Re: Is NASA a US "Defence Agency"?

On Mon, 26 Nov 2007 08:37:31 -0800 (PST), Eric Chomko
<pne.chomko@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

JFK propsed Apollo and we did it, Thus far no lunar proposal by the
Republicans have resulted in anything.


The only reason "we did it" after Kennedy died was his successors,
Johnson and Nixon, followed through on what had been started. But
wait, JSC was built in Johnson's home state of Texas and named after
him! Could that be the "real" reason he backed it? Although that
didn't save NASA from having its budget cut in the '60s and '70s.

Apollo wasn't as universally approved of as the rose-colored glasses
of hindsight would have us believe. The mid-'60s saw a book called
"Moondoggle" tha took a very critical tone of it. Another book on
satellites from the same period ridiculed the ideas of astronauts
doing anything productive on the Moon; the author depicted the first
Moonwalker as talking about how great it was to be there but doing
little else. That they would take along cameras, insturments, and be
trained by geologists in what to look for never crossed his mind.

Now, SEI was terminated/doomed/whatever about 15 years ago, so of
course, it has produced nothing. Cancelled programs rarely do. And
even then, it was supposed to be spread over 30 years, so, no, it
wouldn't have launched anything by 1992 anyway. VSE is still in its
formitive stages; whether anything comes of it depends on what Bush's
successors decide. But let's just say it continues. Orion will not
have it's first manned flight for eight years, and not go to the Moon
for a few years after that, so it's understandable nothing has flown
NOW. You might as well say Apollo flopped becaus they didn't land on
the Moon in 1962. But knocking down straw men is a good way to burn
off holiay callories, so please, continue. (I prefer the heavy bag
myself; you don't always have to pick it up every time.)



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