Clark Lindsey responds.
[Update a while later]
You know, when supposed captains of the European space industry are both able and willing to submit such an ignorant and illogical piece to a major industry publication, and it’s willing to run it, it tells us something about how screwed up that industry is, and explains why we’ve made so little progress in opening up space after over half a century.
Ilya Somin says that George Bush should, finally, stop giving a bad name to free markets:
Bush’s belated support for free markets follows in Hoover’s footsteps. After leaving office in 1933, Hoover wrote books and articles defending free markets and criticizing the Democrats’ New Deal. Some of his criticisms of FDR were well-taken. Many New Deal policies actually worsened and prolonged the Great Depression by organizing cartels and increasing unemployment. But by coming out as a free market advocate, the post-presidential Hoover actually bolstered the cause of interventionism because he helped cement the incorrect impression that he had pursued free market policies while in office, thereby causing the Depression. Bush’s post-presidential conversion creates a similar risk: it could solidify the already widespread impression that he, like the Hoover of myth, pursued laissez-faire policies which then caused an economic crisis.
What should Bush now do if he genuinely wants to help the free market cause? The best thing would be to take up economist David Henderson’s half-joking suggestion that he “express his regret at nationalizing airport safety, carrying out illegal surveillance of U.S. citizens, raiding medical marijuana clinics, bailing out General Motors, AIG and other companies, and socializing prescription drugs for the elderly [the biggest new government program from the 1960s until the present financial crisis].” Bush could also point out that he advocated an ideology of “compassionate conservatism” that included vastly expanded government, and an “ownership society” that (in his own words) involved “us[ing] the mighty muscle of the federal government” to incentivize dubious mortgages of the kind that helped cause the financial collapse of 2008. The greatest contribution Bush can now make to free market policies is to dispel the impression that he pursued them while in office.
Unfortunately, as Somin points out, the likelihood that he will admit his perfidy to markets, or the disastrous nature of many of his domestic policies, is pretty low, so the best thing he can do for free markets now is to just shut up.
…and knocking down a straw man, over at The Space Review, by Dr. Day:
Occasionally, space activists critical of NASA claim that whereas the civilian space agency is a badly-run bureaucracy that ought to be eliminated and replaced with something else, the military manages to do a much better job with its space program. The military, which they believe to be immune to congressional micromanagement and political interference, somehow manages to do great things in space.
Which “space activists critical of NASA”? With whom is he arguing? Can he name names? I wouldn’t claim that this argument has never been made, or that there aren’t people who hold such a view, but I’m not aware of any. It certainly isn’t representative of “space activists” in general. So I’m not sure what his point is. He then goes on to kick the straw out of the thing with a list of past and current DoD space (and other) procurement screwups, with which anyone who has been following things is quite familiar. And his conclusion?
By now you might have detected a common theme here: procurement of complex hardware is hard. Many projects are over-budget and behind schedule, not just at NASA, but everywhere.
Actually, that’s not the common theme that I detect. The common theme that I detect is that the government procurement system for space is seriously FUBAR, whether civil or military. One of the places that such cost and schedule problems aren’t the case (at least not to the huge degree that the government programs are) is SpaceX. Yes, things have taken longer than they hoped, and probably cost more, though we have less insight into that, because we don’t know what the original estimates were, but here’s the bottom line: they have mostly developed both a launch system and a pressurized return module, capable of carrying crew with the addition of life support and launch escape, for about a hundredth of the cost that NASA estimates it will take to develop Ares I alone. And what is the “uncommon” theme here? SpaceX is doing it with their own money, and not subject to government procurement rules and the dictates of porkmeisters on the Hill.
[Early afternoon update]
Clark Lindsey has further thoughts:
SBIRS and many such projects at least have the virtue of advancing the state of the art. ARES I retreats from the state of the art. Rather than building on lessons learned from the Shuttle and taking a step forward towards practical, low cost reusable space transport, Griffin backtracked the agency and led it down the Ares I dead end where no development path to lower cost space access exists. Furthermore, it was known from the start that Ares would be hugely expensive both to develop and to operate. It is just an added insult to the taxpayer that, on top of all that, Ares turned out to have several serious technical problems that resulted in delays and even more costs. Hanging around with a rough crowd offers no excuse for this miserable project.
Indeed.
Where would meals be better and cheaper? A city where customers could choose between restaurants competing in a free market? Or a city where everyone was forced to buy all their meals at a few mafia-controlled restaurants?
Like the mafia, Congress wants to make you an offer you can’t refuse. At least the mafia doesn’t pretend that it’s acting for your own good.
Hey, it’s the Chicago Way.
A reusable suborbital rocket company based in New Zealand. Call it Kiwispace.
[Monday morning update]
Clark Lindsey has more. Apparently I misinterpreted the project in my quick read. Payloads are recovered, but the vehicles don’t seem to be reused. I also have to say that someone who legally changes his last name for this kind of thing is a lot more fanatical about it than I am.
I have some more advice for Barack Obama that, like Joel Kotkin’s, he will be constitutionally unable to take, over at PJM today.
More proof that government spending doesn’t do much for job creation.
One reason unemployment continues to rise may be that stimulus funds did not target high-unemployment states.
You don’t say.
…it would look like this.
I think that this is one of those rare cases where an abortion is the only reasonable option.
…and 10.2% unemployment:
Naturally, according to the “experts” it’s more than expected.
It’s not more than I expected. I’m actually surprised it’s not worse, considering how they’ve been making war on business and vandalizing the economy in general.