moon and mars - no manned missions for at least 20 years

[oddjob]

It really irks me that we had to start from almost nothing in the early 60's and develop everything within 10 years to get men on and off the moon. Now with all the intervening technological advances we are struggling to even service the international space station as the shuttle goes out of commission.

Perhaps the motivation for greatness has gone away, and instead of funding awesome innovation we are channeling huge sums of money, with no accountability, through Goldman Sachs Geithner to his corrupt banking buddies. That's just one area where the government has gone totally off the rails.

Anyway, the NASA budget exceeds all the rest of the worlds space budgets combined, so it's not like there isn't money there. It just seems we are lacking the will to be exceptional, lacking a vision to capture the publics imagination. I'd love to see Obama "do a Kennedy" in 2010 and commit to getting men to Mars and back by 2020. Or begin a new Manhattan scale project to harness fusion power and create a super clean energy source. Telling us make sure our tires are properly inflated just isn't cutting it as energy policy.

Let's roll.

[JesseK]

Originally Posted by oddjob

It really irks me that we had to start from almost nothing in the early 60's and develop everything within 10 years to get men on and off the moon. Now with all the intervening technological advances we are struggling to even service the international space station as the shuttle goes out of commission.

Perhaps the motivation for greatness has gone away, and instead of funding awesome innovation we are channeling huge sums of money, with no accountability, through Goldman Sachs Geithner to his corrupt banking buddies. That's just one area where the government has gone totally off the rails.

Anyway, the NASA budget exceeds all the rest of the worlds space budgets combined, so it's not like there isn't money there. It just seems we are lacking the will to be exceptional, lacking a vision to capture the publics imagination. I'd love to see Obama "do a Kennedy" in 2010 and commit to getting men to Mars and back by 2020 ----->1<-------- . Or begin a new Manhattan scale project to harness fusion power and create a super clean energy source ------->2<------. Telling us make sure our tires are properly inflated just isn't cutting it as energy policy.

Let's roll.

1. If you want the Obama Administration to up the ante on Mars exploration, you will be severely disappointed.. You can't sit here and think that going to Mars is as remotely simple as going to the moon. For the moon missions, they could carry all of the fuel and oxygen necessary, and if they missed the window for launch it was probably only a matter of waiting another day or two to make it again. To move the amount of mass for all of the required oxygen to Mars would require massive amounts of fuel, and all of the mass for that fuel takes even more fuel to move. Not even technology can beat the laws of physics.
2. The government is already funding that. Quit your griping and do your part -- inflate your tires. It's the same principle as the whole "time spent on voicemail prompts costs Americans $850 million annually" argument. 1 drop may not cause the flood, but it definitely is a part of it.