Assorted NASA Budget Reaction Stories

Well..

I said last week that the Administration's revisions to NASA were to give us absolutely nothing.. zilch... nada..

This is exactly what happened.

There is no vision.
There is no inspiration.
There are no new heavy lift vehicles at all.
(sorry Direct 'Fanboys')
There is nothing to be had after the Shuttle retires.

I hope those that bashed Ares I are happy now.
I hope those you teased the "Direct Fan Boys" are really happy now.

Sometimes in life, the more you complain, the more things are taken away.

The space community showed nothing but divisiveness and self loathing over the past few months.

It was a my way or the highway approach.

Well, now its No Way to anywheres.

Don't even try to sell me on the idea that launching to the ISS is a suitable substitute for landing on the moon.

"Did that done that" is such a favorite phrase that is being tossed around.

We went to earth orbit in 1961 - Did that Done that...
We had Skylab in 1973 - Did that Done that...

No Apollo 8 CEV shakedown cruise in 2012, No moon landings, Mars in 20-30 years (if and only if proposed by another President),

We might as well have had Mondale or Proxmire appointed Administrator.

We should all be ashamed at ourselves and our behavior.

No unity, just acrimonity...

Well, we got our just dessert...

Now we shall wallow in our misery.

At least you're taking it lying down.

Perhaps there's more to be optimistic about than you currently imagine...like
* funded development of an industrial base for multiple competing crew-launch vehicles (another form of programmatic risk reduction and healthy cost pressure)
* expanding space tourism that rides on the coattails of NASA-purchased HSF
* introduction of the cost-saving efficiencies of competition into the program
* support for innovation and ingenuity driven by corporate competition
* reduction of a constituency and entitlement based on civil service employment.
* heavy lift vehicles developed as an offshoot of commercial product lines.
* creation of new launch services for international customers.

Huntsville politicians have always been very shrewd and well-positioned when it came to protecting NASA projects. Now it's different. The 5th District's Congressional representative is the recent party-switching Parker Griffith, a man without even a committee seat as of today.

Sadly, there's only one word to describe HSV Mayor Battle's tone in his letter to Obama: Jonesin'.

Yes we did feed on ourselves BUT it's been going on since the announcement of the Constellation program, not just the last few months.

I would laugh if it weren't so serious at the rapidity with which Bolden shoved all of his astronaut buddies under the bus and how he can stand up there and tell me that we're still going to the moon but by a better means and do it with a straight face.

@Papa

I have to admire your optimism but not your naivete' to think that government (tax) money flowing to industry changes the business equations as opposed to the same money flowing to "government business". I remind you of military contractors "competing" against each other and how when there is a finite amount of tax money many of the private industry businesses form partnerships thereby eliminating your precious competition. Besides the argument that somehow we'll now see a heavy lift vehicle (albeit 15 years down the road) is laughable because without a place to go there is no need for it. And you can bet if Obama wins this one, we won't be going anywhere for a long time just as we've not been going anywhere for the last 40 years.

I have never tried to justify the exploration of space on economic terms and never will because of the intangibles spurred by inspiration and technology advancement. We CAN afford a robust space program IF we cut the useless missions from NASA (earth sciences is one that comes to mind) and cut the budget for entitlement programs. It's interesting that we will be spending more money on NASA but not going to the moon. It will be going to Obama's grand vision for redistribution of wealth under the guise of education, earth science and commercial innovation.

So now the real battle begins.

Many states and many congressional districts will be affected, so there will be much gnashing of teeth in congress over all this. But we have to remember that Alabama and Texas did not vote for Obama, nor did Florida if I remember correctly.

Ordinarily one would think that senatorial support would keep things going. But then I remember when the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard was on the chopping block. There were two senators each from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland who had constituents working there. It was closed anyway.

So anything other than overwhelming congressional revolt over this will not be effective.