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Bush Wants NASA Revamped
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by First of Two: [QB] As it is one of the few government programs which consistently generates more wealth than it consumes, boosting the space program is good economic policy. As I've said before, I believe that a good Space policy would include: Ongoing: Continued planetary exploration. I want every object in the system located and mapped, robot landers and/or minilanders on every moon larger than Amalthea. Development of next-generation space telescopes, interferometers, and other projects designed to detect extrasolar worlds. #1. We need reliable, reusable systems: for cargo, and for people. A passenger liner and a heavy lifter. They don't necessarily have to be the same system. #2. Expanded orbital and near-orbital facilities. Including construction facilities to aid in assembly of components for large-scale missions. (this would be the stuff to go into the Lagrange points... In fact, I think we have a [URL=http://sirtf.caltech.edu/]space telescope[/URL] going to the Earth-trailling point at the moment.) #3. A network of orbital energy stations. We can DO this, I'm convinced. What we really need is for the government to offer a miultibillion-dollar "X-prize" (and a supply contract?) to the first commercial energy supplier to 'beam' a megawatt of energy safely back to Earth. Hey! let's see if Halliburton can do it! :D #4. Detailed lunar exploration, including landers. Make certain of ice on Moon, if there is any. #5 Moonbase, if ice makes it feasible. Otherwise, it might have to be put off until we can get some. #6 Mars mission. Moderate scale, for now. #7 Mass drivers. Capture or deflect comets, asteroids. If H20 absent on moon, jump this priority up and drop a couple tiny comets onto the Moon's south pole. #8 Near-Earth Asteroid capture, and mining facilities. #9 Larger-scale Mars missions. Terraforming activities (presuming no life is found on Mars). Colonization. #10 Extrasolar probe missions as soon as feasable. Ion engines will help this along. We need to be able to accelerate and decelerate a Voyager-type probe at high G's to get to nearby stars. Money worries about going to Mars? PIFFLE! The 2004 federal budget is $2.2 [b]trillion.[/b] NASA's is $15.5 [b]billion.[/b] Reasonable estimates suggest the space agency's share of the pie would only need to rise gradually to $20 billion within a few years if footprints are to be made in Martian dust within a generation. The technology that would be developed over the next 20 years, in preparation, along with the medical knowledge gleaned from long-term low-gravity living and exposure to high levels of radiation, will have unknown but surely significant benefits to those who remain on this planet. In medicine alone, NASA spinoff technology has a solid track record, having given us MRI and CAT scanners, among many other benefits. [/QB][/QUOTE]
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