In article ,
says...
Neil deGrasse Tyson

I have mixed feelings about this guy. On one hand, he presents
information to the "mainstream" in an easy to understand fashion. On
the other hand, he often spouts views that seem unsupported, likely
because he's reluctant to delve too far into the details, lest he
"lose" his mainstream audience.

Also, he's an astrophysicist, so I often find his views on aerospace
engineering to be, at best, lacking. But the main "thrust" of this book
seems to be what motivated the space program in the '60's and what
should motivate it in the present and future.

I find it curious that you provided the old title to his book "Failure
to Launch: The Dreams and Delusions of Space Enthusiasts", when the book
title is actually: "Space Chronicles: Facing the Ultimate Frontier" by
Neil deGrasse Tyson.

I've not read the book, but from the reviews I've read, the first part
is a restating of "the space race" as we all know it. Fueled by the
Cold War, the Space Race, was nothing more than a *&^# waving contest
between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. It was a contest, an alternative
to nuclear war, to "prove" which country (and ideology) was superior.
The Soviet Union was clearly in the lead, until the U.S. decided to put
a man on the moon with a "waste anything but time" mantra.

Oddly enough, the U.S. took a socialistic approach of a single program
led by few people at the very top. The Soviet Union had a few competing
camps in both the launch vehicle (missile) and spacecraft arenas. In
other words, a more "competitive" approach which was much closer to
capitalism than the U.S. approach. It's therefore somewhat ironic that
the U.S. claims that it "won" the Space Race by putting a man on the
moon in 1969.

Only now, with the budgetary necessity of the "commercial cargo" and
"commercial crew" initiatives is the U.S. starting to approach space
travel in a more capitalistic manner. Oddly enough, the budgetary
crisis is being caused by the gigantic, socialistic, congressionally
mandated, SLS/Orion program. SLS/Orion is so huge, from a budgetary
perspective, that there is little to no money for any actual payloads!
So, on one hand Congress mandates yet another huge, socialistic, mega-
program (SLS/Orion) with one set of winners picked by NASA, but the day
to day manned space program (ISS) is being run on a shoestring budget in
a capitalistic, competitive, manner.

The good news is that the "commercial" programs are showing much more
progress, with far less money spent, than the mega-project. Hopefully
this means that people will begin to realize that "the emperor has no
clothes".

So, goof-ball proposals like "unmanned asteroid retrieval" with
SLS/Orion visiting the asteroid only when it is brought back to the
earth/moon system are being floated by NASA. I personally think this is
the dumbest idea ever. Why use an *unmanned* mission to bring an
asteroid close to earth to study when SLS/Orion was intended to fly far
beyond LEO.

Very strange times, to say the least.

Jeff
--
"the perennial claim that hypersonic airbreathing propulsion would
magically make space launch cheaper is nonsense -- LOX is much cheaper
than advanced airbreathing engines, and so are the tanks to put it in
and the extra thrust to carry it." - Henry Spencer