On Sun, 2 Nov 2003 14:30:03 -0800 (PST), "The Ruzicka Family"
wrote:

Whether or not this "debate" (if I can call it that, as, between the two of
us, I am the only one presenting any facts) will continue probably depends
on whether or not the moderators here care to let it go on. Since it
appears that most of the people in the group are rather more on the
conservative side of things, it probably won't be long before I get shut
out. But then again, who knows?

I'd like to think (and I assume) that one's position in the political
spectrum is not used as a reason to "shut you out" from posting here.

As a casual observer, it seems that the real debate between you and
Derek is over who gets "the blame" for swallowing up money that might
otherwise be used for the space program. Martha seemed to place that
blame squarely on the defense budget. You seem to concur. Personally,
I think our defense spending is far too high. Not that I think we have
far too much defense, but I think it's as inefficient and over-spending
as any other government (and often corporate) bureaucracy. My totally
unsupported opinion is that we should be getting far more "bang for the
buck", not only from the DOD, but from many places we currently pour our
money into (not only governmental).

Derek's assertion that social spending is an "order of magnitude" above
military spending is pretty hard to swallow. So is the assertion that
military spending is solely to blame for us not having enough money for
space (or roads, healthcare, libraries- whatever). There are flaws in
our system. One is the bloated and excessive cost of getting anything
done anymore. Lots of reasons for that beyond simple greed and graft, I
suppose. Another is that it's easy for a President and/or Congress to
take the easy way out, financially and politically, and just spend
beyond our government's revenues. You listed the interest on the
national debt. That amount is appalling. That problem is getting worse
at a record rate.

Maybe if someone with courage actually tackled the problems with the
bloated and inefficient (and in some cases, no doubt corrupt) status
quo, and the citizenry began to realize that we then need to pay for
what we get, we'd have the money to actually rebuild our infrastructure,
provide the needed "social" programs, maintain an adequate defense _and_
explore space to boot. But I'm not holding my breath.....

Dale