SpaceX Executive Calls For $22-25 Billion NASA Budget 114
MarkWhittington (1084047) writes "While participating in a panel called "The US Space Enterprise Partnership" at the NewSpace Conference that was held by the Space Frontier Foundation on Saturday, SpaceX Chief Operating Officer Gwynne Shotwell opined that NASA's budget should be raised to $22-25 billion, according to a tweet by Space Policy Online's Marcia Smith. The theory is that a lot of political rancor has taken place in the aerospace community because of the space agency's limited budget. If the budget were to be increased to pay for everything on the space wish list, the rancor will cease.
The statement represents something of a departure of the usual mutual antagonism that exists between some in the commercial space community and some at NASA. Indeed Space Politics' Jeff Foust added a tweet, "Thought: a panel at a Space Frontier Foundation conf is talking about how to increase NASA budget. Imagine that in late 90s." The Space Frontier Foundation has been a leading voice for commercializing space, sometimes at the expense of NASA programs."
The statement represents something of a departure of the usual mutual antagonism that exists between some in the commercial space community and some at NASA. Indeed Space Politics' Jeff Foust added a tweet, "Thought: a panel at a Space Frontier Foundation conf is talking about how to increase NASA budget. Imagine that in late 90s." The Space Frontier Foundation has been a leading voice for commercializing space, sometimes at the expense of NASA programs."
Well, hold on. (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's Heritage's numbers. [heritage.org]
Federal entitlements are driving this spending growth, having increased from less than half of total federal outlays just 20 years ago to nearly 62 percent in 2012. Three major programs—Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security—dominate in size and growth, soaking up about 44 percent of the budget.
BUT interest on the current debt is also increasing the debt and along with entitlements, it is crowding out other spending.
The thing with entitlements though, is that most of that spending is on old people and is increasing due to our changing demographics. [wikipedia.org]
But we also need to keep in mind that Medicare was expanded greatly under Bush in 2003, greatly increasing the costs [wikipedia.org]. So lets not put all the blame on Obama.
We should also realize that the old people have considerable political clout - hence why you NEVER hear ANYTHING about Medicare or Social Security when the Tea Partiers are demanding budget cuts. That is why you can keep going back and every President of both parties has tapped into taxpayer money to buy the old people's vote.
Poor people on the other hand, have virtually no political clout and are looked upon as lacking moral fiber and deserve to have their programs cut. And why the attacks are continuing on "Obamacare". As a side note, my wife's clinic has actually started doing MORE business (and actually getting paid) because of Obamacare. See, when a medical provider doesnt get paid, they just pass the costs on to the rest of us in the form of higher fees. But that another post .....
Never the less, I see many many criticisms about government spending and vague references to entitlement programs and no mention of the true burdens on our government.
OH! War spending. Here is an interesting article about that and to make it short: nobody knows how much or how it is afftecing the economy. [cfr.org]
Space travel isn't feasible. (Score:4, Interesting)
Reality check: space travel with chemical fuels just barely works. It takes huge rockets to launch dinky payloads, and that hasn't improved in 45 years. Satellites and probes are useful. Man in space has just been a boondoggle.
If fusion ever works, this may change, but with chemical rockets, it's not getting much better.
What to cut (2) (Score:0, Interesting)
Mothball or scrap at least two aircraft carriers, leaving ten, still far too many.
Draft all neocon nuts under 40 for five year terms into the infantry, Marines, or similar; give them fancy uniforms and good rifles and plety of ammo for practice, in between tough language lessons in Russian, Ukranian, and Mandarin.