“as far as flying the actual missions to the Moon, NEOs, L-Points, Mars, that’s NASA’s ball game, not Musk nor any other commercial provider”

What if a couple billionaires pooled some money and bought a trip to the moon or an L-point, should a law be passed preventing them from doing that?

Space Adventures will be announcing a lunar flyby by the end of this year, should the federal government take this to the U.N. and ban any privately financed trips?

So simple it’s simple minded. And you still don’t have an actual explanation. You just continue to restate your religious beliefs.

“NASA explores. Commercial exploits.”

You’ve said that before. The real question is why?

Why the bright dividing line for commercial?

What happens if commercial companies (or individuals) start doing space exploration, which they surely will at some point. Will that be against your law? Should they be prevented from doing exploration on their own? Again, why?

“And yes, I would be a lot more comfortable with Commercial Crew if Boeing was leading on this”

How could Boeing lead? You mean that a company that had a faster plan to develop a crew system should be stopped until companies with slower plans catch up? Is that fair? How could you justify that on a legal basis?

And isn’t it NASA that is leading this, so you would think that NASA is applying the same rules to all the companies. That’s what I expect, and Bolden has stated that too. If NASA is happy, why shouldn’t you be? SpaceX has been doing all the right things so far, getting paid for accomplishing them, and is leading the way. What’s wrong?

“Space X, while they have some great people working for them, doesn’t have the latter”

You say this, but have you actually compared the personnel that are working on capsules at both Boeing and SpaceX? I think this is more a wish of yours than reality, although it fits into your dislike for anything SpaceX.

“And in case you haven’t heard…”

The big surprise would have been if Boeing DIDN’T choose Atlas V, but we threw a party anyways since it shows the progress commercial crew is making – didn’t you get the invite?

Maybe you thought that this was bad news somehow? Weird.

“Boeing’s rep stated that NASA astronauts would be likely flying at least one test mission, if not more, and that even if a flight had one or two company crew, there would also likely be one or two NASA astronauts aboard.”

Boeing will do the test flights with company personnel, and then leave it up to the customer as to whether they want to use their own crew or use Boeing crew.

I’ve always thought it would work this way for all the commercial crew providers, since customers will likely buy a whole flight, and they may want to maximize the amount of people that can deliver to space. I don’t think it makes a difference to the crew service providers, since NASA crew will be trained by the providers, and NASA will have to pay for the training. Extra revenue sources!

Just as a note Matt. You keep thinking that competition in the commercial crew arena is bad, but most of us see it as a sign of strength, since no one wants another monopoly on U.S. spaceflight like what NASA has had. We want to see as many competitors as the market can support.

So Boeing announcing that they are using the rocket that everyone expected them to use was really only bad news to the clueless that thought that they might use the ATK/Astrium Liberty instead. Hopefully that was the last nail in the head for that zombie rocket…

Don’t forget to answer the first question.

And in case you haven’t heard….Boeing selected Atlas V for their commercial crew launcher. And they’re looking for crew to fly the test missions.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44021510/ns/technology_and_science-space/&sa=U&ei=zUY7TtWbLKfhiALnpMDcCw&ved=0CEIQqQIwAw&sig2=zAqYblwt-OXz96qmpmOKLQ&usg=AFQjCNG4FI0aLXrD8Vv8vD_PA4eFMn7pUA

And before STS-134, there was a presser where the commercial prospects were outlining their plans for Commercial Crew to the media, Boeing’s rep stated that NASA astronauts would be likely flying at least one test mission, if not more, and that even if a flight had one or two company crew, there would also likely be one or two NASA astronauts aboard.

If you don’t worship him, why do you call him “Lord Musk”? I think that he’s doing useful things, but I don’t call him that. He’s just a visionary entrepreneur, not an aristocrat or a god. I think that it’s hilariously ironic that the only people who call him “Lord Musk” are the people who pretend they don’t worship him (as opposed to the rest of us, who really don’t worship him).

…as far as flying the actual missions to the Moon, NEOs, L-Points, Mars, that’s NASA’s ball game, not Musk nor any other commercial provider.

You keep saying this, but never provide an explanation as to why it’s not nutty, or how we would have opened up the west with such a bizarre attitude.

“But, and here’s where I draw the line. ”

Why draw the line Matt? That’s what we’re trying to find out from you, why it makes such a big difference to you?

I guess if you had your way that the Google Lunar X PRIZE would be illegal?

Why does it matter if it’s an agency of the U.S. Government that does something or that it’s a private individual or company?

What’s the big deal?

Commercial LEO means NASA BEO. Cut and dry, that is it. Boeing, Orbital, Sierra Nevada, and even SpaceX can support NASA’s exploration activities (assuming that on-orbit refueling works-but we’ll have to wait until the technology demonstrator flies to see if that is feasible), but as far as flying the actual missions to the Moon, NEOs, L-Points, Mars, that’s NASA’s ball game, not Musk nor any other commercial provider.

“Musk needs to prove to NASA’s satisfaction (and Congress’) that they can do the jobs they’re being contracted to do. And the same goes for all the other potential commercial space providers.”

The difference between you and Musk is that Musk has actually been doing Pay-for-Performance contracts for a long time (COTS and CCDev), but you see them as something novel to keep commercial aerospace away from NASA. Weird.

What’s also funny is that you advocating for this (i.e. doing the work before getting paid) makes you an Elon Musk fanboy, since he has been advocating for NASA to do more of it for a long time. He’ll also advocate it to Congress if they ever allow him to testify. I’m sure he’s glad he can rely on your support…

“Said it before and I’ll repeat, but if NASA issues RFPs for improved exploration vehicles, everyone would be invited-the Boeings, Lockheed-Martins, Northrop-Grummans, etc, along with the new companies.”

Now you’re a government contracting expert? Matt, you are in way over your head. It’s obvious that you have certain biases against commercial aerospace, especially SpaceX (as many have pointed out).

But as I point out to others who take unfairly biased views of commercial aerospace, it doesn’t matter what you think, since the progress commercial aerospace is making, and the budget issues NASA is getting ready to face, will force NASA to rely on commercial aerospace more and more if they want to do anything more in space.

And isn’t that really what you want anyways, for us to do more?