Uh no, it’s clear you don’t get it- for if you did, you’d know it and employ it daily Understandable as it’s not the forte of technicians comfortable as followers.

“More’s the pity. To Musk it is.”

If increasing your wealth to $2B is a hobby, then that’s the hobby I want.

Just like you create new dictionary words when you can’t refute facts, now you’re trying to come up with a new definition of “hobby”. Won’t work, as everyone (except for your buddy Gaetano Marano) knows a business when they see one.

Just out of curiosity – how many startups have you successfully grown? Oh, that’s right, you don’t create value, you only complain about people that create value.

Well, I gotta keep asking you what it is, if just because you’re evidently not that clear on how to explain it. I know very well how to motivate a team, but inspiration isn’t a word I use to express how I accomplish that. There is some kind of divinity and perhaps evangelicalism associated with that i-word. Nixon’s comparison of the Apollo 11 event to creation just underscores that uncomfortable linkage of human space flight with religion. I do find it remarkable that passionate human space flight advocates often sound like true believers in more than one sense of the phrase. They worship the act, oftentimes losing track of rationale for it.

BTW, Coastal Ron, I left off Landsat (and many other space satellite industries) in favor of comsats and GPS for a very straightforward reason: both have greater revenue, profits, and overall economic value than private sector remote sensing and these other uses.

GPS is a government (military) system that doesn’t operate on a for-profit basis. Same for other GNSS services.

Commercial remote sensing on the other hand is a growth market.

“Or perhaps it’s just because [Santorum’s] a normal person.”

Perhaps you should review Mr. Santorum’s history– professional, political and personal. He most decidely is outside the ‘norm’ hence his steep rejection by Pennsylvania voters.

“To all of Musk’s employees at SpaceX, it certainly isn’t a hobby.”

More’s the pity. To Musk it is. Like cars, marriages– and making movies. But then, he’s planning to retire on Mars, isn’t he. LOL

Santorum’s indifference may or may not be to HSF, but it appears to be a marked indifference to a major event in human history– ‘the greatest week since the Creation’ as fellow GOPer, Presdient Nixon, labeled it. Curios oversight for a Holy Roller like Ricky, along w/8’s Genesis Xmas Eve moment & Buzz’s lunar comunion post 11’s landing. Maybe he was into the ’69 Mets when the Pirates cratered, instead. His JFK faux pas only reinforces the point that it occured in his lifespan but the actual event when it occurred had little impace on him. He read and referenced it with years of Biblical hindsight. As to ‘inspiriation’ if you gotta keep asking what it is then you’ve never had to apply it as a coach, a manager or a leader of a team.

You’re still blaming Santorum’s “obvious indifference to it” (it, being human space flight, I presume) on his response to Apollo 11 when he was a kid. Again, having been “inspired” by Apollo 11 is your badge of honor for human space flight enthusiasts. Not to apologize for Santorum’s indifference, but it may be that he clearly sees that, at least with regard to the Moon, Apollo 11 was a failure in setting us up for grander efforts on that body. Could be that’s why he didn’t mention it. Also, he says he has a digestive problem with JFK that may make him reluctant to point to a space accomplishment started by that President.

“It a hobby– it interests him– although he hasn’t flown anybody.”

To all of Musk’s employees at SpaceX, it certainly isn’t a hobby. They developed a high performance, modern launch vehicle, which is something that NASA hasn’t done for a long, long time.

As to inspiration and management techniques, you’re still unable to define what that inspiration is. But boy, we sure need it, whatever it is. That’s the problem with inspiration and space exploration. No one really understands what it is or how it works. If we did, we’d use that understanding to design a program to generate it. Yeah, we can talk about mouths hanging open, or kids playing in boxes, but these aren’t signs of creativity or innovation that are unique to space exploration any more than they are to a stunning motion picture.

No, you said that. Santorum infers he watched, but it’s not a matter of ‘lack of excitement’ on his part but an obvious indifference to it in spite of it not only being a major news event of his time but having major local coverage as well in the Pittsburgh area. Saw it first hand. It’s a peculiar position for him. It was an national eventt w/international impact a savvy politician speaking to a space-based crowd in Huntsville should have referenced accordingly. He didn’t. It simply did not register with him because it wasn’t important to him. Birth control is. So too are the Pittsburgh Pirates, as he referenced them before as well. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. It was clear to the crown in Huntsville that in spite of his locale, he isn’t in the ‘space camp.’

“It’s interesting that Elon Musk was born two full years after Apollo 11. However can it be that he is passionate about human space flight?”

It a hobby– it interests him– although he hasn’t flown anybody. He likes cars, too. And getting married. Space doesn’t interest Santorum as his comments on Huntsville clearly reveal. AS to managment technoques, if you can’t insire your team, they won’t follow your lead, particularly though hard-fought and/or long-term and costly endeavors- be it a football game, a war– or moving humans out into the soplar system.

@Coastal Ron wrote @ March 10th, 2012 at 12:40 pm

You’re just crankin’ to crank. You do not lead and will not follow so all that’s left is for you to get out of the way— or get run over

Only very partially. It’s nice to know about the van Allen belts before launching satellites beyond LEO. But comsats, GPS, Landsat and the like are mainly technological spinoffs of the 1950s IRBM and ICBM programs, as well as Eisenhower’s important but unheralded spysat and military comsat programs (started long before Sputnik) based on those missiles. One practical application leads to another, while the impractical applications and economic fantasies of the kind pursued by NASA are dead-ends.

“As to Santorum’s lack of mention of any concrete HSF space exploration plans, that is more a reflection of the lack of consensus on the subject.”

Or perhaps it’s just because he’s a normal person rather than an astronaut cultist. Even if he was a closet cultist and your reason here is the correct one, it would be yet more evidence that lack of consensus about a future full of alternatives is a feature, not a bug.

P.S. Santorum just drubbed Gingrich again in the Kansas caucus.