Excellent article, most of which I fully agree with — though I think you underestimate the true breakthrough nature of the X-prize. I do not want in any way to belittle the breakthrough political victories, espcially of the bi-partisan support for additional funding for NASA and the implicit support for human deep space exploration.

However, I worry about the ever increasing Federal (and personal) debt, and impending global financial disruption caused by that, raising the bar higher in every subsequent year. As you correctly point out, it is very high bar now.

Congress, and even less the President, have failed to make hard financial choices: they’re funding essentially everything while an ever larger part of the budget goes down the interest rathole and nobody saves for the future. Soon, Japan, et al, are going to decide to stop funding this stupidity by buying dollars. Very soon, Mr. Bush and Congress will no longer be able to avoid some very, very difficult funding decisions, between things like dropping very large and visible middle class subsidies (e.g., Social Security, freeway spending), leaving elderly widows starving on the streets (since their families racked up credit card debt rather than savings), or funding Lunar and Mars exploration.

Those of us who want a strong space program have got to hope that someone with even the most basic accounting skills is appointed to talk some financial sense into this Administration, and to the American people. . . .

— Donald