cost of roughly 700 billion over 7 years, the Iraq war wouldn't even be enough to fund OUR healthcare, let alone yours. You're living in a dream world. Wake up.
[citation needed]
This would be the CBO's forecast:
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/113xx/doc11307/Reid_Letter_HR3590.pdf
The coverage provisions will have a net cost of $624 billion for the ten years from 2010 to 2019, and a gross cost of $875 billion over the same ten years, the $624 billion number is what is actually relevant. However, with new taxes and other cost savings the bill would implement, the total effect of the bill on the budget deficit would be to lower the deficit by saving $118 billion over ten years. On the other hand the CBO estimate in 2003 for the bill that established Medicare Part D stated the new (at the time) benefits would have outlays (costs) of $460.7 billion from 2004 to 2013. That is here:
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/44xx/doc4468/hr1s1.pdf
Impersonating Tycho from Penny Arcade since before there was a PA.
I'd say coming down out of the trees was probably a mistake...
In fact we should return to the trees. By my math, raising the living level of 6.8 billion people by three meters yields a net increase in the human living level by 20.4 billion person-meters. We could achieve the same net increase in the level of human life by sending 53 astronauts the 385,000 km to the moon, but it's important to note that would do nothing for the median level.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Oh, don't worry about it. Whatever happens to the rest of the country, our troopers will be certain to have the latest toys.
After all, the moon needs democracy, too.
I don't believe in time. It's a grand conspiracy designed to sell watches.
When I was 6 years old my parents moved to Titusville, Florida right across the Indian River Lagoon from the VAB. I grew up watching Saturn V's, Atlas, Delta, Titan, and Shuttle space vehicles thunder skyward. I went to school with the sons and daughters of real "Rocket Scientists". I'd say the number one reason I got into the engineering field was the excitement and allure of these kind of epic and difficult endeavors. What inspires people to go into engineering today ? I only worked on Spacecraft and launch systems for 10 years before I got into other things, but would I have been inspired at all by a presidential challenge to build a better battery, or an energy efficient home ? I somehow doubt it. So I would argue that not only does going to the moon spin-of useful technology it inspires the youth of today and tomorrow to achieve great things in engineering !
Like many politicians before him, Barack Hussein Obama broke a campaign promise. He outright lied in order to get the votes independent voters.
How did he break a promise to fund Constellation? From a previous Slashdot story
"In a recent article on The Space Review, Greg Zsidisin reveals that Barack Obama plans to delay Project Constellation for at least five years, using the redirected funds to nationalize early-education for children under five years old to prepare them for the rigors of kindergarten and beyond, if he is elected president. It is feared that if this happens the Vision for Space Exploration will flounder and that may be the end of human spaceflight altogether."
Seems like he's just following through on what he said almost 2 years ago.
Reading code is like reading the dictionary - you have to read half of it before you can go back and understand it.