Yeah! A billionaire makes it to 'SPACE!' NOT! We are so gullible as we funded their billions.

[egbertowillies]

While many were excited to watch rich people get to space on technology developed by us commoners, I'll be the pooper. I promise this is not wealth envy. It is a complete disdain for a system that has been effective in most of us doing the work. It is a system that uses the intellect of most to benefit just a select few.

https://egbertowillies.com/2021/07/11/yeah-a-billionaire-makes-it-to-space-not-we-are-so-gullible-as-we-funded-their-billions/

[PortTack]

1. A true scientist speaks!! Can we please pay attention!!

[bamagal62]

2. The whole thing was a bit of a let down.

[egbertowillies]

3. I posted at Coffee Party USA and received the following comment.

Jerry Armstrong
It's wonderful. It was a worthy endeavor while also being a joy ride for a billionaire. So what. It promotes even more technology and space travel. The naysayers forget that it was rich people who sank money into "flying machines" a hundred years ago, which brought us where we are today. Only the narrow minded fall to see the advantage of a private citizen pouring money into space travel.

My response was:

Egberto Willies
Jerry Armstrong Your response is the one that most frustrates me. If I rob you and then invest some of the loot in something that benefits the few makes it OK? Using your wordage, "Only the narrow-minded fail to see that the wealth of the rich is the capital that was not paid to those who afforded them the wealth they have." We are in a system that sanitized the theft from the masses through financial structures that abstract said theft.

Thoughts?

[PortTack]

8. Trickle down economics at its best!

[dsc]

9. well for one thing the Wright Brothers weren't all that wealthy

They were small business owners, their dad was a bishop in the Episcopal Church. Even after their invention they weren't robber barons by any means.

[MerryHolidays]

4. egbertowillies, that was excellent!

Good job, both with Dr. Tyson and your commentary. Spot on, IMO.

[egbertowillies]

6. TY my friend

[MerryHolidays]

7. I've posted a couple of times on this already in other DU threads

Here's one example: https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1018&pid=1530316

At most, space should be a public-private partnership. That's exactly what the Apollo project was, with NASA and contractors like Boeing, Rockwell etc all working together. It was a huge success, with some terrific sadness along the way like Apollo I and Apollo XIII. However, it essentially accomplished everything and more. To me, that was America's finest time. As you point out, these were things done 50-60 years ago.

This is clearly about money, and if it is not HEAVILY regulated, both in the US and internationally, we are polluting space for the benefit of pretty much nothing except some billionaires to extract money from wannabes. I would have loved to have been an astronaut. But the training involved is so great, it is a decades-commitment to do it properly. And even then, it is incredibly dangerous.

I will give Richard Branson a bit more slack, as he has been a lifelong adventurer, particularly in aviation. But Bezos? Musk? I will forever remember that a Tesla is orbiting Mars (or somewhere). Can you imagine what intelligent life that might intercept it would think: why exactly would you put a dummy in a car in space!?!

[Buckeye_Democrat]

5. Good video!

Branson will be treated by future historians like some young cobbler from the 16th century who later went into a shoe-making business, getting wealthy by selling shoes with a red heel that were all the rage at the time, and later becoming even more wealthy with investments in fleets of fishing vessels. Ultimately investing in a larger ship that could traverse the Atlantic Ocean, offering sight-seeing tours of America to the wealthy around 1552.

No such cobbler existed as far as I know, but he wouldn't get much attention by today's historians if he did!

[LT Barclay]

10. Glad someone said it. Time to cut the hype and give the job back to the professionals at NASA.

[paleotn]

13. Bingo.

[mtasselin]

11. socialism

The State of New Mexico spends 250 million dollars on the facility and the rich dude comes in and uses it, the rich hate socialism until they want and need it.

[paleotn]

12. Careful. You'll get castigated for being anti-capitalist.