Obama to privatize NASA launches, end moon mission

[Hannah Bell]

Old news -- but I, for one, missed it when it happened.

Is there *anything* this administration *isn't* privatizing?



By KENNETH CHANG

The New York Times

President Obama will end NASA's return mission to the moon and turn to private companies to launch astronauts into space when he unveils his budget request to Congress next week, an administration official said Thursday.

The shift would "put NASA on a more sustainable and ambitious path to the future," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. But the changes angered some members of Congress, particularly from Texas, the location of the Johnson Space Center, and Florida, the location of the Kennedy Space Center.

"My biggest fear is that this amounts to a slow death of our nation's human spaceflight program," said Rep. Bill Posey, R-Fla.

Obama's request, which will be announced Monday, would add $6 billion over five years to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's budget compared with projections last year. With the increase, NASA would receive $100 billion over the 2011 through 2015 fiscal years.

The new money would largely go to commercial companies that would provide transportation to and from the international space station.

The commercial rockets would displace the Ares I, the rocket that NASA has been developing for the past four years to replace the shuttles, which are scheduled to be retired this year. Companies expected to seek the new space-taxi business include United Launch Alliance, a partnership between Boeing and Lockheed Martin that launches rockets for the U.S. Air Force, and Space Exploration Technologies, a startup company led by Elon Musk, who founded PayPal.


http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2010922405_nasa29.html

[EFerrari]

1. Par.

[Cha]

2. Yeah, there's a lot President Obama isn't privatizting..

to answer your disingenuous question.

[Hannah Bell]

3. name something.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

5. Actual legitimately scienitfic NASA missions.

Which he's actually increasing the budget for.

[Hannah Bell]

13. better check your data, pron.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

22. Obama increased the Nasa budget. We discussed this all weeks ago.

[Hannah Bell]

27. go a little deeper.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

29. Here:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2010/01/30/give-space-a-chance/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/buzz-aldrin/president-obamas-jfk-mome_b_448667.html

[Hannah Bell]

30. you've misunderstood but i don't have time to post the details.

[EFerrari]

6. Well, he did socialize Wall Street Debt.

[Bluebear]

9. ouch :)

[leftstreet]

18. double ouch

:rofl:

[ixion]

4. So much for the "only republicans privatize" meme

another gory death of a myth.

[brentspeak]

7. For-profit companies running the space program -- meaning, they'll be hiring mostly non-U.S. workers

to maximize their profit. Not what JFK had in mind.

[EFerrari]

10. We've really come full circle in my lifetime.

I remember how excited everyone was about the moon program. My whole neighborhood worked at NASA.

Gracefully surrender the things of youth . . .

[Oregone]

12. And shooting Toyotas at the moon on subsidized dollars

[Starry Messenger]

8. This is such a stupid idea.

If Elon ever gets bored with playing spaceman, then where is the country's space program going to go?

[berni_mccoy]

15. Really? Because DU thought it was a stupid idea when Bush announced the mission...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x252252

Are you now defending Bush?

[Starry Messenger]

16. No, I'm shit-talking Elon.

Try to keep up. :hi:

[Name removed]

20. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[NoNothing]

19. It's not just the moon base

It's *all manned spaceflight*.

[Johonny]

38. OMG we'll only have Atlas, Delta, Athena, Pegasus, Minotaur...

to launch our satellites into space... In other words our space program will be exactly like it is now accept we won't launch 10 % of our missions that were "manned". The part that used the vast majority of the budget and produced the least science. Oh well.

[Individualist]

11. Don't you just love DLC/NDC policies?

:sarcasm:

:sarcasm:

:sarcasm:

[berni_mccoy]

14. The moon base was Bush's baby. It should be cancelled.

It was a waste of resources that could be spent on next generation propulsion systems and next generation scopes.

And NASA outsourcing to private companies is nothing new. They've been doing it since they were created.

In fact, it's painfully clear how some people here would use ANYTHING to attack Obama. Here's a post of what DU thought of the Moon Mission when Bush announced it:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x252252

[EFerrari]

21. It's one thing to disagree with a particular project. It's another entirely

to privatize them.

Apples and dominoes.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

24. The manned spaceflights have been a concern for a long time.

They do not produce the science that things like Opportunity and Spirit have produced. People point to things like aluminum and alloys as reasons to keep the manned spaceflight program, but those things were NOT discoveries of manned spaceflight. They were discoveries made here on Earth. Manned spaceflight has produced little science for us.

[Warren DeMontague]

31. I think the paroxysms of joy being expressed by the anti-manned space exploration contingent

are proof enough that Obama's NASA budget is a) being taken as a swipe, deliberate or not, and manned space exploration b) a really bad idea and c) a non-starter.


I mean, look, either it's about 'game changing technologies to get humans to places like Mars faster' (as per the defenders of Obama's budget) OR it's about what a giant waste sending people into space is, because gee whiz, if we weren't giving NASA those pennies on the federal dollar every year, for sure we would have ended hunger and homelessness, etc. by now.

But it can't be about BOTH. Get it?

[Warren DeMontague]

32. We are going to be left with no manned space capability. This is a mistake.

A lot of people on all sides of the aisle think so.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

17. The moon mission was a failure. Even Buzz Alderin, champion of the moon, thought so.

[EFerrari]

23. If it was such a failure, why does someone want to buy it?

[SemiCharmedQuark]

25. The purpose of space exploration for NASA is to gather scientific information.

The purpose of space exploration for private contractors is to make money either by harvesting something or by charging to take people into space. They can take risks that NASA cannot.

[EFerrari]

26. Think about what you're saying. A private company can take risks

NASA cannot. So, what are these risks? Are they financial? Do you mean risks with human life?

I've never been a big cheerleader for the space program. But privatizing this program raise red flags.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

28. I do not think that privitization is a wonderful cure all.

But in this case, it isn't the catastrophe that people are making it out to be. I think people are making assumptions. For example, in another thread, Russia's new launch was being discussed. Someone said that the U.S. would fall behind because of the privatization of the shuttle missions. Only then was it pointed out to this person that Russia's shuttle was already owned by a private company.

Private companies can gain money simply by inviting investors with promises of wealth. If the private companies fail to find this wealth? Oh well, those are the chances you take.
NASA can't do that. Their funding is limited. And when people defend the manned astronaut program, their number one fear is that people will get bored with science without astronauts. I don't buy that. People followed Spirit and Opportunity eagerly.

[Warren DeMontague]

33. So, really, you do think we should ditch manned space exploration. At least you're honest.

No, my "number one fear" isn't that 'people will get bored with science without astronauts'. My number one motivation in supporting a robust human presence in space is the belief that we MUST explore -personally- the cosmos, and become a spacefaring race. Move off the single planet. And sooner or later, we will. I strongly believe it is our future.

Anyone genuinely interested in science -too few people, if you ask me- is well aware that absolutely amazing things have been done with unmanned and robotic space exploration in recent decades, from the Mars Exploration Rovers to the Huygens probe landing on Titan, to the encyclopedias of knowledge coming out of the Hubble Space Telescope (serviced by humans)

...of course, anyone who truly understands space science also knows that we were able to learn a tremendous amount -and do direct scientific exploration not possible with robots- just with 6 successful manned Apollo moon landings. I'm not talking about computers or teflon or other tech spin-offs; I'm talking about real scientific understanding of the moon brought about by direct exploration by people.

It is a fallacy to claim that manned and unmanned exploration of space are somehow mutually exclusive. In a country where we spend $40 Billion a year just to try to stop people from smoking pot, I think we can afford both.

With all due respect to Buzz Aldrin (not "Alderin"), the guy has a lot on his plate right now, between this and Dancing with the stars. If you watch his exchange with Miles O'Brien here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5icnMDAGsI&feature=PlayList&p=XEF29BenrrE

you'll see that the guy has some, er, interesting ideas, some of them sort of jumbled together- but one thing he most absolutely is NOT doing is advocating the end of manned space exploration, or government sponsored manned space exploration, or anything like what you seem to believe this is all about. And he specifically advocates retaining the Orion capsule, a core hardware piece of the allegedly "failed constellation moon program".

And as for science on the moon, how about what Harrison Schmitt has to say on the matter?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/09/AR2010030902594.html?hpid=moreheadlines

Or how about what a group of several families of astronauts who gave their lives for space exploration have to say?

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/federal-eye/2010/03/astronuat_families_press_nasas.html

[SemiCharmedQuark]

34. Ideally we'd cut the defense budget and fund a NASA program like the 1970s had

Ideally there should be both a government sponsored and a private sector for space. However that isn't going to happen. NASA does not get the funding it needs. So the options are to either continue throwing money at a program that was destined for failure as soon as it was released due to lack of funding, or to invest it in unmanned spaceflight and get a better science return for our values.

Just as I would hope that the families of fallen soldiers who want to stay in Iraq or Afghanistan to prevent their child's death from being a waste were not the deciding factor in whether we stayed there or not, families of astronauts who have died are a great emotional source, but should not be the deciding factor in how best to spend NASA's meager budget.Although I wouldn't take it as far as Dr. Steven Weinberg, most people focused on getting scientific returns agree that unmanned spaceflight has given us our best data. As far as Buzz Aldrin, if you wish to cast aspersions at former astronauts, Harrison Schmitt-global warming denier and Palin defender-is an easy target.

[Warren DeMontague]

36. I'm not casting aspersions on Buzz Aldrin. I'm saying that his idea for an "Aldrin Cycler" manned

spacecraft to cycle between the moon and Earth, for instance, is a far cry from an abandonment of manned space exploration. I think it's an intruiging idea. Aldrin also supports keeping the Orion capsule and a heavy lift booster, which is, essentially, the Ares V. You can't say, "oh, Buzz Aldrin agrees that we should do such and such" and then ignore what the guy REALLY wants.


And if the only "options", as you put it, are Constellation -which you keep claiming has "failed"- or no manned space exploration at ALL, let Obama go down to Florida next month and pitch THAT. But then fucking admit that's what you're doing- stop with this wishy-washy goo about "game changing technologies to get us to Mars faster". Say "we're not sending humans into space anymore. Sorry. We'll let the Chinese do it from now on"

See how that works out.

[gleaner]

35. What ever happened to..

seeking knowledge for its own sake? Like finding out more about the moon, the planets and the universe. This new program is nothing but Reagan's space shuttle redeux. They are building new transport because the shuttles are in terrible disrepair. Every time Bush allowed a flight he was knowingly rising the lives of the shuttle crews.

Also it is yet another way to funnel public funds into the hands of the greedy instead of letting the government run the space program well, the way it used to do before Reagan.

[Johonny]

37. people understand so little of the US space industry

NASA made there decision a long time ago to launch a spacecraft that could not possibly manage the US space needs. Thus the US a longtime ago developed space capabilities outside of NASA to actually meet these needs. The current "problem" isn't Obama's fault (he was probably in high school at the time) but a long time result of NASAs own policies and the rest of the space industries reaction to those policies. It certainly isn't negative, as in NASA has been using these vehicles for years to launch most of their actual important scientific missions. Really nothing has changed accept the public's knowledge of the fact NASA is actually not involved in the vast majority of the nations launch vehicles and that decision was in part NASAs own decision.

[Strelnikov_]

39. That don't sound very Socialist to the folks down here in Pigsknuckle

Could sister Sarah and brother Glenn be a little short on the truth regarding this Obama guy.