Takes No Guts! -
It takes no guts to announce support or opposition to the launch, less than 3 hours from now of another U.S. Vehicle into space. It only requires that one weigh the subject and vote their own personal belief.I, for one, am not too concerned with the launch. The odds are FOR the astronauts. The launches, 118 to date, are proven safe by margins much beyond the limits which could call for abandonment.
My problem is not with the launch. It is, instead, with the fact we are launching an ANTIQUE! This vehicle is 25 years old. Nothing short of decades old in terms of space knowledge.
Why, after these 2-3 decades, have we not provided our folks with an up-to-date vehicle? Money is the answer.
The United States has become a victim of its own bureaucracy. The equally antique NASA has made money such an integral part of this development of spacecraft that they have remained frozen in the old modes.
Much, I am afraid, like the development of many of today's state-of-the-art planes and fighting vehicles, the antique system of the US military/NASA shows just how woefully-prepared we are for new ideas. The entire concept of our formerly-well-proven ability to respond to needs is now grounded in the desparate fact of lockdown of ideas in view of costs. NASA has refused to play the game for most of its existance, and as a result it is not advancing.
A shame that the leading country in space travel is soon to be passed by China and others due our terrible flow of money-to-projects....not to RESULTS!
A crime by any standards.
Duke
posted by Duke of DeLand @ 7/01/2006 01:02:00 PM
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