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Candidate Gingrich Pushes a Moon Base, Other Space Initiatives
New submitter thomas.kane writes "Newt Gingrich announced yesterday, while visiting Florida's Space Coast, a visionary plan for the future of space travel. He suggested a combination of the current private incentives and a government funded section, developing a moon base, commercial near earth orbit, and continuous propulsion systems to better reach Mars." "Visionary" seems an awfully positive spin on it; Gingrich is not the first President or presidential candidate to propose revisiting the moon — and the moon seems like small potatoes, by some measures.
The US federal debt is going to ensure that this never happens. Not this side of 2050. Not even if the Chinese start making concrete plans to do the same.
GWB set up a program that he knew he couldn't finance and thus put all the expenses on whoever would come after him. Of course, this didn't stop them from handing out heaps of money for useless non-development - like $450,000,000 dollars for the "Ares-1x" - an ordinary surplus shuttle booster with a mockup stage strapped on top of it, that didn't even manage to separate properly and couldn't tell anything about the flight characteristics of the real Ares-1 (with a longer 5-segment booster) anyway. For comparison: the cost of that flight was more than two full flights of the Ariane-5.
Speaking as a strong advocate for space expolration, the last thing we need is the support of loonies like the Newt.
It amazes me that anybody is still taking him seriously - let alone voting for him in these primaries.
Gingrich said this in Florida, a few weeks before the Floriday primary. Newt needs a win here to cement his momentum, because if Romney wins it's a serious blow to his candidacy. Because of that, I expect him to spend the next couple of weeks telling voters any outlandish fantasy it takes to get elected, up to and including telling people in Miami he'll invade Cuba and kill Castro.
Floridians are promised a moon base right before primary night. Texans will be promised their independence. Arizonians will be promised a border fence. Pennsylvania will be promised a revitalized steel industry. The grain belt will be promised increased access to foreign markets for meat, milk, and grain. Alaska will get more wells AND greater environmental protections at the same time. So will Ohio. Such is the power of American ingenuity. We will have the largest economy, the largest and best equipped army, the healthiest economy, the best education, equal opportunity for everyone, but no limit on personal wealth and power. Anyone can have a gun, and we will be the safest nation on earth.
Meanwhile, opponents will be defined by their positions on controversial hot-button but trivial issues of no national consequence whatsoever.
Could be almost any politician's platform; except that Newt is an exemplary example of how extreme such cynical manipulation of the electorate can go. He truly holds the citizens of this country in contempt; no one sees the world as clearly as he does; no one possesses such incisive insight. He will do or say anything to get elected. In short he is a psychopath.
Alarmingly, that seems to be what an inexplicably large proportion of the population wants right now. It's a scary time to be an American.
Government undertaking grandiose projects, be it man on moon, be it universal healthcare, be it war on poverty, are all typically Democratic thinking. The Republicans usually slant towards free markets, low deficits, small government etc. In moderation both sides have good ideas. When ideas from either party are taken to the extremes, it becomes grotesque. Suddenly because Floridians think they will benefit by the revival of government spending on space research, he is pandering to them. Such pandering is the bane of democracy.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Going back to the moon is not small potatoes, by any measure.
The pessimistic case, it's done by Government, will cost a fortune and get us what, a publicity stunt? Worse, NASA will take it seriously, develop extensive plans for what we really ought to do, and then as soon as the publicity wears off, cancel everything at even more cost. 1972, deja vu.
In the what-should-be-done vein, we (humans) need to go to the moon, plant a base, and then develop that base into an industrial economy in its own right. This means that we will need to find resources on the moon, develop them, and aim for a self-sustaining colony.
No politician will ever support this, because the time frame of such a project is fifty years, or a hundred years. Where's the electability in that? What political force in the US could ever conceive of something that didn't pay off in the current election cycle? What money manager would invest hard cash in a project that was two hundred quarters out? Nobody I know.
China, maybe. They are not (yet) governed by short sighted kapitalists (sic) or even more short sighted politicians.
Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.
Given this bloated gas bag's religious fanaticism, his desire to "go to the moon" is nothing more than campaign bullshit, the same campaign bullshit that has been spouted by every presidential hopeful since JFK.
Gingrich has no serious plans about building a moon base. He's just pandering to Floridians to get their votes. You can rest assured that after Florida is done, he'll drop it like a bad habit.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
Unlikely. Several carriers are in the yards at any given time.
So, 9 or 10 carriers means six to eight available at any given moment. One in the Med, one in the Indian Ocean, a couple in the Pacific, one in the Atlantic is about minimum.
And that assumes that the operational carriers are at sea basically 100% of the time. With no time for transit to duty stations.
So unless you're good with the notion that the carrier battle group in the western pacific or the med or the Indian Ocean NEVER gets to come home, and the sailors on same never get to see families for their entire enlistment, it won't happen.
That said, there is NO chance of a moon base by 2020. Even if Gingrich got behind for real (promising space activity in Florida campaign speeches is normal - every President since Kennedy has done it, including Obama), there isn't time to develop the heavy-lift capability, much less actually move hardware to the moon - we're actually behind where we were in 1962 right now, in that we're not even in working on a heavy lift vehicle yet....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Don;t need to mothball a carrier to do that. Just repeal the Bush Era tax cuts. 2 trillion right there.
Won't even hurt anyone in the bottom 90%. Then you can look at mothballing carriers and looking at social security reform etc.
If Gingrich was anything close to a "visionary", he'd be talking space elevator, not moon bases.
What he is, is a liar that will say anything to gain power for himself, and that's quite clear from his history. The American voter has a very short memory, though, which is why these tyrants keep coming back even after leaving in disgrace.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
You mean the Obama era tax cuts. The Bush era tax cuts expired two years ago.
When did Paul advocate eliminating the military? Look, I'm a vet. I'm very much for having a strong national defense. There is no credible way in which you could describe me as anti-military. But we spend 78% percent as much as the rest of the world combined ($687B for America vs $876B total for everyone else). Do we have to? I mean, could we reduce that to just outspending China, France, UK, Russia, Japan, Germany, and Saudia Arabia combined ($426.8B)? That'd save $260B from the budget each year while still giving us a stronger military than the next 7 put together. Can we call that good enough?
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?