Re: commercial uses of the Dtick and the Heavy Lifter

On Thu, 06 Oct 2005 01:30:01 GMT, simberg.interglobal@xxxxxxxxx (Rand
Simberg) wrote:

>On Wed, 05 Oct 2005 18:13:12 -0400, in a place far, far away, Josh
>Hill <usereplyto@xxxxxxxxx> made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
>such a way as to indicate that:
>
>>>>The commercial launch industry is already competing against
>>>>taxpayer-subsidized systems from Russia, China, and the EU, and with
>>>>the handicap of a manipulated exchange rate.
>>>
>>>So why should we make it even worse (and add insult to injury) by
>>>competing againt them with their own tax dollars?
>>
>>Well, zero from zero is zero. I'm not sure how NASA can compensate for
>>the Federal Government's failure to do something about the exchange
>>rate and anti-competitive subsidies. Using EELV's would help a bit,
>>but only a bit, because it wouldn't help the big guys attract
>>satellite customers. So would an offer to buy launches from the
>>company that could meet their mission requirements at the lowest cost,
>>which might help startups gain venture capital. But if we can't or
>>won't get the Russians, Chinese, and Europeans to compete on equal
>>grounds, I say we compete on their grounds and outdo them.
>
>If you want to play that stupid game, at least do it by subsidizing
>the existing commercial players, not by having a government-run launch
>system.

Already pretty much the arrangement, isn't it, where practical, with
the possible exception of the stick (and of course Shuttle, but that's
pretty much dead except for a handful of missions where there's no
good alternative).

--
Josh

"It was amazing I won. I was running against peace and prosperity
and incumbency." - George W. Bush
.