For a pair of late January debates, one Republican and one Democratic, Politico.com is not only soliciting questions, but allowing people to vote on their favorites. Space is doing remarkably well as of early Tuesday morning: for the Democrats a question about the candidates’ support for the Vision for Space Exploration (filed under the category “Education”) was ranked fourth on the “Most Popular” list, with similar questions at #13 and #15; for the Republicans a question about support for the Vision (filed under the category “Energy”) is ranked #15 on the “Most Popular” list, with a similar one at #29. This suggests that space is of surprising interest to the public—or simply that voting on questions has been very light and thus easily skewed. What isn’t mentioned on the site is how these votes will factor into the selection of questions for the two debates.
Meanwhile, MSNBC is soliciting questions for tonight’s Democratic debate in Las Vegas. There’s no voting for questions here, and another caution: when I tried out the form this morning, I got a server error.
I detect cooked books here, not least because space questions appear not at all early in the list and very frequently later on. Nonetheless, I think this is worthwhile, and I voted for most of the space-related questions.
— Donald
The Space Advocacy community is finally acting as a community! I blogged about this, yesterday. And have received 3 emails prompting me to go, submit a question and vote. So, somehow I don’t think this is “cooked books” as much as I think there might actually be a groundswell of support PLUS some coordination within the community.
I have voted for all the space-related questions, too. And I have added the following to the MSNBC, and Politico sites:
“How will your proposed budget reflect your commitments to activities in space? Specifically – what are your goals for Mars and the Moon, and what are you goals for Robotic, Satellite, and Human exploration, military use, industry, energy resources, and settlement in space?”
One thing I have learned in business is that I am sick to death of “mission statements”. What I want to see is your budget, because that is where you show what you really care about – how will you spend your cash? That is why I framed my question the way I did.
I am excited that “space” is making its way (in a limited fashion) onto the national agenda. Let’s hope this continues.
Take care. mjl
P.s. – I have also sent my “question” to Alan Boyle at MSNBC, to see if he has any influence over the questions asked. I don’t know if that will do any good or not.
I, too, had a server error, but it appears to be up now. My question is:
Human space exploration is vital for understanding the Solar System in which we live, and for exploring and eventually using the resources that undoubtedly are out there to make life better here on Earth. Will you work to establish the equivalent of a “transcontinental rail road” to lower the costs of accessing the new frontier? Projects such as these could constructively employ many thousands of people while creating a hopeful future for us all.
— Donald
I addressed Mr. Obama specifically because of his position cutting NASA’s budget to pay for some education goals, but it should resonate with the other candidates as well.
Mr. Obama,
President Kennedy inspired my generation with the moon challenge and my career choice was directly affected by watching the Apollo astronauts journey there. Those events inspired me to pursue mathematics and engineering as my life’s work. Given that this experience was not unique to people in my generation, do you support NASA’s current plans to return to the moon in the planned timeframe? If not, how do you propose to inspire today’s youth to pursue careers in mathematics and engineering?
Chuck
About time the space community did something to prod the political elites and would be’s into stating (or not) what they would do about and for civil commercial and military space programs in the US. There is so much that could be inquired of and commented on, I don’t kow where to begin, but I did ask about their intentions to reverse the financial starvation diet NASA has been on for many years, if they thought not having access to the International Space Station via a US spacecraft and depending on an increasingly hostile and bellicose Russia was sound polcy, etc.
I also asked if they thought that leaving the moon in December 1972, and taking twice as long to return there was wise, in light of Russaan, Chinese, Japanese and European interest in the moon’s resources and energy supplies.
I asked about much more than that, like ITAR, the Chinese ASAT test and the resulting orbital debris problem it created, helping private/entrepreneurial efforts, COTS, and other issues as well.
It will be interesting to see if anyone cares enough or is informed enough to give me, give us, an informed answer that shows some depth and thought. I hope so!
Perry A. Noriega.
Well, with 2 weeks left until the events, “Space” has 2 questions in the top 10, and 4 questions in the top 20… so, if we can keep up the presence and activity, and make sure we vote on each others topics, we are bound to get some of our questions asked/answered.
My request/suggestion – to forward to whatever mailing lists you have available, and ask that every person in the space activist/advocacy/think-its-cool community, respond to the space questions and ‘vote’ for what is important to them.
Does anyone remember that during dark-ages of the Internet, People magazine posted a poll for the “most beautiful person in the world”… and Howard Stern fans nominated (and won in a landslide – Hank, the Angry Drunken Dwarf… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hank_the_Angry_Drunken_Dwarf).
I would submit that ‘where this country goes, and what we do in space’, is significantly more important than who is the prettiest person. SO, why not rally the troops, and flood this site with the questions we want answers to? Why not vote on the issues that are important to us, and make a political statement in the process?
I’ve got a mailing list. So do many of the people that read and contribute to this site. Why not see what kind of muscle we have, and make our voice heard. The Mars Society has already sent a notice to its members. What about the Planetary and National Space Societies? What about Space Generation and Yuri’s Night? What about the students and the professors and people that work at Boeing and LockMart? What about the NASA, FAA, and NRO folks? What about the army of Science Fiction fans (worldwide) that are “true-believers” and think that ‘going to space matters’.
I propose we each do 3 things:
∑ Register with Politico (http://dyn.politico.com/debate/) and write 1 question for both the republican and democratic debates. I used the same question, and posted it 3 times, under the headings of “Leadershipâ€, “Economy†and “Educationâ€, to each party.
∑ Then vote on at least 15 space-themed questions that other people proposed. Remember to vote for your own question, too. I followed links from “most recentâ€, “most popular†and by “topic†to find the questions I wanted to vote on.
∑ Finally, pass this message on, via blogs, newsletters or direct comments. If you have the power to Digg or Slashdot a message, and get wider distribution, do it. If you have media influence and can get a story written about this coordinated effort, do it. Personally commit to 5 people that will follow these 3 steps.
The way I figure, it can’t hurt, and it would be a rare case of the space ‘community’ acting as a true community. You do not need to be a citizen of the US to participate. And the way I figure it, this set of space questions will affect the whole planet, so we might as well get the global space community involved.
One thing that I want to caution against – please – you can write your own question, and vote on whichever questions matter to you. But, please, don’t divide “US†into
∑ Mars vs. Moon,
∑ Manned vs. Robots,
∑ Earth Studies vs. Solar System,
∑ NASA vs. Commercial vs. Military, or
∑ California vs. Texas vs. Florida.
My goal in this is not to set an agenda of “my vision is better than your visionâ€. That sort of in-fighting is too common in our community. My goal here is to have, at the end of the day, our (potential) political leadership hear that “WE†care about space – and that there is Federal level support for our combined goals. Once the national budget and goals are affirmed, we can then continue with our informed debate on the merits of one vision over the other.
I am not a “single-issue†voter. And I suspect that most of you are not either.
However, wouldn’t it be interesting if, by banding together, we were able to influence whom the next President of the United States were? These debates are perfect leverage points for us. We have the ability, and the reach, and the passion and the vision to make a statement that could change the world. Why not use it, and do some good? Wouldn’t it be worth the effort, if we, through these 3 simple steps, were to influence who was chosen as the leader of the United States of America. Wouldn’t it be worth the effort of these 3 simple steps if that leader were chosen because they inspired hope, and were – in fact – leading this nation (and the world) in the direction of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. And wouldn’t it be even better if they actually understood why STEM mattered in the first place.
We have a unique opportunity. Let us take it!
I will do my part. Will you do yours?
Take care. Mjl
P.s. If you want to email me, please do. Info at liftport dot com, and use the subject “political willâ€. I would love to get a feel for what sort of grass root activism is available ‘out there’. If there is enough, I will formalize things a bit, and create a mailing list, to keep people informed and updated. I think this particular action is short-lived (the debate is in 2 weeks), but if there is demand for it, and unity, then this list might have value later in the year.
Mjl.
Michael, I tried to keep my question short, to the point, and to appeal to Democrat sensibilities. And, other than making it clear that I thought human exploration to be important, I tried to avoid the controvercies we engage in here. In short, I agree with your advice!
— Donald
Politicians are driven to make choices the same as everyone else. Fear being the number one way to get action done. When fear reaches a climax then the message generally does the 180 to hope.
So those SHOULD be the subtopic line for EVERY question.
FEAR that the chinese will get to the moon first, FEAR that the russians will have the only manned launch system to service the ISS. FEAR FEAR FEAR.
The 180 of hope should be driver for exploration, new frontiers, inspire math and science et cetera.
my 2 cents.
Vladislaw
I submited 2 questions, – currently they are numbers 33 and 34
specifically,
and
Er, I should’ve said they are 33 and 34 under the economy line
Please make sure you all vote for the space solar power question under Energy. It could be the question that saves NASA from itself.
Great to see the community getting some attention! The poster Michael Laine makes really good points and I hope things get formalized..sending e-mail.
All – thanks for your support.
LOTS of space questions are already posted. I just did a quick survey (and voted for new ones!) and on the Democratic side, we have 9 of the top 25 questions. However, we “only” have 4 of the top 25 on the republican side of things.
I got a great email from J this morning, he should be the guy that gets some credit for getting this ball rolling, he emailed a bunch of people, initially.
Nothing about space on last night’s debate, but we didn’t have much time to organize that. However, we have about 2 weeks left – and a lot to do.
Please pass the word – vote on current questions (Rep and Dems) and create your own question. And let’s see if we can get a “story” generated with the help of the press.
Thanks. mjl
[…] more prominent with decision makers or other people of influence. The best example of this was the effort last year to submit and vote up space policy questions solicited by the CNN-Politico pres…. That effort succeeded in the sense that space questions were, for at least some of the time, the […]
good thing to know