CEV to be made commercially available

Paul F. Dietz ) wrote:
: Alan Anderson wrote:

: As it happens, this is one of those "not in full agreement" bits. I
: think flights of United States astronauts made plenty of sense in the
: context of the Space Race, which itself was reasonable in the larger
: context of the Cold War.

: I think it's illuminating to ask 'how would the Cold War have gone
: differently if the space race hadn't happened'? I doubt much would
: have changed. It eventually became clear to all that communism was
: seriously flawed, so it wasn't necessary to demonstrate first
: world superiority by means of large government programs.

Are you saying the DOD budget during the Cold War should have either
stayed the same or actually have gone down? Explain to me why you think
that the DOD isn't a "large government program".

Eric

: Paul

Eric Chomko wrote:

Are you saying the DOD budget during the Cold War should have either
stayed the same or actually have gone down?

In 20/20 hindsight, it could have been smaller. Avoiding
Vietnam would probably have saved a lot of money, for example.
And we had many more nuclear weapons than we really needed.

Explain to me why you think
that the DOD isn't a "large government program".

Sorry, that's your hallucinations talking to you again, not me.
Anyway, the DOD budget wasn't an exercise in national potlatch
like NASA's was.

Paul

Paul F. Dietz ) wrote:
: Eric Chomko wrote:

: Are you saying the DOD budget during the Cold War should have either
: stayed the same or actually have gone down?

: In 20/20 hindsight, it could have been smaller. Avoiding
: Vietnam would probably have saved a lot of money, for example.
: And we had many more nuclear weapons than we really needed.

Why do you think that was?

: Explain to me why you think
: that the DOD isn't a "large government program".

: Sorry, that's your hallucinations talking to you again, not me.
: Anyway, the DOD budget wasn't an exercise in national potlatch
: like NASA's was.

After WWII, the defnse industry became an industry like any other,
requiring the bottom lines and the like. For you to claim that the DOD was
probably too large during the cold war and then not even be open to that
budget having been manipulated on purpose, politically, as quid pro quo
for an industrial constituency with deep pockets, only means that you are
naive or in denial. Pretty sad coimng from a military brat...

Eric

: Paul