Political Commentary, Space

The Constellation Empire

7 Comments

…strikes back:

The video itself is perhaps a bit subtle: it’s arguing for staying the course in Constellation, but doesn’t hit the viewer over the head repeatedly with that message. The closing slide asks viewers to contact the White House and Congress and “tell them you DO NOT Want to ‘Take a Chance’ with the U.S. Human Space Flight Program.” (capitalization and punctuation in original.) The information on the YouTube page, though, is rather more blunt: “Although a thorough review was conducted four years ago—and a direction chosen, contracts awarded, tests conducted, and rockets built—the Augustine committee wants to stop work and do something new,” it claims. “This will widen the gap between the retirement of the shuttle and its replacement vehicle, waste billions of dollars and threaten Americas [sic] presence in space. You can STOP this.”

It’s going to be an interesting fall for space policy and politics.

7 thoughts on “The Constellation Empire”

  1. The video contains an out-and-out lie when it says George W. Bush cut $12 billion from the NASA budget.

    Giving a government agency more money than it had before, but less than it wanted, may or may not be warranted but does *not* constitute a cut.

    If you actually believed this video, you would have to believe the NASA budget had gone from $14 billion to $2 billion under Bush, when it actually rose to $17 billion. (The increase in real terms was somewhat less but it was still an increase, not a cut.)

    I also love the scare words: “The Augustine committee wants to… do something new.”

    Oh, no, please! Let’s never do anything new!

  2. “Oh, no, please! Let’s never do anything new!”
    Like Obamacare, cap and trade, and all of those other new things.

    Edward is being a little disingenuous. The video is clearly referring to the promised budget for Constellation, not NASA.

    There are arguments for tweeking the exploration program, but not by playing rhetorical tricks.

  3. A four percent margin got Obama elected. I bet none of those four percent had space on their mind when they voted for him. People were tired of the wars. People were really sick and tired of four dollar gas. Talk about unintended consequences! I am hoping space solar powersats actually start making money. Japan just started a 21 billion dollar national solar powersat program. Didn’t we just buy alot of high mpg cars from Japan with the “cash for clunkers” program? It appears that someone in the japanese business ministry can think clearly about the future!

  4. Love how the public sessions feature Augustine panelists saying that NASA needs lots more money to do the current program but somehow if NASA doesn’t get that money it’s the panel’s fault….

  5. “Oh, no, please! Let’s never do anything new!”
    Like Obamacare, cap and trade, and all of those other new things.

    Are you advocating Obamacare in space, Mark?

    Or did you simply not understand the subject of the conversation?

  6. What exactly is your argument Mark? I can’t figure it out at all. This seems like a rhetorical trick:

    “Oh, no, please! Let’s never do anything new!”
    Like Obamacare, cap and trade, and all of those other new things.

    So what’s your argument?

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