January 18, 2004
Martian nitpicks
Riding on past lunar glory, stuck in orbit around the Earth, and crestfallen because of recent tragedies, NASA needed a kick in the pants —- which is what Bush gave it this last week.
Instead of cheering a bold new venture, and being constructive, this move was mostly met with cynical skepticism.
Andrew Sullivan, understandably ticked by Bush's recent spending spree, vented thus:
I guess I should say I have no problem in principle with government-funded space exploration. But the full costs of this will explode in a decade or so, at exactly the same time that social security is cratering and Medicare is going bankrupt. If the president were proposing means-testing social security, raising the retirement age, restraining Medicare growth, ending subsidies for big agriculture and tackling corporate welfare, I'd be happy to go along with a new space program.
NASA's budget is about $15 billion, and at a paltry increase rate of 3-4%, touches a projected $18 billion by 2008. To put things in perspective, the recently approved Medicare bill costs about $400 billion, and the estimated Social Security budget for 2004 is $410 billion. A look at this PDF will show that most of the money for Mars is coming not from drastic NASA budget increases, but by cutting down some existing programs (the shuttle, ISS), and putting them into what NASA should really be doing --- space exploration.
There is a bright side, in case you were wondering, as Krauthammer, once more going against the grain, points out:
Establishing the first human habitation on a celestial body would not just allow for extraordinarily interesting science (from geology to astronomy) and be the locus for extraterrestrial manufacture. It would be -- those without an ounce of romance in their souls are advised to skip the rest of this sentence -- the most glorious human adventure since the Age of Exploration five centuries ago.
This is once again the age-old battle between the wanderlust-struck and the homebound, between those looking starward and those shuffling pebbles in the dirt. Had it not been for the former there would be no New World, no "great step for mankind". And that settles it for me.
Posted by Vivek at January 18, 2004 06:11 PMGiven the track record of the Bush Administration, I’m not surprised at their cynicism.
The Leave No Child Behind initiative seems to have left a great deal of it’s funding behind. They did manage to put some really cheesy-looking red schoolhouses on the front of the the Department of Education Federal Building, though, so I have to give them points for style.
He’s kept his promise about the tax cuts, but what is that worth? More people believe deficit reduction will improve the economy than those who think tax cuts will do the trick. But Bush has to insist on his tax cuts. Supply-side has to be vindicated, doesn’t it.
He keeps on employing those companies that overcharge the public. He keeps on insisting on minimal to absent regulation of industries whose malfeasance is a matter of public record.
With any other president, I’d be overjoyed. But Bush makes me nervous. He’s seems like a person who feels entitled to his office, at the same time that he seems ill equipped to deal with any surprises or events contrary to expectation. Helen Thomas asks him one tough question, and he exiles her to the back of the room.
I’ll be breathing easier when Bush is no longer in charge of NASA policy
Posted by: Stephen Daugherty at January 18, 2004 11:16 PMIf you think we are getting to Mars from the kind of modest budget increases he has proposed, I’ve got some nice oceanfront property there to sell you.
As I posted in response to another column, the Democrats should offer universal health care for a billion dollars a year, then deride their critics as wet blankets.
Posted by: Woody Mena at January 19, 2004 10:19 AMI’d venture a guess that the main reason people are skeptical is that Bush Sr. promised the same thing, then quietly shelved it when he got the cost estimates.
I’m all for space exploration, but it’s gonna be expensive.
Posted by: ceejayoz at January 19, 2004 01:56 PMAs I’ve stated in earlier posts about any space exploration campaign versus social welfare issues, I think the real money lies in the private sector (even Stanley Kubrick realized this, hence the Pan Am Clipper in “2001: A Space Odyssey”) but it needs to be done right: private ventures which have a more noble cause than making Bernie Ebbers or Ken Lays out of their owners/main shareholders. Of course, such an endeavour always runs the risk of having someone like Howard Hughes running the show but Howard Hughes, for all of his flaws, still seemed to have a “grander scheme” in mind than anyone just looking to garner percentage points — be they from voters or on stock prices. Personally, I don’t think that Bush, Jr’s Martian campaign is anything more than selling the American people (as Woody, so eloquently, puts it) “oceanfront property” but he’s also sold “us” (for we’re all in this together) the oceanfront property of Weapons of Mass Destruction, Healthcare Reform, Education Reform, and a Safer America Without Civil Liberties.
Maybe Mars and the Moon aren’t so bad, even if they don’t have a breathable, liveable atmosphere…
Posted by: Huxley75 at January 20, 2004 12:12 AMAccording to ABC:
More than three-fifths of Americans oppose President George W Bush’s proposal to return to the moon and eventually put a human on Mars, according to a Time/CNN poll.
His plan to spend billions of dollars to a manned mission to the moon and eventually to Mars drew opposition from 61 per cent of the 1,003 adults surveyed from January 14 to 15.
Mr Bush has called for a new space vessel capable of travelling to the moon as early as 2015.
He would give the US space agency NASA an additional $1 billion over five years, in addition to its annual budget of $15.4 billion.
Even among members of Mr Bush’s own Republican Party, 48 per cent opposed the plan against the 42 per cent who supported it.
About 9 per cent of the people questioned in the Time/CNN poll said they would spend billions of dollars on space exploration.
Some 40 per cent said they would rather improve education, 27 per cent would balance the federal budget, and 13 per cent would clean up the environment.
Only 7 per cent said they would enlarge the military.
The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.
Posted by: David R. Remer at January 20, 2004 06:57 AM
