I like NASA and space flight, but the "return to the moon" by 2018/20

[darkstar]

is embarrassing...
http://www.space.com/news/050914_nasa_cev_update.html

Announced in '05, that's 13-15 years to do what we did in 9 years THE FIRST FRICKING TIME when announced 47 YEARS AGO.

Considering we are in something of a second space race, I just don't get it. I suppose safety is being emphasized more as I've read some stuff about the dicey odds the first go round. But still, *everything* was new in the sixties and people were working with slide rules versus computerized models, etc.

WTF?

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

1. This came on the heels of the Chinese manned spaceflight

...and moonshot announcement.

[darkstar]

2. Yeah I get that part, i.e. the "new space race" I mentioned

Are you saying this makes the time frame even more pathetic, i.e. the Soviets never announced and we did it in 9 years?

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

3. Yes, it's just a big joke.

Like Bush's Mars landing trial balloon.

[edbermac]

4. I think they should put a base on the moon.

And also use it to practice for a Mars landing.

[Bucky]

5. I think you're forgetting that with all that new technology...

...billing by fatcat NASA contractors takes a lot longer to process.

Why even bother to go to the Moon again if we can't bilk the tax payers in the process, huh?

[Orsino]

6. Can't we cook some intel...

...that suggests an al Qaeda cloning facility has been built on the moon, and they will have reconstituted Saddam within three years?

edit: Oh, yeah. On top of strategically vital oil reserves.

[darkstar]

7. No kidding...

And maybe link children without health care to the illegal drug trade, a market we know only serves to expand terrorist's coffers.

:hi: