Mars

[yesthattom]

Bush wants a round-trip voyage to mars. I'd rather buy him a one-way ticket back to Crawford, Texas!

Comments

[gerardp.livejournal.com]

It's definitely cheaper (the one-way to Crawford vs. the r/t to Mars).

[tactisle.livejournal.com]

I wish the Democrats would soften their anti-space-program rhetoric a bit. I HATE the fact that Bush is like the only person currently running for President who wants to go to Mars.

If we're not careful, we'll start convincing our big-picture progressives that they somehow belong on the GOP side of the fence.

[stormsweeper.livejournal.com]

It's more of the way he's going about it that bothers me. He wants to scutle the rest of NASA to focus on the moon base.

[tactisle.livejournal.com]

Oh, I think you misunderstand me. Of course any plan that Dubya's handlers would come up with for space exploration would be heavily slanted towards grandstanding and handed out to give the most advantage to the energy moguls. And probably also not designed to succeed; just to sway public opinion long enough to commandeer some more key publically-financed R&D groups and think tanks for the energy industry's advantage.

I'm SOOO not fond of the way the GOP is milking the good healthy American desire to explore and homestead outer space for the sake of lining their overstuffed pockets. And just as pissed off at the knee-jerk "space is wasteful, we need to feed the hungry instead" response to the ploy that I've been hearing. It seems like pandering to the Lowered Expectations people who've had too much pull in the DP for too long, and to whom Dean is supposed to be an alternative.

[beowabbit]

What polydad said below. My understanding is that he's called for allocating $1bn in new spending (over what period of time?), but also reallocating several $bn in existing NASA spending to these new programs. That sounds to me like it means gutting things like the spectacularly successful probes, the space telescope program, and stuff like that. And judging by his energy bill (mercifully blocked), his prescription-drug benefit, and his occupation of Iraq, the money he takes from other NASA programs to spend on the moon and Mars will not be well or efficiently spent; it will be simply be funnelled back into the unofficial kleptocracy that pulls the strings of his administration (where a very tiny fraction of it will get funnelled back into donations to the National Capitalist American Bosses' Party).

I don't trust King George II with space policy any more than I trust him with health care, with defense and war, with the environment, with education, or with economic policy. He does not serve the people or the nation, nor even the élite; he serves a tiny minority of the super-rich.

[stormsweeper.livejournal.com]

He wants to re-allocate $11 billion of current NASA funding. NASA's entire budget was $15 billion in FY2003.

I'm all for manned exploration, but this is a sure way to kill other projects - there's already rumors of the US pulling out of the ISS.

Those interested in such things can see the NASA budgets for the past few years here:

http://www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Budget_Previous.html

[stitchinthyme.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't mind his taking a one-way trip to Mars!

[jss]

Or even a one-way tickey halfway to Mars!

[polydad.livejournal.com]

How about a compromise -- give him a one-way ticket to Low Earth Orbit? If he doesn't like it up there, he can walk back.

I like the idea of putting some life back into the space program. Given Georgie, though, I suspect his motive is to use NASA as another conduit to plunder the treasury.

[kimuchi.livejournal.com]

As I was saying at work, this just kills me. I have so much enthusiasm for things like a moon base and a trip for Mars, that's the stuff I dreamed about as a kid. And as a coworker of mine pointed out, putting big money into a national technology project probably would have some benefits to the workforce. But...I just don't trust George Bush to be the one to take us there, and I feel like he's already spent _so_much_ money stupidly that he needs to be stopped regardless of what I might think about this one proposal. Especially since this $12B number is just the first bit, the projections are that his proposals would cost hundreds of billions over time.

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

This. Why, oh why does it have to be Dubya, of all people, and now, of all times?

Oh. Right. Dubya, because he probably wants to leave a "legacy," and now, to distract us from the fact that he's ass-raping this country without a condom.

[jss]

Or a reacharound.