http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/space/09/19/space.moon.reut/index.html


$100 billion dollars by 2018? Sounds good I suppose, in the spirit of space travel and exploration. Then again, we're in a budget crisis and spending is at an all time high.

I guess this will just lead into my main question. I'm not one of those people who think the moon was built in Hollywood, but it does confuse me as to how we get to the moon 60 years after the first man made flight, yet there has been no attempt in 30 years and the next one is 13 years from today. How did we progress technologically in such a short time to now having problems with our methodology? Is old spacecraft to blame? Or is it something else that I don't know about (my knowledge in space exploration and NASA is limited)?

Conspirators are allowed in this thread as well, I'd like to hear some Hollywood basement stories. http://forums.clubrsx.com/images/smilies/biggrin_color.gif

I would rather see 100 Billion spent on our country with new means of health care, replacing fossil fuels, ect...

We have to keep putting money into space exploration.. We cant leave ourselves defenseless against the aliens.. what if we have to do space combat :/

Coincidence?

http://www.spacetoday.org/China/ChinaMoonflight.html

Ya know, it does seem awfully strange that we were able to get there so many years ago when technology isn't nearly what it is now. And yet now it seems even farther away than it ever has.

However, a satellite orbiting the moon might prove or disprove that the man has ever walked there.

Jeepers, my first deleted post.

Was linking to "All Your Base R Belong to Us" that out of line? Maybe not funny but delete worthy??

Huh, odd.

All your R belong to us, that brings back some memories :D

No space initiative has ever cost us money. The space program is the only program in US history that has fully paid for itself in advanced technology. The only reason we havent been going to the moon for years is that people who thinkits "a waste of money" have consistently voted against it, not realising what a huge benefit it has been for the US and the human race as a whole.

For more information on all the benefits the space program has helped develop try looking here:

http://www.thespaceplace.com/nasa/spinoffs.html

Was linking to "All Your Base R Belong to Us"

A friend linked that to me the other day. It was just as funny the eighth time.:D

Well, placing things in perspective...
Going to the moon (maybe again?) = $100 billion dollars
Rebuilding New Orleans = $200 billion dollars
War in Iraq = $200-$600 billion dollars over the next 10 years

I personally find more value in R&D resource exploration.

Rebuilding New Orleans = $200 billion dollars

Wow buddy rethink this number.

That's the current estimate.

That's not even a single percent of the federal budget. We spend more money burning cash crops in foreign countries.

That is seriosly the estimate? whatever happened to Cutting your losses.

It reminds me of a bumper sticker I saw recently. "There is always money for war, but never any money for education." When politicians look at budgets and want to find some items to axe, why do they go to war / military spending last and things like education and space exploration go first.

It would be really ironic if China put up a sattelite that took pictures of the moon that debunked the US claim of having been there. On a side note, I browsed over a site recently that was refuting the NASA pictures of Mars as showing an inhospitable red landscape and atmosphere. They showed pictures which claimed mars had brown dirt and blue sky just like us, and that NASA was for some reason hiding this. Anyone have more info about this?

http://forums.ayonae.ro/showthread.php?t=7081

They showed pictures which claimed mars had brown dirt and blue sky just like us, and that NASA was for some reason hiding this.

I'm pretty sure most atmospheres will appear blue because of the way light scatters. Colors of light with longer wavelengths - like red - are able to travel through gas without much interference. We've been using that method to determine how far away stuff is in the universe for a while now; the "more red" the light coming from a star, the farther away it is. It's also partly reponsible for why the sun looks red or orange at sunsets and sunrises - it's gotta travel through more of the atmosphere to reach you than at, say, noon. I'd surmise it's the same reason a red laser pointer doesn't scatter through air like a flashlight does.

The persistence of red light is also what causes the blueness of our atmosphere. The blue light (shorter wavelength than red) gets scattered around in the air. For that reason, just about any planet with an atmosphere similar to our's is going to have a blue sky.

I'm not sure how you'd explain the colors our Mars probes have sent back to us, but I'm fairly certain the images are distorted when they're beamed back to Earth, and scientists have to make guesses at what color they are. Anyone know anything about the way those cameras work?

Just to weigh in on the topic, I would much rather see the money spent on space and the related technology than on either Iraq or New Orleans.

Iraq offers little more than the oil resource, which is not infinite.

New Orleans offers a port, and some great history. There are other ports, plus the NO port can be rebuilt more safely and securely, without rebuilding the entire city. Maybe the 35 mile stretch of wetlands that was taken for development can be returned to it's natural state and provide something more substantial than high dollar real estate.

Space offers us the opportunity to explore, to advance our research and technological base, to have potential options when we have finally tapped this planet dry of it's resources, etc.

I say spend on space, and close the checkbook on the other two.

(I would say something about taking money away from Halliburton this way too, but I don't want to give Fandros apoplexy and get more neg rep hits from him, hehe)

More fuel for the conspiracy fans http://www.apfn.org/apfn/moon.htm I'm still reading, there's allot there.

You won't give me "the fits" but you will likely worrywart yourself into an early grave blaming everything on the evil, yet strangely competent, Haliburton.

I'm all for racing into space again. It's a balm for the human soul and begats much good.

Fandros

Do remember that all of these expenses, or large parts of them, re-enter the economy. Most of our aerospace contracts put money back into the pockets of US citizens holding wrenches and driving computers.

If you're going to read the conspiracy sites, make sure you follow up by reading the debunking sites. I love the conspiracies, just make sure you follow up with facts.

As to why technology hasn't changed that much - has there really been much of a change in the basic mechanics of space flight? It's not quite the same as going from airplanes to supersonic jets, in this case we're still talking a fuel boosted ship and a lot of careful physics. Star Trek is still fantasy.

But I'm all for seeing more money put into technology R&D.

You won't give me "the fits" but you will likely worrywart yourself into an early grave blaming everything on the evil, yet strangely competent, Haliburton.

I think the company as an entity is quite possibly the best suited and positioned for the majority of the work being contracted out in both Iraq and New Orleans.

My problem is that I am from the previous generation, and any hints of corruption tended to make us twinge much more severely than they do to folks these days.

I am not pleased with this company under the leadership of our now vice-president doing business with a country declared to be a member of the axis of evil by our president; I am not happy with those business dealings being done while the country of Iran was under sanctions from both the US and the UN; I am not happy that the company was given almost exclusive rights to contracts to rebuild Iraq without any open bidding process; I am not happy that the president declared he would prosecute the war against any who did business with our enemies but never raised the question of Cheney and HB doing business with what he claimed was a terroristic state; I am not happy that the vice-president continues to receive payment from the company that is getting contracts from the government without an open bidding process; and, I am not happy that there is an appearance of conduct on the part of our leaders that is not of the highest standard we should be able to expect from the White House.

That does not make me hateful, or mean-spirited, or worry-warting myself into an early grave.........it just makes me VERY unhappy with my country's leadership.

Sorry for derailing.....I again say SPEND ON SPACE!!!!!!

I agree with Bylimet. Even if Haliburton is the best company for the job, and even if they aren't as evil as liberals like myself make them out to be, you can bet your ass that they could be as evil as they wanted to if it weren't for the 'worrywarts' bringing attention to the company.

Space exploration is still a fascinating and valid use of $100 billion dollars in R&D. The Richard Bransons (http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=17520) and Gene Roddenberrys (http://www.famoustexans.com/roddenberry.htm) of the world will not allow our human interest in space to diminish. Our finite consumable resources (http://www.maweb.org/en/Article.aspx?id=58) on earth won't allow it from a more practical perspective.

To the original poster of this thread's hope that the spending might be better used for alternative energy sources, the moon has a large quantity of Helium 3 atoms (with an extra proton). One hope would be to learn how to mine this isotope and then use it in fusion reactors to produce electricity, which has already been done (although not in enough quantity to produce electricity). This is a major advance over tritium reactors that have yet to fuse. Read more here: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/helium3_000630.html

Haliburton never had any dealings with Iran. Foreign companies in which Haliburton had an interest did. I suspect a large majority of the Fortune 500 companies had similar situations.

From what I have read, payments from Haliburton to Cheney are for deferred compensation he earned as a Haliburton employee. There's absolutely nothing improprietary about that. Cheney could donate his deferred compensation to someone if he wanted, but he would still be deemed to have received it first and then donated it. In other words, I don't believe Cheney can refuse payment and Haliburton cannot refuse to pay it.
If you don't like the open bidding process, find a company that could actually bid against Haliburton. That's like a school deciding to buy only Apple computers and then complaining they only got one bid.

That's like a school deciding to buy only Apple computers and then complaining they only got one bid. I could tell you a scary story about that statement, but I'm not sure the public really wants to know how schools bid for equipment.

I definitely think Space exploration should be a priority, but in the scheme of things where does it fit?

Education funding
Military funding
Medicare/Social Security/et al programs of this sort

Come to think of it, where the hell does the budget go anyway? I'm not in favor of cutting military or education spending or medicare type stuff either. But personally I'd love to see another manned mission to the moon and Mars and beyond.

It doesn't fit in any of those. Many argue, and perhaps rightfully so, that the government shoudl be hte biggest sponsor of pure research in the U.S. Government funding of research has nosedived over the years.

Come to think of it, where the hell does the budget go anyway? I'm not in favor of cutting military or education spending or medicare type stuff either. But personally I'd love to see another manned mission to the moon and Mars and beyond.

Put up taxes then? I'd recommend a tax on fuel, it's way too cheap over there.

Haliburton never had any dealings with Iran. Foreign companies in which Haliburton had an interest did. I suspect a large majority of the Fortune 500 companies had similar situations.

One of the news magazine shows, either Dateline or 60 Minutes, aired a segment on the Halliburton subsidiary created and officed off shore and listed as the company doing business with Iran, and they interviewed the two HB employees who manned the office, which consisted of a desk and telephone.
The two employees stated for the record that all correspondence went through them directly to headquarters in Texas.

GE was one of the other companies which did business with iran in violation of the sanctions, and was also mentioned in the news piece.

Exactly. It was a foreign subsidiary and not Haliburton. Is it a clear violation of the sanctions to have a foreign affiliate that does business with Iran?

Probably not a literal violation of the sanctions, but a cheap workaround that amounts to the same thing.

The conversation about spending $ on Space Exploration was much more interesting than the same old debate about Haliburton we hear constantly :(

Where are all the people crying foul because the government uses too many Kellogg products (Carlos Gutierrez used to be CEO there) or too many Microsoft products?

There's nothing wrong with using an industry leader. Every flaw you will find with Haliburton, you will find with any large company. You'd think HB was the only sinner in an industry full of saints, by the way people condemn them.

If the administration purposely selected an underdog, to be "fair", you'd have the same people up in arms because they chose the less capable company.

Unfortunately, too many want to read the words as being a condemnation of Halliburton, when in fact it is a condemnation of Cheney and the Bush White House that seems to be the point.

Bush and Cheney are about big business, and the goal of returning to the moon is just as much about big business and jobs and research as it is about any sense of national pride in taking those giant steps.

As far as the HB/Iran thing, and people wanting to make it ok, here is an analogy for you:

Cheney is CEO of a large company that distills and distributes alcoholic beverages. Because the US sanctions any US company that sells alcohol to minors, Cheney and his company open an office off-shore, and man it with two employees and a telephone and give it a different name, and then order the employees to pass all correspondence to them at the main office.
Now Cheney and his company freely sell their alcohol to minors from the off-shore location that has no laws or sanctions against doing so.

Can you seriously say that Cheney and his company are not involved, but that they merely have an "interest" in the company selling the beverages?
Are they any less disgusting simply because they put two guys on an island to answer the phone for them?

Anyway, the money spent on space exploration will be much better used than the money we are spending in Iraq or the monies that we will be pouriing into reconstruction of the city of new Orleans. And it will be interesting to see how and where the money for that exploration gets spent.

"Now Cheney and his company freely sell their alcohol to minors from the off-shore location that has no laws or sanctions against doing so."Wow that would be like a Budweiser affiliate selling a beer to someone under 21 in France. You're right. Lock em up and throw away the key. Here's a quiz: An affiliate incorporated (wrong term but whatever the proper term is) in France must obey the laws of (a) U.S. or (b) France. If it's legal to sell beer to minors in the jurisdiction, it would be absurd to assume a company is going to obey U.S. alchohol sale restrictions.

So anyway.....about spending $ for space research.....

Apparently Sanchek hasn't ever used any government, anything. They've got the shittiest oldest computers but the worst is the military equipment they send in the field costs 50x more than my satelite cell phone with half the reception and 10x the weight :)

Not a liberal or a conservative slam, since the government is one really large stupid mass made up of thousands of individuals, but the lack of ... well capitalism ... in our government's decisions on how to spend money is not only a huge problem, but also a huge liability. Glad I'm not in Iraq carrying around 20 pound cell phones in the middle of the desert because some asshole here at home decided to pay 5x more than they should have for a worst product.

The equipment is so heavy for reasons:

1. all the damn sheilding around it
2. to keep it ruggidized

I will however agree with you on one point. That shit is old.

Kelraz you do know the difference between a "Satelite Phone" and a "Cell Phone?" Satelite phones are larger but they serve a purpose ..you think Cellular One has towers in Iraq? Ever use a Satelite phone? I used one in Alaska where the nearest town was 300 miles away and there surely wasnt any cell phone coverage...they are kind of large but nice to use.

Ibudin ... I work for CBS news as a freelance videographer, obviously I know what a Satelite phone is, I had to buy one to get the job (and once Rita hits you can call me on it down in Texas!) :) Its not that big at all, compared to the shit my girlfriend had to carry in the Army.

Oh yeah back to the point at hand. Today we shot some VNRs for a company called "Space Adventures, Ltd." which was pretty ironic that I read this before I went. They plan consumer trips to the moon sometime in the next year for only $100 million dollars per person. I think right now you can travel to the ISS for like $20 million through them too.

What I don't like about this though is its become an elitest vacation and not really as a scientific and wonderous adventure as when man first walked on the moon oh so long ago. I keep thinking of Deception Point by Dan Brown and what would happen if Coca Cola was allowed to put a billboard in space so large it blocked out the sun (a la Montgomery Burns) and all that :) I'd rather our government spends the bucks ,maybe teaming with other countries more, letting those too small to have their own space programs (europe) contribute for the greater good.

,maybe teaming with other countries more, letting those too small to have their own space programs (europe) contribute for the greater good.

We have our own thing going, but thanks for the thought :)

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/index.html

Yup, they had their own thing going...till France heard there might be ET's...

They have their pride dammit...they don't want to fly up the white flag to just anyone!

Fandros

I am with you Ibudin. I would rather see the money spent on other things as you mentioned. :) Hard to fend big business from making our politicians their personal puppets though to some degree, IMO. So big money will go to them in the end. We have yet to see how high we can make a federal deficit. And most importantly how long it will take for each person to care about it as much as they care about other social issues or taxes. :D

Yeah Linlaweniel, but why they don't team up with the US more doesn't make sense. Its not like every country doesn't have something to gain from space travel, it should be a global space program not competiting ones :)

If we are gonna piss away money, may as well pool together to only piss away a fraction of what we are now =P

why they don't team up with the US more ........ it should be a global space program not competiting ones

Go tell that to your Government.

They would not guarantee the continued functioning of GPS, so we had to go and create our own (Galileo), and then your Government starts threatening to blow up our satellites of if they so wish.

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=20312

http://www.spacedaily.com/news/milspace-04zc.html

I will however agree with you on one point. That shit is old.

I roomed with 2 guys that were co-ops with NASA in 92 when in college. Then, they said alot of the shuttle was running off 60s and 70s technology. Simple fact is you only have so much funding and have to choose what gets upgraded based on necessity.

The other thing is designs are often done, sent for approval, funding allocated, scheduled for bid, etc... It takes time. Even in the DOT it isn't unusual for for me to pull plans on something to bid and see specs that have to be 4-5 years old.

It goes back to what I said before about the state or district (contract owner). If you have someone job scared, they make you supply outdate stuff. They worry if they let you vary, and there is a problem, they'll have to explain that they approved spending money on something that was outside the spec.

Wasnt the owner of Virgin suppose to be making a passenger rocket to go to the moon?

On the topic of wasteful spending, there has been much talk of the $24 billion in earmarked projects in the Transportation bill being looked at for disaster spending.

It might have been just that scrutiny that got the Senate to vote 55 for and 39 against public discosure of pork barrel projects added into the 2006 Department of Agriculture appropriations bill, as opposed to the normal practice of hiding the pork in the fine print deep in the bill. The 2005 bill had $526 million in earmarked projects, and with the spending concerns right now over disaster relief and reconstruction, and the Iraq invasion and occupation and it's related costs, it may be some in the Senate are wanting to make sure that money is being spent more responisbly, or at least that there is some accounting for those who want to maintain pork barrel politics.

If the President's ambitious goal of space travel does get funded, I would not be surprised to see some attached wording in NASA's appropriations that would allow for greater scrutiny.

Wait, disclosing the projcets in an Agriculture bill *came to a vote*? That isn't just .. given?

I'd rather our government spends the bucks ,maybe teaming with other countries more, letting those too small to have their own space programs (europe) contribute for the greater good.

Europeans have made a much larger impact on space exploration in the last decade than the US has (about ten times over). Lately, NASA kind of sucks balls compared to everyone else.

oh really? please do explain.

Europeans have made a much larger impact on space exploration in the last decade than the US has (about ten times over). Lately, NASA kind of sucks balls compared to everyone else.Yes, please do explain.

I agree that there needs to be an explanation as to why NASA sucks balls. There are, however, plenty of accomplishments outside of the United States that deserve recognition.

The Russian space program (http://www.2-russia.com/russian-space-program.asp) is still alive and kicking, producing 40% of the completed launches in 2004. This made them the world leader (http://www.spacedaily.com/news/launchers-05i.html) in completed launches last year. The European Space Agency (http://www.esa.int/esaCP/GGG4SXG3AEC_index_0.html) is out there, in Paris, doing 'something,' and the Chinese (http://en.rian.ru/analysis/20050621/40563855.html) are partnering with Russia, the ESA, and NASA,..using their economic and political strengths to volley themselves into the space arena. Japan and India (http://www.spacedaily.com/news/spacetravel-04r2.html) are out there, too.

I did not see anything stating that the ESA, the Germans, or any other single European nation were running circles around NASA.

I for one take heart that the mars rovers are still operating long after their projected lifespans on the surface of mars. (or the movie set, for all you conspiracists out there...:) )
Even with all the stuff thats befallen our space programs the last few years, we have managed to do a few things right....