The current American space program

1. Spent $150 billion on the ISS, sapping any money for a Shuttle continuation or replacement.
2. Failed attempt to build a heavy lift rocket.
3. Having to crawl to Russia (with who they are having a tiff over the Ukraine) to launch astronauts.
4. The mysterious and unexplained cancellation (after spending $700M) of the "Prometheus Project," a plan to develop a large RTG to provide tens of thousands of watts of power to unmanned probes so they could do wide-ranging experiments on solar system planets.

Kick the unctuous buffoon out of the White House, things might change.

On Thursday, May 8, 2014 2:58:32 AM UTC-4, RichA wrote:

1. Spent $150 billion on the ISS, sapping any money for a Shuttle continuation or replacement.

That's OK, instead of spending money for a reliable system for launching from Florida, the greenies wanted to spend $5 billion for high speed rail to get people to and from -Orlando-, Florida (as if people don't ALREADY have cheaper, better ways to get there.)

2. Failed attempt to build a heavy lift rocket.

The Shuttle WAS a heavy lift rocket, just not all that practical.

3. Having to crawl to Russia (with who they are having a tiff over the Ukraine) to launch astronauts.

And that's really a shame since Soyuz-style hardware probably isn't all THAT complicated. China's Shenzhou is somewhat similar.

On Wednesday, May 7, 2014 11:58:32 PM UTC-7, RichA wrote:
1. Spent $150 billion on the ISS, sapping any money for a Shuttle continuation or replacement.

2. Failed attempt to build a heavy lift rocket.

3. Having to crawl to Russia (with who they are having a tiff over the Ukraine) to launch astronauts.

4. The mysterious and unexplained cancellation (after spending $700M) of the "Prometheus Project," a plan to develop a large RTG to provide tens of thousands of watts of power to unmanned probes so they could do wide-ranging experiments on solar system planets.



Kick the unctuous buffoon out of the White House, things might change.

Our DARPA and NASA have become ghost towns with only wussy probes sent to places that can't possibly improve the quality of life or revise our GW+AGW demise for the better.

The national leadership sucks almost as badly as the mutually perpetrated cold-war era.