4 ms·
NASA unveils sweeping new programs - manned rockets, deep space exploration
- kadavy 17y agoAn interesting comment on this story, about NASA: "They have been one of the big fuelers of my dreams for most of my life. I grew up in the Apollo years where we broke through one boundary after another and celebrated the early years of the Shuttle program where we created a system that is still unrivaled after 3 decades for it's ability to deliver and return payload to Earth. Then Challenger blew up and along with it the spirit that was NASA. Instead, it was replaced by bureaucrats and risk managers. Everything involving manned exploration became so risk adverse that it amazing we have even managed to keep the program running today. If you have any doubt, look at Constellation, where we were going to basically replicate the accomplishments of Apollo, and take twice as long to do it and burn huge sums of money in the process. We can dream bigger and I am glad the current administration killed the program."
- ck2 17y agoIf we weren't constantly waging war on multiple fronts, we could give NASA a massive budget. But when you are gushing $4+ billion a month, everything else has to be cut. What they are giving NASA over the next five years, will be spent in just April+May in Afghanistan and Iraq.
- xtho 17y agoWould you prefer sending Space Troopers to Mars?
- rbanffy 17y agoOnly it they kill some bugs.
- ars 17y agoJust because they could, doesn't mean they want to. If they wanted to fund NASA the war would not matter.
- waterlesscloud 17y agoYeah, it's too bad we had to abandon those lunar bases we built in all those years we didn't fight war.
- antipaganda 17y agoYeah, like we've never not been in a war.
- rbanffy 17y agoIt's more like those bases were never built because the money went to Vietnam.
- tjic 17y agoWe went to the moon at the same time that we were in Vietnam. We stopped going to the moon at the same time that we withdrew from Vietnam. The only thing that correlates with the end of any interesting manned space program is the growth of government entitlements. Social Security and Medicaid suck up FAR more of the federal budget than the Department of Defense does.
- gnosis 17y ago"Social Security and Medicaid suck up FAR more of the federal budget than the Department of Defense does." This is false. Actually, it's the other way around. See here: http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm
- waterlesscloud 17y agoThat chart specifically says it excludes social security and other "trust funds".
- ck2 17y agoVietnam War cost $110 Billion (over 10 years). USA currently borrows that much per MONTH (mostly from China). Vietnam was a bargain basement deal compared to current wars. Also remember that in our "modern" wars, far fewer soliders die, instead they get lifelong permanent disabilities requiring super-dooper expensive care, and since they are teenagers or in their twenties, we have to fund their care for 50+ years instead of just paying for a funeral. So there are massive hidden costs to war.
- blhack 17y agoCan we get a new rule that forbids using "The War" as a blanket cause for everything bad? See this:http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1a/NASA_budget_linegraph_BH.PNG http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1a/NASA_budget_li... See that nonexistent budget slide that happened when the war started? Oh, excuse me, what we actually saw was almost $5 Billion in additional spending. Right, if only we weren't fighting a war.
- mturmon 17y agoIn fact, the NASA budget was not cut. It is increasing over the next few years. The initiative discussed will mean reformulating (again) the manned spaceflight program (which is a good idea). It would probably not be a good thing to "give NASA a massive budget". It would prove politically unsustainable, and then it would be cut back down. The resulting turmoil is not usually worth it.
- ANH 17y agoThe Administration has also given NASA the go ahead to start reorganizing and reprioritizing Earth science missions in a sane manner. I happen to work on one, and the proposed changes we're seeing at the program level are like a breath of fresh air. They might actually decrease the amount of bureaucracy. Here's hoping Congress doesn't put the kibosh on them.
- tjic 17y ago> They might actually decrease the amount of bureaucracy. Bureacracy grows, inexhorably. Care to formulate some sort of bet on how much delta you see in bureaucracy over the next few years?