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Neil Armstrong To NASA: You're Embarrassing
astroengine writes "Neil Armstrong, Apollo legend and outspoken critic of NASA's current direction for human spaceflight, was joined by three other space experts to address Congress on Thursday. It wasn't pretty. Amongst the other criticisms was Armstrong's tough statement: 'For a country that has invested so much for so long to achieve a leadership position in space exploration and exploitation, this condition is viewed by many as lamentably embarrassing and unacceptable.' He might have a point, but Apollo 17's Eugene Cernan, the last man to walk on the moon, suggested the shuttles should be brought out of retirement to fill the U.S. manned spaceflight gap — a suggestion that probably rolled some eyeballs."
In broad, total-budget-allocation numbers, it is unequivocally the case that the US seems to have backed out of a great many 'big picture' projects in favor of a mixture of foreign policy adventuring and financial jiggery-pokery.
In that sense, Armstrong is correct.
However, it must not be forgotten that Armstrong is also speaking in his capacity as one of the White Elephants. The people we sent to the moon pretty much to show Ivan whose dick was bigger. An impressive feat of engineering(that conveniently aligned with the Cold War enthusiasm for big missiles); but not really a high point for science. Those unassuming little RC cars on mars that survived so long did a fair bit more extraterrestrial data gathering, and a combination of orbital and improved ground telescopes have done extraordinary deep-sky work...
So far as Armstrong is arguing that there is something rotten in the US, he is correct. However, I can only take them seriously so long as he stays there, rather than expanding into a lamentation over the decline of the impressive, but scientifically dubious, in favor of unsexy but productive and increasingly robotic space work.The fact that it's easier to find money to save gamblers from the consequences of their own folly than it is to explore the universe is sad. The fact that tinned-monkey 'space exploration' is being supplanted by increasingly sophisticated robotic systems is not.
Space exploration is the right thing to do, but we don't yet have the knowledge or technology to make meaningful manned missions.
We didn't have the knowledge or technology prior to 1961 either. But spending money to learn how to do those things was the right thing to do.
IMO the goal of our space programs isn't just to put humans into space. It also serves to dump piles of money into US science an tech development. Our space program is an investment in the US that allows us to maintain a technological edge. We've lost hope of outproducing developing countries like China, out best chance now is to keep ourselves ahead of them technologically. We can't do that unless we are keeping our scientists and engineers working and advancing our sci/tech industry.
TL;DR: We must do this in the name of SCIENCE!
No, try again. As the poster above you points out: the Bush Bailout cost more in one year - nay, in ONE LUMP SUM PROGRAM - than NASA's entire budget for the entirety of its existence.
And what did the Bush Bailout get us? Pretty much nothing except a bunch of Republican fat-cats lining their pockets after claiming their businesses were "too big to fail."
NASA is not a reflection of "government." NASA is a reflection of what happens when you give an agency - ANY agency, whether public or private - an order to do grand things on a shoestring budget and then start hacking away at the budget even further.
The final three planned moon missions were all canceled by Nixon and the Republicans, who had their hate on for the space program because it had been put in place by JFK (Nixon had an especially heavy hate on for any remnants of that administration, as he had lost to JFK previously). This behavior has continued more or less apace every time the Republicans held either the Presidency or at least one house of Congress.
As has once been said: NASA is an agency with an undeniable problem. The problem is not the will to do what they are assigned to do. It is not the capacity and intellect to get the job done. No, the problem is that it is an agency assigned to tasks that require a 10-15 year program to set up and accomplish, while being overseen and funded by a bunch of assholes who are generally replaced on a 2-year cycle and who are perpetually looking to be seen as "cutting government waste" and wanting instant gratification. For god's sake, we build in a 10% overage "just in case" fund for every construction project, but Congress won't do the same for NASA's programs!
You want to see NASA do well? Give them a task, assign realistic funding (and a percentage for overruns when they happen, because something unexpected always happens) for the task, lock the funding in place so that future Congresses can't touch it, and GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE WAY.
He didn't say this to NASA, but to congress.
Here's the thing that gets me. We bailed out AIG, GM, Chrysler, Goldman Sachs, GE, Bank of America, the list goes on and on. We gave them Trillions in direct cash infusions and 0% interest loans. Essentially every member of the financial sector and virtually all large businesses were saved because of either being directly saved or we saved their financial counter-parties. As soon as someone starts talking about raising taxes on the decision makers in those big corporations a few % all of a sudden it's class warfare. I agree there's class warfare going on, but it seems clear that my side is losing.
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So NASA always gets hit during economic downturn, but apparently there is always money for the US war machine. At least something positive always comes out of the NASA spending.
Tesla was a genius. Edison however was a overrated hack who liked to torture puppies.
Maybe they should be run like CERN.
Basically have a big bank account that the government(s) dump money into each year and then leave it up to NASA to decide how to spend it.
That way if some wingnut gets in and decides to defund it, they'll just loose funding for that year or two and can live off the savings during that time.
but the real blame goes to the american people. exactly such as yourself, or people like you.
to think that one half of america is an innocent bystander while the other half is a lying, self deceiving bunch ....it's indicative that you have your head so far up your ass, the taste of old copper pennies fills your mouth.
The reason I disagree with this is that the American people are lied to and propagandized to such a degree that they have no basis on which to make informed decisions about government. They are taken advantage of at every turn by self-interested politicians and media outlets. Where can they get good, honest information about what various government agencies are up to, and what policy outcomes are? TV ain't gonna tell 'em! Local news is just that, and the national stuff is high level overview, and mostly just what the government wants us to hear anyway. And the politicians are too concerned with funding their next campaign and getting elected to be bothered with any kind of honest assesment.
So people are left to their own devices. Some will go out of their way to find out what's going on (even then it can be tough). But many people are too busy with taking care of the kids and keeping a job to really understand what is going on and how to respond. And even if they do, how do they affect change? It's hard to get anything done in Washington without an army of lobbyists. It's hard for the average citizen to challenge the military/industrial complex, or Wall Street, or Big Oil. So you can blame the American people if you want. And I might agree with you if we had a real, functioning republic with real, adversarial media. But we don't.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
The hell he did. He inherited a BOOMING economy with a MASSIVE surplus. I'm so fucking sick of this bullshit false equivalence. What you have said isn't just a lie. It's mendacious to the extreme.
Stock market peaked in March, 2000. The dotcom burst was well under way by election day. As you might recall, half of the valuation for all publicly traded companies went away by late 2001. That in turn dropped tax revenue considerably, since so much (around 20% of the 2000-2001 fiscal year) was dependent on capital gains. So no massive revenue surplus in fiscal year 2001-2002.
The original poster is correct.
Meanwhile, the DOD gets another 700 billion or so. The 'we don't have the money for it!' argument doesn't fly so long as the DOD enjoys that much without issue.
Dear Mr. Cernan,
While I respect your contribution to the space program, you're wrong. Specifically, with respect to the Space Shuttle, it is too late. They've been pulled out of service, stripped of flight hardware, and decomissioned. Contracts have been cancelled. Staff has been layed off. Necessary support infrastructure and hardware has been mothballed. It's done.
In addition, required airframe inspections were postponed in order to complete the final missions by the deadline. So, even if we were to renew all the contracts, re-hire all the staff, and pull the ground support harddware out of mothballs, a recertification of all three airframes would be required. This takes time; and, for the duration of the recertification process we would have no launch vehicles. Given that we did not have facilities to do more than one full tear down and inspection at a time, (or have not had the capability for a considerable period of time), the recertification would be drawn out until at least two airframes were inspected, sequentially -- flight rules require a second shuttle be available on standby in the event of an on-orbit accident.
No, Mr. Cernan. As embarrassing as it is to have no capability, returning the Shuttle to flight, now, is not the option. Our best option for NASA designed hardware is a return to flight leveraging proven components and technology, in the form of the SLS (or whatever you choose to call it) If you want it sooner, get it funded faster. And although your past arguments make it clear you find commercial options distastefully, I feel you should review your decision. One option is the ULA Atlas V+ Boeing CST-100. Another option is to use the Lockheed Orion on either ULA vehicles (Atlas or Delta) As these contractors are the people who built and maintained the Shuttle, they're already intimately familiar with the manned space flight requirements. Frankly, they're likely to be ready before SLS.
Finally, You should not be so quick to dismiss alternatives such as SpaceX. Yes, it is rocket science. Yes, these are the "new kids on the block", upstarts some may call them. Consider that SpaceX is hiring many experienced people from both NASA contractors and NASA itself. Consider that the work being done by SpaceX is under contract to NASA and the Air Force, and is under constant review by NASA and Air Force personnel. Consider that their designs, while new, are based on existing works. They may be the "new kid on the block" but they are clearly leveraging the industries 5 decades of experience.