Keith, here is
a collection of articles and quick takes, from the Froomkin/White House
Briefing column
@ http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/politics/administration/whbriefing/
Space, The Financial Frontier
Kathy
Sawyer of The
Washington Post writes that "Bush has outlined a tortoise-like pace,
dictated by severe budget constraints."
"What the plan lacks in momentum and flash, however, it makes
up in political shrewdness, and analysts said that, unlike previous attempts to
get the space program off the dime, it might even survive the congressional
gantlet," she writes.
David
E. Sanger and Richard W. Stevenson write: "With the nation deeply divided along partisan
lines on the most pressing issues of the day, including the war in Iraq, tax
cuts and the environment, Mr. Bush's political advisers backed the plan as a
way of associating the president with a
unifying and uplifting election-year goal that transcends
politics." Their colleague William J. Broad
notes that "the
history of bold visions for human spaceflight is littered with more failures,
delays and cost overruns than clear successes."
Bob
Kemper of the
Chicago Tribune writes that the potential cost of as much as $1 trillion.
Where'd he get that number?
Here's the
transcript
of Bush's speech; video
excerpts; the
full video; a White
House fact sheet; and
a White House position
paper.
Like Father, Like Son?
As Mike
Allen and Eric Pianin note in their story in The Washington Post, "Bush's
aides were eager to avoid the mistake made by his father, who in 1989 proposed
establishing a base on the moon, sending an expedition to Mars and beginning
what he described as the permanent settlement of space. NASA responded with a
plan estimated to cost as much as $500 billion over decades, and Capitol Hill
rejected the plan."
256. Bush's latest
moonshine
President Bush's plans for the exploration of the Moon and Mars are, of
course, a product of Karl Rove, his electioneering spinmeister. When Bush
was governor of Texas he visited NASA just once in the whole of his term.
It is hard to imagine any American president who has been less interested
in science (or even capable of understanding it) -- never mind "the thrill
of discovery" -- than George W. Bush.
It's true that NASA has been piqued by the possibility that the Chinese
might overtake them in the next ten years -- as implied by their recent
announcement after they'd placed their first astronaut into space. Th
Chinese also score significantly higher on IQ tests than Americans. No
doubt NASA will be given higher priority in the coming years. But they
won't be given anywhere near the money that's implied by the Bush
announcement because the US administration is going to take at least the
next five to ten years to pay off the present budgetary deficit -- which is
growing by the day even now that the big spend on the Iraq invasion is over.
It's also relevant to add that, probably, Karl Rove is showing evidence of
anxiety about a possible absence of an economic pick-up in the US in the
next few months. As Chinook after Chinook is blown up in Iraq on a weekly
basis, and as Ayatollah Sistani hangs out for a genuine democratic election
in Iraq, and as the Fed daren't raise interest rates at home for fear of a
consumer melt-down, then Bush will have few other wonderful things to offer
in the next few months. Let's hope that America gets a reasonably
intelligent president in November.
Keith Hudson
>>>>
BUSH INVEILS MOON AND MARS PLANS
The United States will send astronauts back to the Moon by 2020, President
George W Bush has announced.
Humans will live and work on the Moon to prepare for exploration further
afield such as on Mars, he said. An extra $1bn will be spent over five
years on plans which include reviving, then replacing, the space shuttle.
Critics say it is an expensive election year gimmick but US officials say
all Americans will benefit and the scheme will not "bust" the federal
budget.
White House officials say the president's announcement will reinvigorate
the US space programme following setbacks, including the Columbia shuttle
disaster. "I've been waiting for this day for 31 years," said Eugene
A
Cernan, the last astronaut to set foot on the Moon.
Russia and China also have ambitions for new space exploration but some
argue that future trips are best left to robots like the rover now on Mars.
President Bush's "new vision" for American space exploration calls on
the
United States to: 1.Send astronauts back to the Moon as early as 2015, no
later than 2020. 2. Use human and robotic exploration of Moon to prepare
for living base and missions to Mars Return the space shuttle to flight but
retire it by 2010. 3. Develop shuttle replacement by 2008 for manned
exploration by 2014. 4. Finish US work on the International Space Station
(ISS) by 2010.
Speaking at Nasa headquarters in Washington, Mr Bush said astronauts had
recently been going no further from the Earth than 621 kilometres (386
miles). "It is time for America to take the next steps... and extend a
human presence across our solar system," he said. Experience gained from
new journeys to the Moon would be used in "human missions to Mars and to
worlds beyond", the president said. "Human beings are headed into the
cosmos."
'No space race'
Mr Bush added that he wanted a new era of discovery but not a new space race.
However, scientists in Russia, whose spacecraft currently service the ISS,
announced on Wednesday that they had plans for manned flights to Mars
within a decade. "Technically, the first flight by earthlings to
Mars
could take place as early as 2014," said Leonid Gorshkov, a designer at
the
Russian space corporation Energiya. He put the cost at about $15bn, saying
that America planned to spend 10 times that amount on its Mars programme.
China plans to put an unmanned vehicle on the Moon by 2010.
Spreading the cost
The White House estimates that the Moon plans will require an extra $12bn
over the next five years. It said $11bn of that would come from
reallocation of Nasa funds to the new priorities and the president would
ask Congress to approve the remaining $1bn. Mr Bush would ask for a 5%
yearly increase in Nasa's $15.4bn annual budget for the next three years,
followed by rises of up to 1% in subsequent years.
A total estimate for the cost of sending astronauts back to the Moon and on
to Mars was not given -- and will have to be approved by Mr Bush's
successors in the White House.
Mr Bush highlighted the practical uses of space technology, such as image
processing used in medical scanners, foetal heart monitors and insulin
pumps. The president announced the development of a new craft, the Crew
Exploration Vehicle, presented as the first since the Apollo spaceships to
take humans to new worlds. It would also be able to transport scientists
and crew to the ISS.
'Robots do it better'
The head of Nasa, Sean O'Keefe, predicted that the moon plans would not be
a "budget-buster". However, critics say Mr Bush's return-to-space
idea is
irresponsible at a time when the federal budget deficit is soaring.
Democratic presidential candidate Joseph Lieberman said the US should not
be "going hundreds of millions of miles away on a costly new mission when
[it had] limited resources". The president's father proposed sending men
to
Mars when he was in office in 1989, but the project went nowhere after its
cost was estimated at up to $500bn.
The new announcement comes as the US space programme celebrates the landing
of its robot rover Spirit on Mars and its planned exploration. Professor
Robert Park of the University of Maryland suggested that the best way
forward for space exploration was through robots such as the rover, which
were not subject to the physical limitations of human beings. "The great
adventure of our time... is to explore where no human could ever set
foot,"
he told the BBC's World Today programme.
Story from BBC NEWS -- 15 January 2000
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