Hating Ares is not at all the same as seeing no future for American leadership in human space flight. Ares is (and soon to be was) a giant boondoggle, a compromise of the worst sort.

If Obama leads NASA toward a vision of building commercial capacity, even without a heavy lift vehicle, human spaceflight will be better off than it ever has been. Only private industry has the ability to scale production to the point where costs go down. That’s the real problem all spaceflight faces.

And, face it, earth sciences, robotic exploration, and space telescopes are what have brought NASA success in the last two (or four) decades. Why shouldn’t Obama see that and promote it?

How? India will maybe start a human space flight program this year or next. China has yet to dock two human spacecraft together — forget space stations or exploration missions.

Goofy…

“Obama hates the space program.”

And that’s why the White House is proposing to increase NASA’s budget? During a time of historic deficits?

Goofy…

“Remember, Mondale’s one of his heros.”

Reference? When has anyone said that Mondale (or any election loser) is their hero?

Goofy…

“a base on the moon gives humanity an additional “solid” ground under their feet.”

National space policy should be based on whether astronauts have “solid ground under their feet”?

Goofy…

“A Lunar base can of course also be abandoned, but can also be re-staffed.”

Not if, like ISS, a lunar base has fatal failure modes that can’t be corrected without a crew present.

Think before you post…

“Going to any of the Lagrange points in space is totally useless”

Because there are absolutely no observatory, solar warning, or other spacecraft at lagrange points worth servicing. Because lagrange points are such awful locations for staging lunar surface missions or missions deeper into the solar system.

Goofy…

“humans to orbit any of the moons of Mars (to what use?)”

Martian moon missions land — they don’t orbit.

http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2010/01/taking-aim-phobos-nasa-flexible-path-precursor-mars/

Lawdy…

I agree with you Bill, to 100%.

Obama gave at the beginning of the presidential campaign, his real idea of what he thought about the space program. And that wasn’t much.

The reason I think it’s especially sad that the ambitions of a Lunar Base now is gone is because a base on the moon gives humanity an additional “solid” ground under their feet. A real step forward a space colonization and expansion into space.

ISS does not offer anything long term and permanent in our expansion into space. A Lunar base can of course also be abandoned, but can also be re-staffed. If the ISS was to be abandoned, it would burn in the atmosphere within a relatively short time.

Going to any of the Lagrange points in space is totally useless as well as taking humans to orbit any of the moons of Mars (to what use?). That is handled better with robotic missions.

…or passing the baton of space leadership to China and India. Good luck with that, Robert. Obama hates the space program. He has to say he’s in favor of it because he’s the President. If he could, he would redirect all $$ for space into poverty and education programs. The only reason he’s keeping earth science alive is because it helps his climate agenda. Remember, Mondale’s one of his heros. Exciting? Yes, for other countries!

I do hope we can start building infrastructure in support of Flexpath missions. One early mission that looks interesting is more extensive telerobotic investigation of resources in Aitken Basin. This could be coupled with polar-orbital Orion missions for high-bandwidth comm and operations with minimal communications latency. Perhaps then some lunar comm link could be developed and left in place for more extensive NASA and non-NASA telerobotic exploration of the lunar surface.

In the meantime, NEOs beckon using Orion with human-rated Atlas/Delta upper stages.

to me that was his wonderful flight. (grin) …

I wonder which one he enjoyed more…I had forgotten that he blasted off on his second…on my Birthday. He was, on the second flight (when I knew him) a prince of a fellow. I had some “Mercury” stamps from the first flight…and he kindly signed them.

I started out opposed to the flight and actually it is the only op ed I have ever pulled before it was published…the more things went on the more I thought “well instead of him they would just send some flunkie and Glenn actually did something”. The odd thing is that I told Glenn that and he was very very pleasant about the thing. He signed the stamps after that.

All in all a square up person. And a top flight Aviator…I have always wondered how he felt when they told him about the pack (on the Mercury flight)…he had to have known what it meant…

Robert G. Oler