Too busy to blog (I’m working overtime, have a sick furnace and a sick cat), but fortunately, Henry Vanderbilt over at the Space Access Society is picking up the slack. He’s very upbeat, and has an update on X-Prize progress, a smart analysis of the president’s space initiative, and the new House legislation on launch regulation, a subject that I still haven’t had much time to analyze.

As part of his new space policy analysis, he also has a powerful argument against the “Bush space policy hoax” folks.

…we think this new plan is very unlikely to be
what many are claiming, mere election-year feelgood puffery. Were
it so, the Administration would be making promises left and right,
jobs for everyone and a contract in every district, and not worrying
overmuch whether the Congress would fund it all once the election’s
over. Instead, the White House and NASA HQ have been notably
reticent about reassuring the established NASA manned space Centers
and contractors that they’ll all have major roles in the new
initiative. Refusing to promise job security is a poor way to win
votes. It is, however, a good way to keep options open to implement
the sort of major restructuring NASA will need to meet the new
program’s ambitious goals within relatively modest budget increases.

It’s long, but read the whole thing.

[Update on Tuesday morning]

There was one specific other item of note from Henry’s report that I would have mentioned last night if I hadn’t had the cat and furnace problems. Pioneer Rocketplane apparently has funding to build their suborbital vehicle, thanks to tax credits from the state of Oklahoma. Mitchell Burnside Clapp, founder and president, told me about this over a year ago, but it’s public information now.

I think that 2004 will continue to be a very interesting year for the new emerging space transport industry.