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NASA Faces Rough Road In 2013
MarkWhittington writes "With the National Research Council report that concluded that President Obama's plan for a mission to an asteroid has no support, either inside NASA or anywhere else, the space agency faces a decision point in 2013. The NRC suggested that the administration, Congress, NASA, and other stakeholders in space exploration come to a consensus behind a new goal. But the space agency's problems run deep, caused by a lack of direction, a lack of leadership, and a lack of funding."
How the hell can you plan a major project when every year you're faced with the possibility of major cuts?
From TFA (second link):
The dimensions of the train wreck that is the Obama space policy are impossible to exaggerate.
The dimensions of hyperbole in that statement are impossible to exaggerate, too. Reading that second link (possibly written by a very bitter pundit-turned-scientist Rove) was an absolute waste of time bemoaning everything from NASA considering too many options before making a decision, to Mitt Romney losing the presidential race. OP's summary was more educational and less biased than that pile.
Only ten?
Where in the world did you get such a staggering discount? Or are you counting on a massive boost to NASA's funding?
NASA budget in 2012: $3.5-$8.7 billion
DOD (not including the FBI, international affairs, veterans affairs, homeland security, many other things): $707.5 billion
Ten times would be a huge change. I mean, the interest on debt for past wars was $109.1–$431.5 billion itself.
Lemme put that into perspective for you: You're spending about 30x as much repaying the debt for the last wars than you are putting stuff into space.
I'll type it again so it's really really clear.
The budget for repaying the debt, not necessarily the whole debt itself, just the interest on the debt, for Iraq/Afghanistan, is around about thirty times the budget of NASA. The defense budget itself is two to three times *that* amount.
Ten. If only, mate. If only.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States#Budget_breakdown_for_2012
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Fact of the matter is this - instead of being the leader of the citizens of the United States of America, Obama chooses to be a crowd pleaser.
Instead of concentrate the limited resource available to make America strong - by spending them on R&D and also space programs - Obama opted for spending the money for welfare to feed the crack addicts and those who are too lazy to work
The president doesn't make these decisions. You might think he's supposed to lead by telling congress what to spend money on, but you would be just another person enabling congress to continue to suck. The president is designed to hold back congress from doing crazy stuff. That's why he has the veto power - and nothing more. Congress sets the budget and congress fails when the budget is wrong. There are 535 people with their own leadership structure. When they fail it's not the presidents' fault, no matter who it is.
Blaming the president for Congress' failing through lack of leadership just enables the executive branch to assume more power and the legislative to point more fingers.
Lack of sufficent funding to (eg) NASA is a fundamental problem, because it shows that The US of A is losing sight of some things which are really important.
I'm not just talking about "more science is good" but a thriving Space Program through NASA pumps something quite literally vital back into the economy.
Confidence In And Hope For The Future.
Almost NOTHING that NASA does is "for today", everything is long term, future thinking, "some day you will thank me for this" work.
Problems with lack of direction (etc) at NASA are mostly a reflection of uncertainty in funding (both current and future).
You can't blame the Captain of a ship that he's not steering anywhere useful when you won't put fuel in his tanks.
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