Putting current events into perspective:
Long after the time in which anyone can easily recall who was US president in 2011, or what party was in power, or which wars of declining empire were fought, and then long after anyone even cares about that ancient history, and later, long after the whole downward slope of the history of the US is but a footnote of interest to scholars of the transition from second to third millennium, and later still, long after anyone can even find out with any great reliability who was US president in 2011 … long after all these things are forgotten, the first half of the 21st century will still be clearly recalled as the dawn of the era in which aging was conquered.
It will also be remembered as the era in which we finally opened up the rest of the solar system to human endeavors after the false start of the mid-twentieth century.
I’m optimistic about manned space, too, now that the private sector is getting more directly involved. What that could mean for the U.S. and world economies is unknowable, but the potential is tremendous.
Back in the mid 1980s, I read Jerry Pournelle’s collection of essays titled A Step Further Out. From memory, one of the things he discussed was that there was a window of opportunity for space travel. IIRC, he stated that if we waited too long, we’d no longer have the resources needed to go into space.
Just at the time when private companies like SpaceX and Bigelow are making things very interesting, we’re facing a debt crisis unlike any in living memory. We in the US have our problems and so does the Eurozone and even China. We’ve built a house of cards economically and if any one of those big 3 stumble, we’re all likely to fall and possibly trigger Great Depression 2.0. Money is a resource. If the cards fall, we may not be able to do all of the exciting things we hope in space, extend human lifespans or much else.
I purchased that book three times Larry. He wrote it in the seventies. It made the cut on my latest move (about half my library didn’t.)
Marxist thought will totally prevent the colonization of the solar system. It takes capital and a realization that all the assets we need are in space and have no need to be sent back to earth. It’s all about the economics and balls. Real estate finances everything if we have the balls.
This is why he saw Orion as a hope in Footfall. He has a lot of confidence in socialistic governments (like ours) screwing things up with only technology being our fallback.
You do not own anything that can be taxed repeatedly.