Rep. Bill Posey Introduces 'Back To the Moon' Bill 562
MarkWhittington writes "In an attempt to rationalize and give focus to NASA's human space flight program, Rep. Bill Posey, Republican of Florida, has introduced a bill that will direct the space agency to send astronauts back to the Moon with a goal of permanent habitation of Earth's nearest neighbor."
Rovers and robots (Score:1, Insightful)
Why waste the money on transporting meat bags to the moon? Send rovers and robots.
Umm... (Score:4, Insightful)
How does this advance the Republican goal of balancing the budget?
What a surprise! (Score:2, Insightful)
On Spending (Score:4, Insightful)
Trying to be ambiguous as to not divert the discussions focus, but spending on an endeavor that will ultimately benefit the entire nation as well as be a boon to science seems like a better use of funds than programs heavily favoring a specific subset of the nation. (Take that how you will, I have no particular program in mind.)
Re:A better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
How about paying the government deficit that is about to default in a month so humans can habitat Earth first
Because if man is to survive as a species, we must leave this planet. To leave this planet, we must advance the state of the art. To advance the state of the art, we must spend money on human space exploration/colonization.
Deficits will never go away, and neither will the fact that the sun will eventually incinerate the earth.
Re:Umm... (Score:5, Insightful)
This is local politics. Need to keep the money flowing into NASA to keep the constituency happy, regardless of your party affiliation. Plus NASA's budget vs. the entire budget is close to nothing. Just like that recent budget "cut" the republicans were bragging about was like less than 1% savings on the entire budget. I guess you could say the victory is that it didn't go up, but whatever. Still seems pretty crappy.
Re:A better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Because if man is to survive as a species, we must leave this planet. To leave this planet, we must advance the state of the art. To advance the state of the art, we must spend money on human space exploration/colonization.
Deficits will never go away, and neither will the fact that the sun will eventually incinerate the earth.
If your worried about the sun going nova, then take a couple of deep breaths and relax. We've got time. Although I strongly support the space program, we would do better as a species if we realized that we're NOT getting off this rock anytime soon and we'd best spend some energy keeping what we've got habitable.
Supporting the space program could be done without materially increasing the deficit (NASA takes up some tiny fraction of the US budget at present). But it really bugs me when congresscritters put up stupid bills like this one. You get all sorts of earmarks and pork embedded in it, you get NASA (or whatever organization) pulled in all sorts of usually contradictory ways. You get things changing from year to year. If someone came up with a bill that funded NASA with x% of the Federal Budget for 50 years, maybe I could go for that but the current bill is just grandstanding and appeasing his constituents.
Would be even more impressive... (Score:4, Insightful)
... if he didn't have a purely selfish agenda because it would just happen to directly benefit his state/district economically long before we'd even get there, and even if it gets cancelled later and we don't.
Re:A better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:A better idea (Score:1, Insightful)
Would you rather the Moon and other celestial bodies be carved up by megacorps?
Re:A better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
The Earth is a lot tougher than we are, and will be here for a long long time, so "man is destroying Earth" isn't a reason.
If you mean that the pile of crushed metal is still 'technically' a car sure we aren't destroying the earth. We are destroying the environment we absolutely need to survive. That's pretty much what people mean when "we're destroying the earth".
You are an idiot (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:A better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Or, as Rep. Bill Posey likes to think of it... (Score:5, Insightful)
...the "Federal stimulus for Florida's 15th congressional district to get Bill Posey re-elected" bill.
Great! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Great! (Score:5, Insightful)
Unlike the Democrats, right, who are totally busy solving that deficit problem? US seems to be screwed either which way.
waste of money (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:A better idea (Score:3, Insightful)
Because the current greedy business model we have down here has a bright future.
And that's the thing that routinely is ignored. The so-called "greedy" business model works because it gives a channel for so-called "greedy" people to contribute to society in a meaning and positive way. The future is indeed brighter.
The so-called "multinational" (the label which includes any business that operates in two or more countries) will have to buy space-based goods and services to support its claims and it'll have to come with profitable enterprises (which contribute to society) with which to support its ongoing expenses. Figuring out how to do that will lead to innovations and developments which will dwarf anything done in space to date.
That's far better than merely letting the Solar System be the occasional playground for a bunch of incompetent and disinterested governments (currently, the only other parties that can play in space).
Using Money Wisely? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:A better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Recent evidence would seem to suggest that said greedy people do not wind up contributing in a meaningful way, but instead wind up finding every edge case they can to try to skim off the productivity of others.
Re:A better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
That's right! Man will never fly! You tell them!
Re:A better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Just so you know, the US isn't going to default its debt. Thats silly speculation from the conservative press thats led to a bit of nervousness from some isolated quarters because the statuatory debt limit is being reached.
But its just a debt limit, its got nothing to do with defaulting what so over, because pushing the default button would nuke the economy and the whitehouse knows it. It simply won't happen.
The US economy is still held to be a low risk of defaulting, simply because it doesn't need to, as it can just go austere instead. Or raise the limit.
Of course austerity is going to suck, because spending cuts wreck economies that are slumping, but life goes on.
If you ask me, its about time the US pulled out of a few wars and cashed in that peace dividend.