NASA's Exploration Of The Cosmos Hobbled By Terrestrial Politics

1. Overcoming gravity is really very simple compared to overcoming politics. All it takes is $$$$. But the politics of $$$$ are always complex, especially when you have two sides that decide they are going to out stubborn the other. This is why science needs to have multiple funding streams. The development of additional streams will protect against single point failures as is now occuring with NASA. America’s system of higher education, a complex of private and state funded institutions partially subsidized by the federal government might be a model to look at in the explason of space exploration. The falling costs of space access makes such a new model even more viable.

   1. We used to trust government. But over the past 50 years there has been a persistent, and consistent, effort to denigrate the importance of our social compromise, to blame some ‘other’.

      So let all of the who cheered St. Ronnie’s “the government IS the problem” look long and hard at what they have wrought.

      Good job.

      Now every numbskull has the cover necessary to take nothing but selfish positions. It’s how those crazies got elected to the House.

      1. ‘We’ certainly didn’t trust government when we framed the Constitution. We reluctantly gave it limited powers. And there has been ‘power-creep’ ever since to the point where many if not all of us have become over-dependent on said government.

         Consider how little real impact a stand-off like today’s would have had in 1819.

         Blankly trusting government is a very, very dangerous path to follow. History is littered with tragedies and horrors derived from peoples trusting their governments to the point of surrendering personal responsibility.

         And, btw, blaming ‘some other’ has been with humanity since there has been humanity (recall a rather ancient text: Adam blamed Eve (& God!), and in turn Eve blamed the serpent); it’s hardly only been around for 50 years.

         1. This graph, from a Jonathan Haidt lecture, suggests that our government’s lack of ability to find the center and compromise is ever increasing: https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
            This data correlates with the statement “Between fiscal year 1977 and fiscal year 2015, Congress only passed all twelve regular appropriations bills on time in four years – fiscal years 1977, 1989, 1995, and 1997”

            Also, love that quote, Keith. Can’t hear it enough.

            1. What parameter(s) define “Distance between the Parties”? I would need more information before giving such a graph any credence. I would appreciate any guidance on where to dig further.

            2. There are certainly many ways to examine polarization, and I am no political scientist, only a consumer of the results. That particular graph considers how often party lawmakers question constitutionality by holding hearings. The full paper may be found here: https://scholarlycommons.la…
               Another measure may be made by considering the polling record, and how often over time mixed voting records are becoming increasingly rare as shown by Pew: https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
               There are other means of measure you can find, but i have yet to find any data which suggests we are getting less polar.
               My point was, there is an underlying problem in that our Congress has not been able to pass clean budgets for the past 40 years. This creates enormous damage to agencies trying to plan and execute multi year programs, and furthermore is reducing the value of the taxpayer’s dollar. Increased party polarization may be a contributing factor here by working against compromise, and if it is a source the problem is likely to get worse.

            3. Thanks.

            4. I would tend to (warily) trust the Pew data as a reflection of polarization more than the paper built on Congressional constitutionality hearings. I haven’t digested said paper completely but it strikes me as a foregone conclusion looking urgently for evidence…especially in the footnotes.

               BTW, my original challenge to Mr. Spencer’s post did not question the possibility of increased polarization. It had to do with his blanket assertion that ‘we used to trust government’ and somehow that had changed in the 80s with a specific administration. As I had noted, not trusting government is part of the fabric OF our government from its very establishment on behalf of the governed. Or, perhaps, it used to be.

            5. Bob:

               I wanted to reply to your post but alas a 10mm kidney stone had other ideas…nonetheless here’s an abbreviated response.

               I do take your point, and acknowledge my comments were a bit of hyperbolic. Having lived through the Vietnam antiwar movement as well as concomitant civil rights efforts it would be hard to say with a straight face that we ‘trusted government.’ We didn’t. Cops? Cops were ‘Pigs’. Returning vets were treated shamefully. We hated The Man.

               Or did we?

               Public activity of the 60s-80s was raucous, pugilistic, often ugly in tone. Anti-governmental attitudes were socially pervasive, dominating printed discussion and, especially music.

               What was different, I would say, is this: an often unstated recognition that government, as an agency for change, had been hijacked. We passionately opposed governmental policies, not because it was the government, but because the government was headed in the wrong direction.

               If we could grab the horns of authority, or the attention of those driving the bus, we could effect huge changes through the agency of government. And why not? Recall that the New Deal was barely 30 years in the past. That every President took office with grandiose plans: A War on Poverty, a War on Drugs; Kennedy’s New Frontier.

               What do these examples have in common? Admittedly they have a questionable efficacy – but that’s a different discussion. What they share is the idea that government can be a friends. A tool.

               I am saying that in many quarters nowadays the government is seen as an inherently a bloated mess with no possibility of acquittal.

               This POV has always been present, to a greater or lesser extent, as you and Dr. Matula point out. I am asserting that formerly extreme and perhaps distasteful views have become quite mainstream. And, in a peripheral way, this shift has given support to unsavory Fellow Travelers.

            6. Sorry for your stone, Michael. I was lucky, many years ago, that the one I developed wasn’t too big (can’t recall the size) and ended up dissolving of its own accord. Now, that gallstone I passed…sheesh. Thought I was having a heart attack… Glad you’re on the mend…or so I presume with your posting now.

               To your point, I had heard not too many years ago an interview with (I think) David Crosby, somewhat lamenting how things fell out with Robert Kennedy’s assassination. As he figured it, if Kennedy had won (as he likely would have?), the ‘Woodstock Generation’ would have had to learn for themselves, once they gained power, just how hard ‘fixing things for the better’ can be when the realities of not just politics but the real world inevitably intrude. He noted that, since Nixon won and the Progressives didn’t get their chance, the political divide only widened even further.

               I can’t say if Crosby’s alternate history perspective carries any wisdom, but I do think your perception is more amplified than the reality. Big government IS a problem in various ways (I have been in the middle of it in two different spheres and got to see it up close), and there remains disagreement over just how much and where.

               But I do not believe that the current stand-off has to do with that…and your assertion in the other thread that it’s all a nefarious strategy on the part of the Republicans to illustrate government’s non-essential nature to me borders on, frankly, conspiracy-mongering silliness.

            7. It also feels wrong. According to that plot, the parties were “closest” during the Roosevelt administration. Last time I checked, the Republican party wasn’t exactly lining up behind the New Deal. I could be wrong, but to me, that’s sort of a flag to check the methodology.

            8. Historically America comes together when threaten like WW II then moves apart when there is no threat. The Democrats and Republicans were fighting like cats and dogs until Pearl Harbor, then came together in a way that shocked the Japanese and Germans who thought they could use the division to get a quick peace treaty signed.

            9. Yes, although I don’t think it was quite as harmonious as you imply. But the plot in question shows a similar “closeness” between parties, before and after we entered World War Two. As far as I know, that doesn’t match history. And that makes me suspicious of whatever standard was used to define “distance” between parties. I can think of some statistical definitions, but I’d want to apply a sanity check before accepting any of them. That plot doesn’t pass, in my opinion, since it shows closeness during the New Deal era and no change around December 1941.

   2. I don’t have any objections to that suggestion, but I can see some problems with making it work.

      First, some people just like big science. Regardless of the reasons, there will be pressure to keep the cost of missions at the largest level fundable, even if the costs go down (e.g. people might respond to a factor of ten reduction in cost by proposing Flagship missions for the price of a Discovery, rather than Discovery class missions for $50 million.) But that’s independent of the source of funding.

      As far as diverse sources of funding are concerned, I’m not sure where to find them. It isn’t likely to be state or local governments. Given what they pay for things like public schools, colleges and universities, I can’t see them shelling out millions to tens of millions per year for space science or exploration. Nor can I see the money coming from companies looking to make a profit. Clear sources of income just aren’t out there. There are possibilities, and I can imagine corporate funding to investigate them. But that’s a relatively limited amount of seed money, not support for an ongoing research program.

      I could also see corporate funding for one-off publicity stunts. The first non-government mission to Mars would make the headlines. I’m not an expert, but that might be the sort of positive media coverage
      a company would pay $100 million for. But, again, that would be a one-off mission not support for ongoing research.

      That leaves funding by private citizens, and there, I think there is a cultural obstacle. I think most private donations go to things the donors think the government will not or should not pay for (third world medical services being an example of the former and religious institutions being an example of the later.) Since the late 1940s, I think people have gotten the idea that big science, and space exploration in particular, is something the government ought to be funding. Getting private citizens to pay would be fighting against that attitude.

      I’m also worried about sustained funding. That’s always been a problem for NASA funding, and the effects of government shutdowns just make it worse. But donations and philanthropists aren’t necessarily more stable sources of income. If launch costs and the cost of spaceflight in general come down significantly, I’d guess the best choice would be some sort of endowment or trust. If someone (or ones) put in half a billion, I’d think the interest and dividends would support a significant space science/exploration program. With an order of magnitude reduction in cost, that ought to cover something on par with NASA’s current Discovery program.

2. Our special friends across the pond are having a very similar baptism of fire and recalcitrance.

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