People are variously saying that the cost of Katrina’s cleanup and reconstruction should put a stop to Social Security reform, delay the Medicare prescription drug benefit and even hasten the withdrawal from Iraq. One expenditure it should render unaffordable is another moon shot, which NASA estimated Monday will cost $104 billion if done by 2018. We’re going to have to get back into that final frontier someday, but the nation’s earthbound problems are more pressing right now.
Still, NASA Administrator Michael Griffin made a good point Monday: “We must deal with our short-term problems while not sacrificing our long-term investments in our future. When we have a hurricane, we don’t cancel the Air Force. We don’t cancel the Navy. And we’re not going to cancel NASA.”
Posted by Rhonda Holman
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26 Comments
Sure we can! Just charge it!
“Deficits don’t matter,” VP Dick Cheney.
Well, they don’t matter to him because he’ll be dead before the bill comes due, but for the rest of us and our children, TeamBush leaves us mired in the mud of unsustainable debt.
Just like Iraq, no “exit strategy.”
Here is a scary scenario…We go deeper into debt in the next year and then China sells all of her American currency.If you think the great depression was bad…Oh yeah! There aren’t many alive still that do remember. I think that is the problem.Our economy is a huge terrorist bomb waiting to happen.
What in the wide, wide world of sports is going on here?How is another trip to the moon or mars an investment in our future?Life in space (at this time) is no more sustainable than our federal deficit is.
If the U.S. intends to have a future, we need to pay our bills, educate our children, and try to build healthy family environments.
Oh, and… DON’T REBUILD ON BEACHES AND RIVER DELTAS.
We are the United States. We are capable to doing anything. :)
Yes, Joe, we are.Looks like Rhonda flunked Economics 101. WE in the US can afford anything.If we spend an extra Billion in the US the majority of the money creates jobs – even that which is ‘wasted’ by the local politicians gets spent. We immediately have an extra 200 million or so being returned in taxes and the rest spent in the local economy, thus creating additional jobs. Around 20% of that is returned and so on. Eventually we get our money back and a self-sustaining economy results (hopefully).Of course, inflation must be controlled and there are infinite permutations with the rest of the Trillion the government spends. See Economics 102 for Supply & Demand curves.
Joe, please retreat one step back to Econ 101. Frankly, I’m not so sure you did all that well in that class yourself.
When you get back there, please study the section on government spending crowding out private investment, its effect on interest rates overall, and the other “stresses” (quoted because it’s such an unerstatement) placed on the macroeconomy by such massive government borrowing.
Used to be that conservatives knew communism from capitalism. No more, I guess.
Note also that the money that allows the US to afford “anything” comes from China, Japan, and any other foreign country with which we have a current account deficit.
The US can afford “anything,” what total and utter BS.
What the hell has happened when liberals are lecturing conservatives about fiscal responsibility? Do my eyes decieve me, or am I seeing just that on this thread? Conservatives saying deficit spending doesn’t matter? Liberals worrying about unsustainable debt?
Welcome to Bush’s Bizarro World of economics.
Janna, you got it called: Tick, Tick, Tick…..
Tracy,The space trips ARE an investment in our future. Not because we’ll find something wonderful when we get there, but because, in solving the problems of getting there, we’ll have discovered all sorts of things that will have applications here.Back in the early 1960’s, computers were huge things, and getting huger. The plan was to build massive mainframes and put lots of terminals on them. Then came the space race, and engineers found they needed computers that would fit in the cramped quarters of a space capsule. The resulting technology eventually became the PC you’re using now, and that’s fueled a revolution in the way we live and do business. Lots of new materials that were invented for space exploration are now consumer staples. Most of all, going out there has given us a whole new way to look back at ourselves and our planet.Being on the moon has so far been less that productive, but getting there has improved the lives of everybody on the planet! We always seem to find the best stuff on our way to something else!
FlikeAced enon 101 and 102. You forgot to read the last two lines. Looks like you flunked reading as well as the class on communism.I gave you a simple example of what government spending in the US does. The rest of your Blog is BS.
Joe W–
If we can “do anything,” why can’t we find Osama and kill him? Why can’t we stablize Iraq so we can pull out? Why can’t we find a real alternative to mid-east oil? Why can’t we raise EVERYBODY’S standard of living instead of just rich CEO’s?
Answer: W.
Joe, you seem to me as somebody who’s run a business. Would you hire Bush to run your business?
So, why did you hire him to run the whole dadblamed country . . .
Galahad. I did not vote for Bush, I’m not right wing, nor am I an evangelical.
Call me a free thinker! No! I would not want Bush to run the country, but I deal with it.
We have alternative to mid-east oil, just enviromentalist will not allow us. We are working on stablizing Iraq, we are trying to find Osama. I didn’t claim we could do anything with a snap of a finger. But I know America is great and we can accomplish anything we set our minds and money to. It always takes time.
Even going back to the moon won’t be attempted till 2018. That is a long time. Maybe we won’t have Social Security anymore when we leave for the moon again.
Not only should the space program be fully funded in this endeavor, but the time for reaching the Moon and Mars should be moved up dramatically.
It’s funny that those who want to deny funding to space endeavors always carp and complain about “wasting money that would be used for this or that other cause”……rebuilding the coast, war on terror, etc, etc insert better case for spending that money here. But the fact is that space exploration is among the best and most positive things that we do. Aside from the technological advances and revenue re-generation mentioned by other posters, that investment in space gives Americans something to get behind, something to believe in, something to unite for. And I don’t know anyone that could argue that we need a whole lot of that right about now.
Funding? Simple, and eminently fair. Reinstate the estate tax. Reinstate the capital gains tax. Return income taxes to pre Reagan standards. These things aint gonna hurt anyone but those that that could stand a little hurting.
Joe W–
You didn’t vote for W? Okay, my friend, I’ll cut you some slack in future posts.
Because those who did bear some culpability for the policies that TeamBush has pursued–the war without end in Iraq (over 1900 soldiers dead and that doesn’t even count the American mercenary guns for hire), the bait and switch on destroying Al Qaeda, and the historic high deficit and nat’l debt.
And that includes the Hillary’s and the Kerry’s who enable Bush’s policies. The go-along-to-get-alongs will find themselves increasingly out of step with the neo-Democrats–fiscally conservative, socially liberal like the majority of Americans.
Women spend more on cosmetics annually than NASA has in it’s budget..just to put a scale on the levels of spending.
American private enterprise will get to the moon before NASA this time around. NASA needs to stick to transportation research, and stop trying to operate air and space vehicles. They wasted billions on the shuttle, and their new moon lander program, based on shuttle hardware, is dumb and overpriced.
Republicans think privitization is such a good idea. Why not privitize NASA?
Sorry…Privatize
XXX most of NASA work is Privatized!
JR, I’m somewhat surprised that you favor the NASA return to the moon. I would have guessed that you would have been someone who would say that the money spent on such things could go to the poor, etc.It proves to me that people shouldn’t just paste labels on others and just assume that people on both sides of the political spectrum think and act the same about every issue.
Joe, Obviously not enough of NASA is privatized judging by their budget, LOL. My point is, if there’s anything worthwhile out there, business will go after it. I know there’s a lot of tech innovation from space exploration, but the same can be said of war.
Joe, what do you think about the expense? How do we pay for it? What about NASA’s failure rate? Counting 2 shuttle explosions and all the scrap metal we’ve scattered on Mars, I don’t think we’re getting our money’s worth. Comments?
Privitization is not the way. It is privitization that caused the Challenger accident.
Privitization will not work because all private companies care about is the bottom line. Your average CEO shows little concern when he lays off thousands of workers to outsource work to China. They got no vision beyond counting beans.
This gets to the fundamental question of what America is about. Are we really (as we purport to be) a nation of idealism and doing great things? Or are we just a collection of people climbing over each other to make a buck?
Privitization is not the way. It is privitization that caused the Challenger accident.
Privitization will not work because all private companies care about is the bottom line. Your average CEO shows little concern when he lays off thousands of workers to outsource work to China. They got no vision beyond counting beans.
This gets to the fundamental question of what America is about. Are we really (as we purport to be) a nation of idealism and doing great things? Or are we just a collection of people climbing over each other to make a buck?
Privitization is not the way. It is privitization that caused the Challenger accident.
Privitization will not work because all private companies care about is the bottom line. Your average CEO shows little concern when he lays off thousands of workers to outsource work to China. They got no vision beyond counting beans.
This gets to the fundamental question of what America is about. Are we really (as we purport to be) a nation of idealism and doing great things? Or are we just a collection of people climbing over each other to make a buck?
Wow JR, way to make your point!
3 times!
XXX. NASA’s budget is a small speck of a fractional of a percent of the overall total budget of the US.
They say $100 billion till 2018.
That is under $8 billion a year. The United States Government spends about $5 billion a day.
Think about it!
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