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Big Cuts Coming to NASA?

Well, don't worry, I'm sure all forms of corporate welfare will remain perfectly safe from cuts.

And Congress will give themselves a pay increase too.

I'm in favor of this...
Warren Buffett, "I could end the deficit in 5 minutes," he told CNBC. "You just ...pass a law that says that anytime there is a deficit of more than 3% of GDP, all
sitting members of Congress are ineligible for re-election. The 26th
amendment (granting the right to vote for 18 year-olds) took only 3 months
& 8 days to be ratified! Why? Simple! The people demanded it. That was in
1971...before computers, e-mail, cell phones, etc. Of the 27 amendments to
the Constitution, seven (7) took 1 year or less to become the law of the
land...all because of public pressure.

Warren Buffet is asking each addressee to forward this email to a minimum of
twenty people on their address list; in turn ask each of those to do
likewise.
In three days, most people in The United States of America will have the
message. This is one idea that really should be passed around.

*Congressional Reform Act of 2011*

1. No Tenure / No Pension. A Congressman collects a salary while in office
and receives no pay when they are out of office.

2. Congress (past, present & future) participates in Social Security. All
funds in the Congressional retirement fund move to the Social Security
system immediately. All future funds flow into the Social Security system,
and Congress participates with the American people. It may not be used for
any other purpose.

3. Congress can purchase their own retirement plan, just as all Americans
do.

4. Congress will no longer vote themselves a pay raise. Congressional pay
will rise by the lower of CPI or 3%.

5. Congress loses their current health care system and participates in the
same health care system as the American people.

6. Congress must equally abide by all laws they impose on the American
people.

7. All contracts with past and present Congressmen are void effective 1/1/12.
The American people did not make this contract with Congressmen. Congressmen
made all these contracts for themselves. Serving in Congress is an honor,
not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, so ours
should serve their term's), then go home and back to work.

If each person contacts a minimum of twenty people then it will only take
three days for most people (in the U.S.) to receive the message. Maybe it is
time.

THIS IS HOW YOU FIX CONGRESS!!!!! If you agree with the above, pass it on.
 
"Budgetary discipline"? I saw someone say elsewhere... gutting NASA to tighten the budget is like cutting off your nose to lose weight.
 
^More like trimming a fingernail to lose weight.

After reading the article, I am guessing Zubrin is just gearing up for the next battle over NASA's budget by spreading some FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt). Even he admits in the article that planetary sciences and unmanned probes have been the most successful and budget resistant parts of NASA over the years with not even Obama showing any interest in cutting funding to it.
 
Really, really big.

That's the rumor apparantly: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/oct/26/obama-readies-to-blast-nasa/

I suppose this shouldn't be too big a surprise given the current economic climate.

Oh, well.
It's more than just current economics. Obama ran on an anti-NASA platform -- he intended to cancel Constellation to pay for pre-K education programs.

I'm not sure this is still relevant. Congress hasn't passed a pre-K education law since Obama has been President to my knowledge. There are proposed amendments to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act to provide grants to states to provide universal preschool but considering the de facto 60 vote hurdle in the Senate, I doubt they will be passed.

I think we should consider these cuts to NASA on their own. They do signal a remarkable lack of commitment to scientific and technological progress on behalf of the administration.
 
Didn't the great leader and visionary, president George W Bush, state something like "we choose to go to the Mars in the next decade, ... because that challenge is one we are willing to accept..." just a few years ago? Why the U-turn, why is his successor squandering a great legacy?
 
I'm at the point where I've just given up on the US in space. I'm hoping China can get their space program up and running.
 
Didn't the great leader and visionary, president George W Bush, state something like "we choose to go to the Mars in the next decade, ... because that challenge is one we are willing to accept..." just a few years ago? Why the U-turn, why is his successor squandering a great legacy?

Because the only way Constellation was going to get to Mars on the budget Bush gave it was if all the engineers tied themselves to the rocket and flapped their arms real hard.

The asteroid mission, while less sexy than Mars, is probably far more useful, considering the threat posed by Apophis and its ilk.

(Shel kek nem ron!)
 
Really, really big.

That's the rumor apparantly: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/oct/26/obama-readies-to-blast-nasa/

I supoose this shouldn't be too big a suprise givien the current economic climate.

Oh, well.

As mucch a I'm for cutting NASA's 40 car Train spending it's not going to make a difference in this debt...The Dual Wars in the Middle East are the problem there as well as Rich Need Riches thievery going on states sides. It's just all catching up. To many irons in the fire....to fix...Obama will be ousted as a failure and 30 years later will praise him like some sort of Legend. It same over, and over, and over, and....
 
While Obamas been a dissapointment, I'll still take him over the crop of crazies the GOP is running this year.
 
I don't think there is anything wrong with how much NASA gets. I think there is a big problem with how much bang they get for that buck. Too much redtape, studies, commissions, boards, reports...
 
A strange kind of can't-do attitude has infected the U.S. Somehow, a much poorer society was able to make six manned moon landings in the space of three years. Incidentally, they did it during a war much larger than Afghanistan and the myriad other engagements the U.S. is involved in today. During the same period the Environmental Protection Agency was created along with Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

The current government, Republican and Democratic, is feeble and ultra risk-adverse when it comes to domestic initiatives. It's great that some entrepreneurs like Elon Musk are investing in space, but it's not enough. Space exploration remains a field where the public sector will need to be central. Unfortunately, Obama, despite his supposed socialist tendencies, is more intent on cutting NASA and outsourcing its remnants to contractors and the Russian government. And Congress is too busy watching the asses of Wall Street and the defense industry to give a damn.
 
Congress & Obama really need to take another look at the "Death and Taxes" poster, to show them just how little of the budget NASA already has to scrape by with.

I don't think there is anything wrong with how much NASA gets. I think there is a big problem with how much bang they get for that buck. Too much redtape, studies, commissions, boards, reports...
Yup. It's very hard to stay on target when they keep moving that target every year or two.
 
The first man on Mars will be chineese. NASA is over I think, which is a shame...

Most certainly not. Two decades of experiences with Chinese consumer goods make me doubt that they can return the crew alive. The Russians might be in the race according to this documentary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4IC7pwh3ys&feature=socblog_ti

It's a mammoth enterprise, the marstronauts have to stay on the planet for 18 months until the orbits of Mars and Earth converge again, and the roundtrip can be completed. Just imagine the amounts of snacks for a 2 year+ space mission. Which I feel is completely pointless, like all this science fiction of settling on alien planets, interstellar or even intergalatic exploration, or making contact with intelligent aliens. The distances are to great. Humans can't live on alien planets which evolved a life of their own, their microbes and toxic compounds make short work with their lifes. We are stuck to this planet which is quite nice, so space exploration should serve to understand its workings, and preservation. It's losing animal and plant species at a rate last seen at the extinction event which saw off the dinosaurs. Even this SETI search for alien radio signals is useless. There is no at the speed of light expanding sphere of radio transmission around our world, the signals are so feeble that they dissipate within a light year or so. What do they expect? That there is ET out there pumping radio in outer space at the energy output of a star?
 
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