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Space The Almighty Buck United States Science

New NASA Budget Woes 273

Posted by timothy from the all-out-of-taxdollar-pie dept.
Abcd1234 writes "The last few months have seen NASA the focal point of high drama, the most obvious example being the controversy surrounding the next Hubble Space Telescope servicing mission. Well, the drama continues with NASA reporting to a Senate subcommitee that it currently faces a $2 billion budget shortfall which could result in the downsizing, delaying, or outright cancellation of a number of NASA missions, including the Space Interferometry Mission and Terrestrial Planet Finder, which may be delayed, and the James Webb Space Telescope, often cited as the successor to the HST, which faces potential cancellation. Among the reasons for the shortfall: cost overruns in a number of missions, including the shuttle return-to-flight program, resumption of the Hubble servicing mission, and mandated congressional expenditures (a.k.a 'pork')."
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New NASA Budget Woes

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  • get us off this rock (Score:3, Interesting)

    by panxerox ( 575545 ) * on Sunday May 22, 2005 @06:42PM (#12607590)

    Say what you want about Dan Quayle he at least had
    a really solid plan for space exploration [issues2000.org].
    And although he had his problems ( a few, ok more than a few,this post is
    about the message not the messenger:) this was the only espoused program that
    would have really had a chance to "get us off this rock". He at one
    point even talked about the "conversion" of 1/2 of the military budget to the
    space program (who would do that now?) we need to take this
    seriously, it sucks being at the bottom of a gravity
    well..

    • If pro is the opposite of con (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      then what is the opposite of progress?

      Go Team District of Columbia!!
    • It is easy for idiots to suggest that a president should do this or do that. But Clinton's focus was on balancing the budget (which came close).

      In addition, if Quayle really believed that, he had his 4 years. Yet, Quayle did not once push or change anything for the 4 years that he was in VP.
  • We're still going to Mars, right bitches?
    • The United States of Space nigga!

  • I like Griffin... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by TheKidWho ( 705796 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @06:44PM (#12607606)
    He understands what needs to be done to NASA. I hope they don't delay the Terrestial Planet Finder mission too long, that mission is a very important mission and would probablly get congress to get off their asses and decide to further fund NASA.

    Heres to hoping theres a nice earth like planet around 1-3AU from Alpha Centauri A =)

  • No big deal, really (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 22, 2005 @06:45PM (#12607612)
    Just offshore NASA to India.

  • Privatize NASA. (Score:1, Insightful)

    by glrotate ( 300695 )
    NASA should be privitized. Commerical Satallites already supportly themselves, somewhat, and the rest we can let Richard Branson and John Carmack handle. Why does the already burndened American Taxpayer have to get stuck picking up the tab?
    • Because John Carmark knows a lot about Mars??

    • The Trick Is... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by EXTomar ( 78739 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:03PM (#12607776)
      People always suggest "they should privatize space!" but these same people fail to realize a fundemental problem: space is not profitable.

      There is very little out there to capitalize on (you know...the root of capitalism?). I don't think people realize how hard it is to travel out there (in terms of size, durability, and other huge problems). What does a company do with space exploration? If the rings of Saturn were made of gold nuggets we would be there. If there where diamons the size of boulders on Mars we'd be there. Unfortunately by all measurements these places are remarkable but not useful for any buisness on Earth.

      I don't think you'll have MD, Boeing, Airbus or anyone else lining up to fund their own excursions into deep space because there is simply no money to make out there. Remember that Columbus had a plan to make money before going on his little trip. Expecting companies to explore space just because is unrealistic.
      • I think it's more a matter of not being profitable as we see it now. For instance, I've heard that the moon has an inordinate amound of He3 which is pretty uncommon here on Earth but is very useful in making a fusion reactor. At the moment fusion power isn't quite profitable, so He3 isn't really needed.

        I doubt gold and diamonds would get anyone in space. Sure, it'd be nice to replace all the copper wires on the planet with gold, but I think it's simply not a profitable enough venture to go anywhere in spac
        • The moon may have an inordinate amount of he3, and it's a common fallicay here on slashdot that's a reason to go there. The reality is, he3 does exist in small quanties in sea water. It'll be WAY cheaper, and far less risky (finacial risk) to build a plant to process a few million cubic kilometers of seawater, and extract it from there, than it would be to fund an excursion to go pick the stuff up on the moon.

          Space travel today is akin to alchemy in the middle ages. Everybody wants to believe that some

          • Not that I disagree, but I would think that any efforts to harness the moon's supply of He3 for fusion would have the reactor situated on the moon sending the produced energy back to the earth in some energy beam (such as microwave). The capability to send energy like that would also give a manner in which to propel vehicles away from the Earth and moon. I'm nowhere near physicist enough to tell what the efficiency of this would be, but you're likely right about it's infeasability.
            • sending the produced energy back to the earth in some energy beam (such as microwave).

              Never going to happen. All I have to do is yell "Save the Birds" and any microwave beams coming down to Earth will immediate ly never happen. The problem with transporting energy using some kind of beam is simple. How do you keep the energy from being transfered to the wrong thing. There is dust in our atmosphere, bugs, birds Water molocules. Microwave ovens work by causing certain molocules to oscillate back and for

              • Solar collectors seem to effectively concentrate lethal amounts of heat without anyone being concerned for the birds. People said the same about the birds when they put windmills all over the Netherlands. The birds just flew around them. And 20 bucks says they can tell when they're approaching a large warm column of air through which a microwave beam is passing.

                Since when do planes and satellites move anywhere but in predicted ways? Why would the beam hit any area of land but what it's supposed to? We're n
        • It's the elemental things that would drive us out into the solar system and we simply aren't advanced enough to make use of the things it has to provide.

          See Gerard O'Neill's The High Frontier, written about 1977. he outlined a plan for colonising space that seems to make sense still. The economics were based on huge solar arrays in orbit generating power to beam back to earth via microwave. Lunar colonies would supply the satellite colonies (giant cylinders ultimately, as in Babylon 5) using mass drivers

      • Re:The Trick Is... (Score:1, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Asteroids are (excuse the expression) goldmines for rare metals and other materials. I hear their's a whole belt of them just beyond Mars ripe for the mining.

        Space will be a few orders of magnitude larger than the California Goldrush once there is technology to get their cheaper.

        Any company that can't make a profit somewhere just isn't thinking hard enough. Not that I'm calling the Fortune 500 deep thinkers or anything . . .
        • Alas, I don't think it's quite that straightforward. If the asteroids are a planet or two torn apart by tidal forces (which was the explanation last time I checked) then most of what's up there is likely to be nickel iron. Useful stuff, but unlikely to pay any bills on earth.

          We may reasonably expect useful mineral resources, but they are going to hard to find and exploit. There is maybe 10 times the earth's mass spread out over an area substantially larger than Larry Niven's Ringworld. I don't know the ex

      • Re:The Trick Is... (Score:2, Interesting)

        by IcePop456 ( 575711 )

        Bullshit!

        Not profitable? You must be kidding. How about the airline industry? Other than some clouds and air, what's in the sky? Takes like 90 min for the shuttle to go around Earth right? NYC to LA in an hour? Maybe expensive, but then again, look at the things bought by people with a TON of money.

        What you are saying, is we should only do stuff we know is profitable right? Ask any major company to comment on that question. OBVIOUSLY we would rather just fund stuff we know will have a high ROI.

      • If the rings of Saturn were made of gold nuggets we would be there. If there where diamons the size of boulders on Mars we'd be there.

        Gold and diamonds are pretty worthless in space. There just aren't any ladies around. Silicium, oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, aluminium and iron would be far more interesting for construction.
        • Diamonds might be useful in the sizes he mentions, but yea, I don't see the value in that much gold especially where it is. If we managed to pull a significant portion of it back to Earth, it'd be so plentiful that we're be using it as a cheap replacement for lead and the like.

          This isn't a rhetorical observation either. There really are metallic asteroids with a relatively high platinum metals content. For example, the asteroid Eros is claimed [anomalous-images.com] to have around a trillion dollars worth of gold alone at today

      • Re:The Trick Is... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by bitingduck ( 810730 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @10:06PM (#12609070) Homepage
        Space has already been privatized and commercialized to a large extent, but only for Earth orbiting systems. The largest commercial application in space so far is telecom, but the imaging market is picking up lately.

        Nearly all satellites built in the US are built by private companies (sometimes with gov't funding, sometimes private, depending on the application). Launch vehicles are designed and built by private companies (typically designed under contract with the gov't, with construction paid for by whoever is getting the lift)

        Deep space and earth orbiting science applications will likely remain gov't funded for the forseeable future, unless the private foundations that fund things like ground based science and telescopes decide to start funding space based research.

      • Re:The Trick Is... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by srleffler ( 721400 )
        Remember that Columbus had a plan to make money before going on his little trip.

        Yah, but ironically his plan was complete vaporware. He had no hope of reaching India that way. The Earth's diameter was much larger than he estimated.

      • space is not profitable.

        You missed out a word: Space is not profitable yet.

        Really, your critique almost sounds like an update of someone's dismissal of the Wright Brother's efforts:

        The Sky is never going to be profitable. People don't realise how hard it is to travel up there. If the clouds were made of cotton candy, maybe we'd have a reason to go, and if the moon were made of good cream cheese...

        And yet despite the water vapour nature of the clouds in the sky and the distinct lack of dairy

    • Re:Privatize NASA. (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Why don't you privatize the military instead? Under sensible management, I'm sure that they can find a way to turn a profit, and the private army can contract to the government interests rather than the other way around as currently.
    • If Bill Gates read this and decided to buy NASA and assert his "property rights" on his extraterrestial investments.

      --

      Oh, the pain! Oh the pain!

    • Hey moderators! The parent of this comment [slashdot.org] may piss people off, but is not a troll. The simple truth is that if you love space you should hate NASA.

      In fact most people don't renember back in the 70's when an invenstor wanted to pull together some capital and buy some old Atlas missle shells and turn it into a pivate satellite launch program. Only to have the whole thing administratively killed by NASA.

      Also, other countries are building very profitable space programs while the US lingers - even though
  • NASA is in a budget crunch. They are going to NOT service the Hubble because its' successor (James Webb) will be up in 4-5 years. But wait, mysteriously, NASA is in a budget crunch and will kill James Webb due to budget priorities.

    Or We will send enough troops to beat the Flintstone army, but not enough to keep Bedrock safe and orderly untill we can install a new government in Bedrock.

    Duh!

    • Re:An Example of a Short Sited Administration (Score:5, Informative)

      by Chairboy ( 88841 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @06:59PM (#12607721) Homepage
      Incorrect. The JWST hasn't even started major construction, and the estimated (and optimistic) launch date is late 2011.

      Hubble is a bird in the hand, and the JWST is two birds flying around in the future, and part of an organization that routinely starts and cancels projects.

      Don't count your telescopes before they've hatched.
    • I have said this many times before and here I'll say it yet again, and those idiots who called me a conspiracy theorist nutcase should know that they have been yet again blind to the obvious and evident. I have emphatically said before that the Bush administration opposed Hubble on ideaological and electoral basis, and did everything they could to ensure that it won't be serviced, and foresaw that even its successor probably will be aborted (in response to those who aruged Hubble is not being serviced becau

      • Re:An Example of a Short Sited Administration (Score:5, Insightful)

        by johansalk ( 818687 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:55PM (#12608201)
        It's all done the same way; in much the way that Bush is deliberately running a huge budget deficit to bring down the "welfare state" thanks to fiscal crises he has created, the same was done with NASA. O'Keefe had nothing to do with space; he's a guy from business who joined the Bush administration on its very first day and was sent to NASA to carry out a partisan politics agenda, and he did it to the letter. The manned mission to Mars is simply a huge cost that will keep NASA distracted and in crises such as this one that will force it to cull science programs, in much the same way they plan to cull social security programs, and Bush has already culled 150 social security and welfare programs in his last budget, on the excuse that they can't afford them. Additionally, Hubble is primarily from the liberal state of MD, whereas the missions the Bush administration imposed on NASA are those that will primarily benefit the military-industrial complex and conservative states such as FL and TX.
      • That would make sense, if there weren't any ground based telescopes now that have better resolving power than the hubble.

        They can't pick up a few bands that are filtered out by the atmosphere, but you're acting like the hubble is the only worthwhile telescope in the world. The ones in Hawaii look fantastic from where I'm sitting.

        AND the Bush administration has increased the budget for the sciences. Doesn't sound like bible thumping fundies to me.

      • Never explain by conspiracy... (Score:4, Insightful)

        by SysKoll ( 48967 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @11:52PM (#12609559)
        ... what can be attributed to good old bureaucratic incompetence.

        Your explanation is actually very optimistic. It describes an administration with a set (albeit evil) purpose, and, with sheer determination, remarkable acumen and awesome foresight, this demonic plan is achieved.

        I think that this is actually giving credit to this bureaucratic mess known as NASA. They haven't been that organized since the Appolo days.

        NASA is in survival mode. Its actions are not rational, they are guided by the panic of administrators that see their personal empires crumble.

        NASA has admirable engineers and great scientists, but they don't get to make the decisions. Bureaucrats do. Evil geniuses need not apply. Now, on the other hand, if you know someone who can snowjob Congress, they are hiring...

  • Strategies for space (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rbanffy ( 584143 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @06:58PM (#12607715) Homepage Journal
    I think we should right now focus on having cheaper access to orbit, a permanent presence on the moon and a fleet of modular vehicles, manned and unmanned, that could be assembled in space for varied purposes.

    Science was a only by-product of Apollo.

    We need something like Apollo to lay foundations to have more science done later at lower budgets. Until science is no longer hideously expensive, it won't be done.

    It gets down to patience, objectives and the will to get from here to there.
    • Science was a only by-product of Apollo.

      Spoken like a technie realist. Most politicians who voted for Apollo probably thought the by-product was showing the Russkies who had the baddest science and technology.

      If Homeland Security can't buy an American computer or cell phone, that is quite a hole to dig ourselves out of today.

    • The problem with ignoring "scientific" missions is that they form a significant basis for over-lifetime cheaper stuff. Sure, you can throw together some pieces of hardware for a fraction of the cost of what NASA does now, but what happens when it falls apart up in space? Do you realize how insanely expensive it is to get stuff TO ORBIT? Forget the X-Prize... they got to sub-orbit, something that's nice and all, but it sure as hell ain't orbit.

      When you start putting junk up into orbit and hope that it la

    • I think our focus now should be on ancillary or supporting industries which are currently profitable rather than on just leaping headlong back to the moon. For example robotics, which could make good use of the tritium power nuclear batteries recently mentioned on slashdot, could make space expansion and exploration far cheaper and easier, or rather the utilisation of resources available there to pave the way for actual people to start colonisation.

      Lets work on sub orbital jet flights to cut down flight

      • Lets work on sub orbital jet flights to cut down flight times from 24 hours from Europe to Australia to 3 hours; I know plenty of people that would happily pay extra for that convenience.

        You can bet that FedEx and UPS are looking at what Scaled Composites did and continue to do with SpaceShip One. I'm sure they would love to be able to advertise "Previous Day Shipping!" Plus, being able to ship perishable items such as drugs, organs, or speciality foods (for the "stupid rich" quadrant of people) anywher

  • Why NASA? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by HermanAB ( 661181 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:00PM (#12607737)
    Honest question: Why does the US have NASA? The US Army, Arforce and Navy all have their own space programs, so what is the point of NASA?

    • Re:Why NASA? (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Honest question: Why does the US have NASA? The US Army, Arforce and Navy all have their own space programs, so what is the point of NASA?


      It is a civilian agency with the primary purpose to explore space and research aeronautics advances for the benefit of all mankind. Sure they also launch some shit into space for the military, but primarily NASA is interested in advancing mankind.

      • The primary purpose is to serve pork, thinly sliced, and widely distributed. Space exploration is the garnish, to make the plate look more appetizing.

    • Re:Why NASA? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by quarkscat ( 697644 )
      The United States Army, Air Force, and Navy do have space programs, military space programs. NASA was the only government agency focused on peaceful civilian use of space. Dubya has turned that definition of NASA on its head, however with the extreme focus on unmannned robotic space missions -- which would be based on dual use technology. In effect, the civilian NASA budget has been highjacked by the Dubya regime as another source of funding for the militarization of space. (There is only so much fundin

    • Honest question: Why does the US have NASA? The US Army, Arforce and Navy all have their own space programs, so what is the point of NASA?

      Because without NASA there would be no civilian space effort. When was the last time the armed forces launched a human in space? They have no plans to either.

      One footnote though is the Clementine [navy.mil] mission, jointly funded by the military and NASA. This mission was wildly successful and cheap!

  • Survivor Mars, The "M" Prize (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:03PM (#12607768)
    Get NASA on a for profit basis. Create the M-prize. First team to reach Mars and bring back soil samples wins a billion dollars. You film the various teams and require them to film the mission. You get a hit TV series out of the deal and cheap science.

    Next season is survivor Afganistan. First team to go in and capture Osam gets a billion dollars. A real bargin and ratings gold. Could save broadcast TV and solve the budgt crisis at the same time! The government is so screwed up outsourcing to entertainment could solve all our problems.

  • A modest suggestion... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by sssmashy ( 612587 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:10PM (#12607819)

    NASA should hire some of those legendary Russian engineers who kept the Russian space program alive on a shoestring budget, using inelegant but practical solutions like kerosene rocket fuel. They should also hire the entire winning X-prize team. Mothball the shuttle program, focus less on manned space missions, increase R&D co-operation with private companies. Figuring a way to get payload into orbit cheaply should be the main mission.

    • > using inelegant but practical solutions like kerosene rocket fuel.

      Yeah, really inelegant in Apollo too! The first stage engines burned liquid oxygen and RP-1 (kerosene).

      The Soviets tended to use hypergolic fuels, in which two components were mixed and would spontaneously combust. This reduced the need for complex ignition systems and makes for lighter engines. The Apollo lunar module also made use of hypergolic propellants.
    • The best of them died of a brain tumor, in the early part of the Russian space program, which is now believed to be the main reason the Americans did actually reach the moon first.


      (What amazes me is that I've yet to hear a conspiracy theory about that, despite the fact that such a theory would be infinitely more credible, given the CIA of the time, than most of the theories that are put out.)

    • You missed the most important of all: mothball the international space station. The ISS is killing NASA... and it's not just the space-station itself. The ISS is the prime motivation driving the shuttles back into service.

  • Yeah, it's always tough to find the money (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:12PM (#12607845)
    When you need to give:

    $700,000 for the Admiral Theater in Bremerton, Washington, despite a $4.2 million privately-funded facelift

    $500,000 for the Olympic Tree Program for the 2002 Winter Olympics.

    $1,250,000 for Aleutian Pribilof church repairs.

    $750,000 for the Ketchikan Wood Technology Center.

    $400,000 for a parking lot and pedestrian safety access in Talkeetna (population 300).

    $2,500,000 for marijuana eradication.
    -----

    Priorities, priorities. You know?
  • Somewhere along the line, we're going to have to ask ourselves: what is more important? Eating at MacDonalds or watching our coutry nuke the shit out of the moon?

  • Hubble Pictures (Score:2, Insightful)

    by RemovableBait ( 885871 )
    You can look at the most recent Hubble photographs (and a fairly extensive archive) at: http://hubblesite.org/gallery/ [hubblesite.org].

    Take a good look at those photos. How would you feel if NASA pulled the plug on such a successful project tomorrow, without a replacement for many years?

    I think it would be a terrible shame if such an asset to the space program -- something that has had huge benefits to the world of Astronomy and science -- was just pulled out of the sky because of money troubles. It would be a sad reflec

    • Re:Hubble Pictures (Score:5, Insightful)

      by kiltedtaco ( 213773 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:36PM (#12608018) Homepage
      This is the only reason NASA would contemplate keeping hubble alive: to appease citizens who want to see pretty pictures.

      You can point at the pictures all you want, but the HST is still broken and outdated. Some great research has come out of it yes, but that doesn't mean that it's worth the cost of fixing. Some great research has come out of ground based telescopes too, but they're not as glamorous and don't put out as many pretty pictures for the public to ooh and ahh at. The ground based telescopes is where great research is coming from now, ask an astronomer. They put far less import on saving hubble than the general populace, and they're the ones who actually use it. Hubble is just a public-relations device anymore.
      • True, the ground based telescopes are having a great impact on the research, but I believe many 'citizens who want to see pretty pictures' may be quite disillusioned with NASA after HST is grounded. As you say, it (along with the Shuttle) is their main PR device.

        However, I do believe there is a place for space telescopes -- they provide pictures from outwith atmospheric interference/scattering, as well as being able to see further in many cases. The problem I have with NASA at the moment is not the inevita
      • What's wrong with pretty pictures of the universe for the people? (serious question)
      • "The ground based telescopes is where great research is coming from now, ask an astronomer. They put far less import on saving hubble than the general populace, and they're the ones who actually use it."

        Don't know what you're smoking, but I don't think a single colleague of mine has said a single thing in support of not servicing HST. Just like the ground-based telescopes, much of the research done with HST does not produce sexy pictures. HST has (and has had) instrumentation that goes way beyond just a fa

  • Somekind of thingy I don't have a word for (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Quirk ( 36086 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:21PM (#12607919) Homepage Journal
    The International Space Station, failures, warts and all, represented a transnation project akin to projects like Stonehenge. Throughout histroy war has acted as a dissemenation tool for culture. An example being Alexander's Hellenization of the cradle of western civilization and the near east. Often conquerers press ganged the conquered into building new wonders to punctuate and perpetuate their victories. The ISS representes an undertaking by many nations to take the first semipermanent step to get us off mother earth. The ISS also could be the only, presently, viable, safe haven for gene banks, living and frozen, to repopulate the earth in case of a worldwide disaster scenario. The USA is in a postion to lead the way to put the ISS back in play as a means and symbol to represent a peaceful transnational implementation of world class science, while sharing the cost burden. I would rather governments, transparent and accountable (at least in theory... Churchill: "democracy is the worst form of government except for all the others") than private corporations be the builders and keepers of the ISS.

    I read Toynbee and weird O. Spengler some years ago, along with many other historians but I can't recall a term that represents the construction of monuments to cement nation building.

    just my .01 cent.

    • Re:Somekind of thingy I don't have a word for (Score:4, Insightful)

      by demachina ( 71715 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @08:37PM (#12608522)
      " to take the first semipermanent step to get us off mother earth"

      Uh you are really overselling the worth of the ISS. MIR was the first step to that goal not ISS and it was done for a fraction of the cost. MIR wasn't in great shape when it was abandoned but it was abandoned due to political pressure from the ISS not because it was done. Chances are slim the ISS will last any longer than the MIR did. The key ISS problem is there is very little happening on it that justifies the staggering price tag. One redeeming aspect of ISS is it kept all the good people in the Russian space program who build MIR employed since they build the heart of the ISS and in many respects its a MIR2 but done on a NASA scale budget which meant vast quantites of our tax dollars were squandered on it, lining the pockets of contractors.

      The key problem with space stations are they are intensely dependent on cargo from earth to continue to function and at current launch costs those costs are steep. As others have noted you would be better served at this point to get launch costs down and then a large permenent presence in space would be more feasible. With current technology and approach keeping people in space is simply not sustainable. You have to throw away buckets of money every year that could better go elsewhere, and there isn't actually that much for people to do spinning around in a tin can in zero G in LEO, to justify the cost. A moon base is only slightly better. Zero G manufacturing was supposed to be a boon but you really dont hear any convincing case that it is. There is growing protein crystals and some material science work but its really debatable if that couldn't be done for a fraction of the cost of the $100 billion ISS price tag using robot spacecraft. At this point all NASA can use to justify the ISS is zero G biology, something that is of value for long duration space travel but simple CAN'T justify the $100 billion ISS price tag.

      A permenent colony on Mars is probably the only manned endeavor that might be justifiable and sustainable because Mars "might" have enough resources, especially water to sustain a colony that is not completely dependent on Earth. I'm talking about sending people there who stay there and not some pointless Apollo style stunt where they plant a flag, pick up rocks and come home.

      Mining asteroids might be another endeavor with some value especially as we exhaust the Earth's mineral resources but its not clear if men or robots would be better for this.

      All in all this is just a sad story because it just highlights NASA's incompetence. They are spending staggering sums of money wringing there hands over every detail of the Space Shuttle and to no real long term purpose. All this money is ONLY to try and finish the ISS, with one exception a Hubble repair mission. The ISS is a staggering failure and no one has the guts to admit it and stop pouring every larger sums of money in to it, while it and the Shuttle bleed every other program with a point to death. If they do manage to finish the ISS then the shuttle is abandoned and all the money they are squandering on it now trying to reinvent it at a point it already obsolete, is down the tubes.

      Simple problem here, NASA bureaucracy and its pork fed contractors Lockheed/Boeing are burning vast sums of money on the shuttle, ISS and their bottom lines to no productive end, and they are just continuing to do what they've done the last 20 years, bleed every other potential aerospace venture white to feed a corrupt empire.

      • Re:Somekind of thingy I don't have a word for (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Quirk ( 36086 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @09:57PM (#12609015) Homepage Journal
        "Uh you are really overselling the worth of the ISS"

        Yes I am, while not wanting to appear flippant, I noted Stonehenge as an example of making a people in the image of an icon or wonder. I'm suggesting we build, and even overbuild, not because it's economically feasible but because it will meld the efforts of several nations in a symbol that transcends political differences. The spinoffs from developing and implementing new and bleeding edge technology are manifold and not always apparent. What I'm suggesting verges on a technological totemism and, as such, may seem bathotic, but I think we are subject to a very primitive brain barely overridden by the executive center of the cortex, and likely to respond very positively to making the ISS a la the Tower of Bable. When has space exploration been an economically driven enterprise? There is probably no similar project in all of history that didn't pork feed contractors.

        One of the biggest blunders to come from the baby boomer generation was the demonization of nuclear power and it was extended to the Orion project. It may be that a transnational enterprise would manage to escape the hysteria surrounding nuclear powered spacecraft giving support to Project Prometheus [wired.com]. (It's not uninteresting as an aside that James Lovelock [wikipedia.org], formulator of the famed, Gaia hypothesis now advocates development of nuclear power because were out of time to search out alternatives in the face of depletion and pollution of oil.)

        • "The spinoffs from developing and implementing new and bleeding edge technology are manifold and not always apparent. "

          As Ronald Reagan used to say, "There you go again". There is next to nothing in the ISS that is new or bleeding edge. The Russian built core is very MIR like.

          ISS isn't even remotely an icon or symbol and transcends nothing. MIR did everything its doing a whole lot more cheaply. The ISS has mostly managed to hack off nearly every one of American's international partners because most of
          • The real redeeming quality that the ISS provides is a technology transfer vehicle (pun intended) for the USA to pick up the space station building skills that the Soviets had developed over the 1970s. (Remember, MIR was built by the USSR, not the Russian Republic, although the breakup of the USSR did happen midway through planning and early construction of the ISS.)

            Unfortunately, with the exception of Robert Bigelow who might actually take advantage of some of those skills, it appears as though NASA is goi

  • Get with the (space) program, fellas. (Score:5, Funny)

    by xigxag ( 167441 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:32PM (#12607988)
    Look, NASA would solve a lot of its budgetary woes if it would just hire somebody professional to come up with names for its various projects. Space Interferometry Mission? WTF is "interferometry"? Sounds like a cancer treatment. "Planet Finder" --- boooring, besides, isn't "Finder" already trademarked by Apple? And who in the tarnation is James Webb? Some hack from the sixties nobody's ever heard of.

    Off the cuff, I can think of much snappier names -- "Intragalactic Terrorist Locator" for the planet spotting thingy, "George H.W. Bush Memorial Telescope" should make it politically impossible to cancel the Hubble replacer, and for that Space Interfrazometer Moozit, let's license the sucker to Electronic Arts/Maxis and call it "SIMS in Outer Space."

  • Budget fudging (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Gaima ( 174551 ) on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:59PM (#12608228)
    Sounds like someone is bumping up the extra budget requirements, so that when congress argue and don't give the full request, they're free to actually cancel the projects they weren't really gonna do anyway.
    • And that's how you play Budget. Everything can be done given the funding. Failure to fund means cutting back. If the powers that be who control the budget really want to avoid it... they cough up more funding. If not - hey.. you did what you could do.

      This might be a good time to mention Ear Marking. When Congress passes a budget for NASA, it is not a lumb sum handed over to NASA to do with how they please. Within that sum is smaller chunks of budget that are Ear Marked for certain Pork - failure to c
      • Another interesting question is, how far does this extend to other agencies? Is DARPA, for example, subject to "Ear Marks"? And why the heck hasn't someone started screaming bloody murder about this? It's pretty obvious is pure corruption, through and through. Worse yet, it's pure *institutionalized* corruption.

  • It amazes me... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 22, 2005 @07:59PM (#12608229)
    That Mr. Bushie can get $80B to support is evil, immoral, and illegal wars, but NASA can't get $2B to fund crucial missions. We've given up on science that's not used to kill people. What have we become? Maybe someone is afraid of what knowledge NASA might unlock.. some other tidbit to go against creationism ?

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