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Internal Interest (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder if NASA is going to be able to keep up internal interest on these projects with the way their budget keeps getting cleaved. Hell, I wonder how they managed to keep people onboard, what with a 5 year delay between test flights.
Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Insightful)
Too bad we spend a trillion dollars invading the wrong country based on obvious lies and fabrications. I think we would have been better off spending that money on cool space toys or at least getting Afghanistan right the first time.
We will be paying for the George W Bush's disastrous presidency for a very long time.
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Informative)
Don't worry, we aren't paying for it. Our putative children (and their children) will be paying for it. We just put in on the big VISA card in the sky.
Ka-Ching!
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To be fair, W and reagan's (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:4, Insightful)
Too be fair that particular criticism applies to a lot more than just one country. The list of nations that are not guilty of that now or in the recent past is quite small.
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Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:4, Insightful)
We just spent almost a trillion in one year as a "stimulus" that has apparently helped nothing... and if it has, very little and it's really hard to tell and it appears that a lot of it is being wasted.
So, wait, let me get this straight... it's "really hard to tell" if the stimulus has done anything. But, despite that admission, in the very same sentence, you claim it has "apparently helped nothing... and if it has, very little".
Uhuh.
Yup, definitely a clear, unbiased, level-headed analysis, there...
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Because there is always evidence for anyone's point, these days, and you can find economists that say the stimulus hurt and the stimulus helped the economy.
But I haven't read any that said it helped very significantly.
If you asked me what I actually thought - in my non-economist and "my macro-econ class boiled down to really complex terms for really simple ideas"-mindset opinion - I would tell you that I think it did nothing good and, if anything, some amount of bad. All it seemed to do to me is put the US
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Informative)
Our national debt went from 4 trillion to over 8 trillion during Bush's tenure in what was supposedly very good economic times. The economic policies pursued during that same administration led to the greatest economic meltdown the country has seen in 80 years. The stimulus package planning was begun under the Bush administration, and finalized in the early months under Obama in order to partially mitigate the poor choices made by our banks and Wall Street.
A number of recent economic markers are pointing to the economy starting to be on the way up again -- I would say that 12-18 months turnaround on this depression is fairly quick compared to recessions of the past. FDR's economic policies in the 30s may have been shocking back then, but Americans expect far more "socialist" programs out of their government nowadays. Not spending any money certainly wouldn't lead to less unemployment, and very likely would cause the depression to last longer as the banks are still hesitant to do any sort of major lending -- which leads to companies hesitant to do new hiring.
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Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Insightful)
Ah yes. Reid and Pelosi, Axelrod, Gibbs, and even Obama at times, definitely act like grownups. Especially when they cry about Republicans not being bipartisan and then - for the first time in the history of the rule, I believe - push a bill out of committee without the quorum of two minority group members.
Just on this topic, ignoring the bailouts and all that, the Republicans have taken on a very simple strategy in the last six months or so: Block *all* proposals coming from Democrats. Period. How the hell can you possibly expect the Democrats to fulfill their promises of bipartisanship if the Republicans do everything they possibly can to hijack the democratic process?
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Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Insightful)
How the hell can you possibly expect the Democrats to fulfill their promises of bipartisanship if the Republicans do everything they possibly can to hijack the democratic process?
But the Democrats won't listen to or accept a single change to bills from Republicans, apparently, unless it is one that the Democrats all approve of in the first place.
In other words, the bipartisan effort in the Obama administration/current Senate goes something like this: Hey, why don't you just agree with us and be bipartisan?.
And if they don't agree, they are being "partisan." Or racist, for that matter.
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Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:4, Informative)
But the Democrats won't listen to or accept a single change to bills from Republicans
The Republicans aren't proposing simple changes. Once again, their approach is simple: our way or the highway. That's it. Meanwhile, the Democrats have been folding on some of their core proposals in order to get things moving (a public healthcare option being the most glaring). There has been *no* attempt from the right to work toward a bipartisan solution. NONE. The Democrats can hardly be faulted for that kind of uncooperative, even childish behaviour.
Worse, in cases like healthcare, the Republicans are actively blocking measures that over *60%* of the US population supports. If that isn't pure, unadulterated political brinksmanship, I don't know what is.
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Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Interesting)
So, Republicans can only propose minor details, not large changes? If Republicans want, say, investigation into nuclear energy but Democrats don't, they aren't allowed to suggest it - it's too big of a change? Or too complex? Or whatever?
It seems that most of the current bills are very ideologically Democrat centered. Public healthcare and climate change stuff (but not nuclear, it seems). As I recall, House Republicans/conservatives submitted a lot of proposals from the so-called tort reform to abortion to making sure illegal immigrants don't get the public healthcare insurance option. None of them - and those are not "major" in comparison with the bill - were accepted.
Meanwhile, the Democrats have been folding on some of their core proposals in order to get things moving (a public healthcare option being the most glaring).
They folded on that? It's still in almost all of their bills, if not all of them, and it is one of the major things that many people don't want. As you mention, "60%" of the US population supports ... what? Supports healthcare reform or supports the current bills, as they are, in the House, including the public option? There's a huge difference there.
The Democrats have not folded on a public healthcare "option." Actually, I can't really find anything they have folded on, at the moment. Pelosi and Reid have repeatedly said they refuse to have a bill without a "public option" though.
The American public is a lot more split than you think on healthcare, according to Gallup [gallup.com].
Saying one party or the other, at the moment, is at fault and doing "pure, unadulterated political brinksmanship" appears to be dependent on who you read/listen to. I try to stay out of the finger pointing, and blameshifting, as that appears to get nowhere - and Republicans and Democrats are very at fault for doing that. Right now, it seems to me that we have some very libecal Senators/House Reps that are trying to push a certain ideology.
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Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:4, Insightful)
As an aside, I happen to think this whole idea of bipartisanship is, at this point, completely absurd. Since the last election, the Republicans have clearly chosen to swing even further to the right (one need only see the NY-23 election to see that), latching on to the extreme right-wingers like Sarah Palin. As such, I simply don't think there *can* be any kind of bipartisan effort between the Democrats and the Republicans, simply because they're so distant ideologically. Meanwhile, the Republicans are really interested in one thing at this stage: tearing the Democrats from power. And if that means blocking any and all attempts and meaningful reform, then so be it.
In fact, I would go so far as to say they've concluded that it's in the Republicans' best interests to ensure that *nothing* the Democrats want gets passed, as if the Dems can show any success on the issues that people actually care about (healthcare, the economy, etc), it'll only solidify their hold on the political ground they've gained during the last 4 years. Much like our good friend Rush Limbaugh, I really believe the Republicans hope Obama and the Democrats fail and fail miserably, regardless of the consequences it may have for America.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
How the hell can you possibly expect the Democrats to fulfill their promises of bipartisanship if the Republicans do everything they possibly can to hijack the democratic process?
I personally don't care. The junk coming from the Democrats is extremely harmful to the future of the US and unworthy of bipartisan compromise. The Democrats have majorities in both branches of Congress. If they can't get their own members to vote for these bills, then why should they expect Republicans to vote for them?
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Well, lucky for us there aren't any unfunded universal health care bills on the table. Perhaps you should inform yourself on what health care bills are currently under consideration.
Government Fail. (Score:3, Interesting)
So Bush initiates Project Constellation, and at a time when it's barely started, after lots of time and resources have been plown into structuring the project, it's on the verge of being shut down?
Well, if it's shut down, at least we saw some cool flames at the back of a rocket!111 Durr...
Obama might also increase the funds, no? (Score:5, Interesting)
Change you can believe and stuff? What better than a daring scientific project of national proportions to catalyze the United States, to unite the minds and the hearts of all the people, to inspire them, to give them hope and a vision?
During the Apollo missions America had a dream larger than life, a vision that propelled her forward for decades to come. The creativity, genius and overpowering enthusiasm that this country showed was what, I think, eventually broke the USSR - the Star Wars "threat" was so much more frightening to the Soviets, because they (the old gard, anyway) still had in mind the Apollo missions and thought that these crazy yankees might just pull this off!
America is now just a shell of its former self - a gigantic trade and budget deficit, a country wholly subservient to foreign (mostly arab) oil, and almost bought out by the Chinese government.
You want a stimulus, one that will really stimulate all the people, all their endevours, all their emotions? Give NASA more, much more money, and tell them to dream big!
Better (Score:3, Insightful)
How about a project of national proportions to get us off of fossil fuels, or at least completely energy-independent, today, and for a fraction of the cost of whatever you have in mind?
How about a project of national proportions to beef up our computing and telecommunications infrastructure so that every Ameri
Making Hay (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:More proof... (Score:4, Funny)
Future Leader: Let's use science to process people into Soylent Green!
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:More proof... (Score:4, Insightful)
...that Obama is really a conservative, not a liberal.
I hope you're joking...
I suppose in some very liberal circles, Obama is conservative ... if you use "conservative" as a "relative" term. But you usually don't use it in a relative term without stating what it is relative to. A conservative democrat? A conservative republican? Conservative conservative?
Anyway, Obama seems to be more "populist" than anything. He won based on his popularity and charisma, not so much his liberal or conservative policies. From my viewpoint, Obama is very liberal. But then, I'm very conservative. So there you have it.
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Space program != science (Score:3, Insightful)
Have you seen his energy initiatives? You can pursue science and "the future of our species" without spending billions on pie-in-the-sky space projects.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a space junkie. I like Battlestar Galactica just like any other red-blooded American geek. And if we were overflowing in riches right now, I'd say let's go for it.
But the practical fact of the situation is that space exploration i
For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm going to break Slashdot etiquette by replying to my own reply, but this is the kind of thing I'm talking about.
If you were president, and you had the choice to, say, send a manned mission to Mars to collect some dirt and maybe begin the steps it would take to, if we're lucky and very, very good, colonize the planet a century or two from now, or roll out a national energy infrastructure that will get us off of fossil fuels today, thus keeping our own planet from boiling away (and most likely discovering a lot of very useful stuff that would make such a manned Mars mission much cheaper, safer, and more practical when we DO do it), which would you choose?
Some people are still under the misguided notion that we don't have to make such choices, that we can just do both. That's one of our problems with science initiatives today. We're trying to do everything, and we end up half-assing it all and nothing gets done.
Personally, I'd rather just not have a space program (well, nothing much more than putting satellites in orbit now and then) than spending billions on the white elephant of one that we have today.
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Re:For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
We're going to get the worst of both worlds: no manned space exploration program and a white elephant "green" energy infrastructure that won't be good for much except making the investors who started the Chicago Climate Exchange richer.
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Re:For example... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
As the price of fossil fuels rise the market will fund alternative energy sources. [Moving to non-fossil energy sources] will happen in spite of what anyone does.
Of course they will, but the question is will this funding be soon enough and large enough to sufficiently replace fossil fuels at a pace that matches the rise in oil prices?
Our entire economy is dependent on fossil fuels. If the price goes up, and there isn't enough alternative sources available so that we need to continue paying this increasing cost, it will put a severe drag on our economy. If the price of oil rises to quickly, and the alternative energy sources are not ready, it could drive us into a depression far worse than the mere recession we're still struggling with now. Where, then, will the money come from to continue developing alternative energy? And what good will it do when it takes years and years to build up?
We are facing a severe problem with fossil fuels if we don't do something about it well in advance. If "the market" is going to wait until the price of oil is prohibitively expensive, then it's going to be too late.
Funding alternative energy means getting the free market to do something it normally doesn't very well, which is respond to obvious problems before they materially hurt the market's bottom line.
Personally I think we can fund NASA too, but that's me.
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Re:For example... (Score:4, Insightful)
Extinction.
Kill our excess children.
Expand out into the rest of the solar system and beyond
The only thing really up for argument is how long we have until we have to make the choice. The thing about that third choice however is that if we don't start it soon enough there won't be time before we have to choose between the other two.
That being said.. Let the market push green technology. Have you been watching the price of oil? There are fortunes to be made! There are many fortunes to be lost before we colonize space. There is too much technology to be developed yet so the market isn't going to do it. We need a money source which isn't required to justify itself by earning a profit to develop space travel technology. We need it to be cheap enough that corporations start shipping people off world to look for resources they can turn into money. The only source I know of is tax dollars.
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Re:For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
Our population rises exponentially. No matter how green our technology gets we ultimately have 3 choices. Extinction. Kill our excess children. Expand out into the rest of the solar system and beyond
Well that's a false trichotomy if I've ever heard one.
We can also slow our population growth to 0 by using birth control.
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Re:For example... (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:For example... (Score:4, Interesting)
Birthrates drop as people become more wealthy and some of the poorest areas of the world have the highest birth rates. The notion that the solution to excessive population growth is to put the "excess" bodies on space ships and send them to live somewhere else is absurd - the cost of the launch alone likely exceeds the total cost of caring for the kid here on earth for the rest of their lives.
The supply of humans, like rabbits, is nearly unlimited - only the resources to provide for them are limited. It might make sense for some reason to send a few prime "breeding pairs" (human and/or non-human) to populate other celestial bodies - for example, if one believes that forms of life on Earth are unique enough in the universe and superior in some way to other life in the universe that it's important for some moral, ethical, or religious reason to preserve and propagate Earthly species even after the Earth is uninhabitable (having been baked to a crisp by our sun for example). But, doing so won't have a measurable impact on Earth's human population.
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Re:For example... (Score:4, Interesting)
Our population rises exponentially.
No, premise is wrong. Some parts of "our" population have exponential growth rates and some have exponential decay rates. And projections are that the global population will start to decline around 2050.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
Kill our excess children.,br> Expand out into the rest of the solar system and beyond
Expanding into Space doesn't help. Imagine a sphere centered on Earth, and expanding outwards over time. That sphere will grow geometrically, eg t^3. As you've posited, our population rises exponentially n^t. Eventually, we will overpopulate space. Expansion is not an option.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Um, if _I_ were President, I would immediately put a stop to the Treasury handing out any more TARP money and fully fund NASA's budget.
There that wasn't so hard.
And yes, it is what I would really do if I were President. I believe completely that the TARP program was one of the worst things my Government has ever done.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
".. billions on the white elephant..."
If you knew what the hell you were talking about with regard to what the U.S. Budget ACTUALLY spends its money on, you would have a heart attack right now,and save /. the time of reading your banalities.
You know what happens if we drop NASA and keep space exploration strictly private? You and I lose, the Corporations win ( and probably at 3x the actual cost), and China surpasses the US technologically.
Yes. We SHOULD completely drop all government funded space endeavors.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I partially agree with what you're saying.
One one hand, we could get more scientific value out of launching 5 or 6 Mars Science Laboratory type projects (or 12+ MER-type projects) per year than a few Shuttle or Ares missions. The human spaceflight program does produce useful science, but it's very, very expensive compared to unmanned missions.
Note that I said science, not engineering. The human spaceflight program does far more for developing our ability to build and survive in space than an unmanned progra
Re:For example... (Score:4, Interesting)
If you were president, and you had the choice to, say, send a manned mission to Mars to collect some dirt and maybe begin the steps it would take to, if we're lucky and very, very good, colonize the planet a century or two from now, or roll out a national energy infrastructure that will get us off of fossil fuels today, thus keeping our own planet from boiling away (and most likely discovering a lot of very useful stuff that would make such a manned Mars mission much cheaper, safer, and more practical when we DO do it), which would you choose?
I'd weigh the cost/benefit of each. Odds are really good that I would do neither. The Mars program would probably take place in the absence of any economic launch infrastructure to space and hence, be hideously expensive. The national energy infrastructure would most likely be a boondoggle and a bad choice. It's better to allow the market to chose a energy infrastructure rather than impose a bad idea (especially one chosen on the basis of what selfish special interest groups are most powerful).
Instead, I would probably focus on spending reduction, not just of expensive, delusionally misguided military projects, but everything including entitlements.
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Re:Space program != science (Score:5, Insightful)
If you take an hour out of your day (really, you have plenty of time left in your life, you can survive 1 hour) to do some poking around over at USASpending.gov [usaspending.gov] you will see figures pop up like the fact that the top five federal contractors this year were:
1 LOCKHEED MARTIN CORPORATION ... $29.748500571 Billion ... $18.231538802 Billion ... $12.318737574 Billion ... $11.900713440 Billion ... $11.156782353 Billion
2 THE BOEING COMPANY
3 GENERAL DYNAMICS CORPORATION
4 NORTHROP GRUMMAN CORPORATION
5 RAYTHEON COMPANY
Now you may already know this, but if not, another hour of research won't kill you, but each of those companies is very diversified in the types of products the provide to their customers. They work on everything from appliances, to housing, to spacecraft. However, a little more research and a little intuition will show you that these companies are, above all else, arms developers. And the majority of their contracts coming from the federal government are those dedicated to developing the new, powerful, absurdly capable weapons that would have been useful in the Cold War, which ended ~20 years ago. If you add up the total monetary value of the contracts provided to these five companies for FY 2009, you see that, together, $88.356272740 Billion (with a B) was awarded to companies that are essentially developing technology to fight a war that fizzled out 20 years ago. Now of course, neither economics or politics are as simple as I am making this out to be, but it does illustrate a point. While these companies probably are also getting plenty of money for advancing science and engineering in general, the mass majority of the spending by the federal government is spent ramping up what is already the most powerful and capable military in the world right now.
Suppose, for a second, that the war-machine lobby groups could be quelled long enough that the exorbitant level of funds being diverted to arms development and obscure wars on ideas (terrorism, drugs, etc.) could, instead, be cut significantly and diverted instead to, as you put it, meaningful science pursuits. We could, quite easily, save money on a federal level AND fund space exploration (manned and unmanned) AND fund alternative energy AND fund stem cell research AND fund computer infrastructure development etc. Instead, however, we have allowed our federal government to be infiltrated and overtaken by corrupt, greedy, selfish corporate interests. Thus, rather than funding valuable, civil science and tech, we have a government whose spending levels are out of control. A good amount of that spending goes towards funding wars that are sketchy at best, and a dormant lion of a military that needs nothing more than a twitchy trigger finger on its leash to free an unholy uproar of annihilation and chaos.
In short, our current priorities are the only thing that keep our country from properly funding the sciences that both you, and I, find valuable simultaneously
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Re:More proof... (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm not sure not spending money on space flight in a conservative philosophy as I at least would consider space abilities to be very much in line with providing for the national defense. There's a lot of overlapping technology and abilities in that realm and most conservatives don't have a problem with the government spending money on programs that are huge boons to our technology/industry/defense sectors. I've lived in both New York and conservative North Carolina and I've never heard any backwoods Conservatives down there complaining about spending money on NASA. But I have heard a lot of saved the world through government programs liberals complain about spending money on space flight when we could be feeding people instead. In reality I think there are people on both sides of the fence that support it and people on both sides of the fence that don't
Either way the one thing we POSITIVELY want to avoid is anyone managing to label supporting space exploration as a "liberal" or "conservative" policy and having party lines drawn on the issue as that way we'll never get it done. Space Exploration isn't something we can accomplish during the time span that one party is in power, it has to be a common endeavor supported by the entire nation.
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Re:Sad, but kind of Accurate (Score:5, Insightful)
Well NASA sure as heck isn't raking in the funding under Obama either. And don't go saying he'll be giving more funding to have NASA do Earth Science either because of his stance on Global Warming, because he isn't doing that either.
All I see right now is liberal special interest groups getting waaaayyyy more money than NASA is even asking for showered on them and NASA continuing to get the shaft from this administration just like they did from the last one.
I am sick of hearing how science can now breathe a sigh of relief because Obama's in the White House. They won't be doing anything at all unless they get some real funding pretty soon.
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Bullshit. Total Bullshit (Score:5, Informative)
It remains to be seen what Obama/Dems will do with it. When it comes to ppl screaming that they do not live in their budget, I see nothing by idiots. The president SETS NASA'S DIRECTION. W set it to be massive new undertaking, but then grossly underfunded it (just like everything he did).
Right now, everybody is screaming for NASA to push THEIR idea of what should happen, and few want to provide proper funding for any of it. Personally, I hope that the dems get the clue that the neo-cons did not; Space is near to being able to survive on its own and grew RAPIDLY. This is the time for the dems to pour a BIT of money into it and get this set up. It is NOT hard to do. What is amazing is that with less than and increase of 3 billion next year, 2 billion the year there after, and then 1 extra billion for the next few years thereafter, they can create in space what the Internet did; massive jobs and new frontiers.
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Re:5 years? (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, if you could somehow link landing on Mars to beating the terrorists, we could get all the money we need to get this thing done quickly. Until then, though, they can only do things as fast as their ever-shrinking budget will let them.
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
That's what the urban legend would have you believe, but as usual, the reality is much different.
In reality, NASA's peak funding (during the Moon race) was in 1965 - and was slashed dramatically in '66/'67. (Before the Saturn V even flew, it's pr
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
You mean like faking the moon landings entirely? ;)
Not that. They went all out on that set.
Re:5 years? (Score:4, Funny)
Woulda worked better back in the commie days. "Beating the reds to the red planet" would have had so much good marketing in it.
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Re:The whole program should be scrapped (Score:5, Interesting)
The saddest part is the test launch of the Falcon 9 has been sitting on the pad since JANUARY. It's been tied up in paperwork ever since. If I had my tinfoil hat handy, I'd say it was tied up solely to make sure the Ares launch happened first. SpaceX has demonstrated their competence with a successful payload delivery to orbit on board a Falcon 1. Not giving the go-ahead for the Falcon 9 smells of excuses, to me. Canaveral is built to handle rockets that size, and the Canaveral range officers have a fine understanding of rockets that size. They know how to use an abort button if necessary. There isn't any danger to anybody, anywhere, whether it works or not. The hazards are to Elon Musk's wallet and to certain pork barrel charity-for-engineers NASA programs. Playing politics has crippled space efforts more than any launch fatalities, anywhere.
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Re:The whole program should be scrapped (Score:4, Interesting)
The first stage was sent back for more testing. Then they did second stage engine tests without the engine nozzle. Second stage mechanical tests. They should still need to make a second stage engine test with the nozzle on, an integrated second stage fire test, vehicle hold down firing tests. Pad work probably isn't 100% finished either.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The biggest cost (both in terms of dollars and time) in rocket development is the design and testing of new engines. This
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
We do want to control malpractice insurance costs. I agree with you there! The system is just far too litigation happy and we have lawyers who make a living off frivoulous lawsuits. But Part of the problem though is insurance companies with have 30% overhead compared to 4% for medicare. If we got rid of the insurance companies and replace it with medicare for all, we would save enough money to cover everyone in the country. Just by getting rid of private insurance and their $120 million dollar salary execut