3 ms·

The fact is that we won't break the bonds of earth with NASA. Decades of bureaucracy and budget cutting has left them as little more than another government age

The fact is that we won't break the bonds of earth with NASA. Decades of bureaucracy and budget cutting has left them as little more than another government agency that exists solely to expand and maintain it's own budget. I'm 29 years old. So is the space shuttle program. It's completely unacceptable that we are taking 30 year old vehicles to space. Would you trust a 30 year old sedan on a cross country road trip? I wouldn't. And now, the program is being discontinued with nothing ready to replace it. We are going to have to rely on Russia until we can get our next rocket operational. If the men who created the Apollo program were told that one day we'd rely on the Russians for our space travel, they'd laugh you out of the room. Also, why haven't we been to the Moon in nearly 40 years? Is there nothing worth exploring left on the entire thing? Thank(insert deity here) that companies like Space X are taking up the slack. It's unfortunate that NASA has fallen so far, but it has.

jordan0day 15y ago
Your 30 year old sedan analogy is terrible. A space shuttle isn't a "daily driver" that NASA changes the oil in every three months or 3 million miles. They're meticulously maintained. Yes, they're old tech and certainly in need of replacement, but they're not bad just because they're old. Heck, thousands of people use the Golden Gate bridge every day, and it's 70 years old! Anyway, I'm much less pessimistic w.r.t. NASA than you. Am I disappointed that we don't have permanent bases on the moon and mars? Most definitely. I'm a huge fan of space exploration, and I really wish we were farther along. That said, NASAs robotic exploration continues to impress. There have been failures, mismanagement and poor performance in plenty of cases, but I'd be willing to pay even more tax to increase NASAs budget. I still view them as a good example of things the public sector can do right.

jordan0day 15y ago

Your 30 year old sedan analogy is terrible. A space shuttle isn't a "daily driver" that NASA changes the oil in every three months or 3 million miles. They're meticulously maintained. Yes, they're old tech and certainly in need of replacement, but they're not bad just because they're old. Heck, thousands of people use the Golden Gate bridge every day, and it's 70 years old! Anyway, I'm much less pessimistic w.r.t. NASA than you. Am I disappointed that we don't have permanent bases on the moon and mars? Most definitely. I'm a huge fan of space exploration, and I really wish we were farther along. That said, NASAs robotic exploration continues to impress. There have been failures, mismanagement and poor performance in plenty of cases, but I'd be willing to pay even more tax to increase NASAs budget. I still view them as a good example of things the public sector can do right.