I am not going to watch any \u00a0coverage of\u00a0 the last shuttle mission; I am\u00a0 disgusted with all the gushing comments about NASA and glorious past with the shuttle. It all bullshit to me. The shuttle did not live up to its expectations, it was just another long running \u00a0boondoggle demonstrating of loss of American leadership and know how after Apollo. In fact, the time\u00a0from Mercury to Apollo was just a 9 year aberration to the\u00a0 40 year failure of the American Space program.
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\nThe seeds of this failure started not with Nixon but John F Kennedy. The seeds of failure were plated on \u00a0May 25, 1961; The problem is the moon program will be manly a government ran operation. \u00a0Missing was a greater involvement by private enterprise. The problem is much government spending for\u00a0 programs is on the basis of what brings in\u00a0 votes that American prestige and the public good.\u00a0 \u00a0The goals were lofty, for mankind and American but like all political undertakings which left the space program with a huge\u00a0 vulnerability: Space Exploration does not\u00a0 bring votes welfare spending does. I see this soon after the Apollo 11 mission; many complained it was too expensive to send\u00a0 people into space, we spend this money on fixing earth. Never mind after 40 years the welfare sate a la war on poverty was even a great failure than the shuttle. It was not lost on me in the 1970\u2019s even children\u2019s cartoons like \u00a0The Super Friends preached how we were wasting money on the US space program.<\/p>\n
Now fast forward to \u00a0Bush \u00a0(41)\/Clintonera shuttle replacement program. The problem was typically government procurement monopoly with each of the many defense contractors competing with CGI presentations \u00a0chasing contactor gold\u00a0 without producing anything tangible\u00a0 The winner Lockheed Martian X-33. \u00a0The X-33 was abandoned in 2001.<\/p>\n
Finally NASA without a real mission became a shell of its former glory. The like to take about how much technology\u00a0 NASA has created but since 1980\u2019s NASA are mort of a new consumer than net producer of new technology<\/p>\n
The solution we need se more private enterprise in space exploration instead of chase for government\u00a0 dollars. For example NASA need to take you fly we buy approach. Unlike \u00a0of the x-33 and now The Dream Chaser or Blue Origin, the wining ship design will be the company that will demonstrate an actual working space vehicle \u00a0\u00a0by \u00a0taking thee astronauts in space for one day of orbits and bringing them home safely. The company must spend it own money developing a working flying \u00a0space vehicle and will be allow to sell flight to private interest<\/p>\n
If US. and the world\u2019s future space exploration to survive, we need to take leave of the old tired government ran space program and its inefficient procurement system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I am not going to watch any \u00a0coverage of\u00a0 the last shuttle mission; I am\u00a0 disgusted with all the gushing comments about NASA and glorious past with the shuttle. It all bullshit to me. The shuttle did not live up … Continue reading