On Jan 29, 7:18*am, Kulin Remailer wrote:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/28/sc...a-moon-colony-
technology-is-the-easy-part.html?ref=science

Putting a manned base on the Moon would be the easy part from a
technology perspective. With millions of Americans living in abject
poverty with no access to healthcare (akin to third world countries),
little retirement savings and no jobs, it will become difficult for
politicians to pursuade the public to support another Moon race, this
time around against the Chinese. With hundreds of thousands of bridges,
tunnels, roads and overpasses in disrepair, it seems the U.S. needs a
lot more taxation to get its house in order, something which the
Republicans will fight tooth and nail over. Where then, is the money
going to come from? More cuts in welfare and social security?

I personally believe that it would be much cheaper to spend all-out on
another Moon program (if it were to be approved) rather than smearing
out the costs over decades. The Apollo program gobbled up 4% of the
federal budget between 1962 and 1970 yet it was done for a comparably
low price, about $150 billion in current dollar value. The ISS program
has cost hundreds of billions with little to show for it, except for a
permanent manned presence in space and dubious experiments on all sorts
of creatures in low-G. The promised returns in new medicines and
semiconductors haven't been realized.

In addition, the Apollo program may actually have netted a profit from
all the technologies developed for it. I'm not aware of any studies
which put a hardball figure on this, but the total costs would have
been offset for a large part by these economic effects.

Netted a profit? But for who? Other than products I may have bought
which in the final analysis may not have benefited my bottom line.
Indeed, I think I'd be better off without the internet/information age.