[Kosh]

So much for the moon........

A White House official confirmed Thursday that when next week's budget is proposed, NASA will get an additional $5.9 billion over five years, as first reported in Florida newspapers. Some of that money would extend the life of the International Space Station to 2020. It also would be used to entice companies to build private spacecraft to ferry astronauts to the space station after the space shuttle retires, said the official who was not authorized to speak by name.

The money in the president's budget is not enough to follow through with NASA's Constellation moon landing plan initiated by President George W. Bush. An aide to an elected official who was told of Obama's plans, but who asked that his name not be used because of the sensitivity of the discussions, said Obama is effectively ending the return-to-the-moon effort, something that has already cost $9.1 billion.

While of course a significant private presence in space is a must to expand the availability of space to more people, there is still a place for manned space exploration. A human on Mars with a chemistry set can do anything any robot we've sent there can do and in a shorter period of time. We are now the second space faring nation in the world with no manned space program, right there with Britain (whose space program hasn't really done much). I wonder how long until NASA's budget gets cut to the bone, like what happened with the British space program.

[Nuclear1]

Funny how much money we could pour into the space program if we just...

Ugh, nevermind.  I'm not going on another anti-war rant.

[Bobboau]

just wait and see what happens when China sends a man to the moon, NASA will have a money ocean.

[Galemp]

More money's gone into the military this year than NASA's gotten in the past two decades. And considering how well they've done with the ISS and Spirit Mars rover, I don't know why the purse strings are so damned tight. NASA's engineers can do more good with less support than any other organization I can think of.

I wish they could siphon off just a fraction of the military budget and put it into NASA. A 1% cut in military spending would triple NASA's funding, and maybe actually capture the public's imagination and get kids excited about science again.

/Good enough for you Nuke?

[SpardaSon21]

You know what I find funny?  Its that people actually think the U.S. government has money, when in fact its been selling debt to finance deficit spending for years now.  The United States federal government is broke, and all of its debt is going to catch up to it sooner or later.

[Kosh]

Well unless someone pulls a 180, we're likely to lose our leadership in space, but I am not so sure we'll really like it when it happens.

More money's gone into the military this year than NASA's gotten in the past two decades. And considering how well they've done with the ISS and Spirit Mars rover, I don't know why the purse strings are so damned tight. NASA's engineers can do more good with less support than any other organization I can think of.

I wish they could siphon off just a fraction of the military budget and put it into NASA. A 1% cut in military spending would triple NASA's funding, and maybe actually capture the public's imagination and get kids excited about science again.

/Good enough for you Nuke?

But but but that's unpatriotic......

[Nuclear1]

/Good enough for you Nuke?

Yeah.  A lot tamer than I would've done, but it works.

[General Battuta]

You know what I find funny?  Its that people actually think the U.S. government has money, when in fact its been selling debt to finance deficit spending for years now.  The United States federal government is broke, and all of its debt is going to catch up to it sooner or later.

Would be nice to go back to the Clinton years, wouldn't it?

[Nuclear1]

You know what I find funny?  Its that people actually think the U.S. government has money, when in fact its been selling debt to finance deficit spending for years now.  The United States federal government is broke, and all of its debt is going to catch up to it sooner or later.

Would be nice to go back to the Clinton years, wouldn't it?

But...but...he was a Democrat!

And he got a bj in the Oval Office!

IT WAS TRULY A DARK TIME FOR AMERICA

[SpardaSon21]

I'll pull one of Obama's favorite lines and claim Clinton inherited his surpluses from Reagan's policies.  Hey, if Obama can blame Bush for what happened (even though the Dems had Congress since what, 2008, 2006?), I can give credit to Reagan for the surpluses in the Clinton era.  Oh and FYI, Republicans won Congress handily in 1994.  But that didn't have anything to do with it.

[General Battuta]

Nope, there were massive deficits under Reagan.

Spin it how you like, but the change to a budget surplus came from a) taxing the rich under Bush and Clinton and b) cutting defense spending under Bush and Clinton.

Ironically, our national debt isn't up to the level it was during World War II yet. I'm not convinced we're facing any kind of imminent budget disaster.

[SpardaSon21]

What kind of economy did Reagan inherit from Carter?  Yeah, you better believe he was going to have deficits.

[General Battuta]

You continue pushing the causative effect in to the past, but we've already located the cause to a change in behavior between Reagan and Bush/Clinton.

Defense spending changed. Tax policy changed.

Reagan, on the other hand, cut taxes and increased defense spending. Deficits resulted.

You, of course, are attacking the idea of going back to the 'Clinton years' because you don't want to give credit to Clinton. You apparently forgot to account for the fact that the Republicans helped push the balanced budget act that allowed the Clinton-era surplus to occur. The Clinton surplus was a bipartisan event.

Partisanship is wonderfully ironic sometimes.

[Nuclear1]

I'll pull one of Obama's favorite lines and claim Clinton inherited his surpluses from Reagan's policies.  Hey, if Obama can blame Bush for what happened (even though the Dems had Congress since what, 2008, 2006?), I can give credit to Reagan for the surpluses in the Clinton era.  Oh and FYI, Republicans won Congress handily in 1994.  But that didn't have anything to do with it.

Nah, it really didn't.

Honestly, the 94 Revolution was one of the most disastrous political events in the last twenty years.  

[Bobboau]

Clinton was the best president I can personally remember.

[iamzack]

I really only have memories of the 8 bush years. And 1 obama year. So Obama's the best I can remember.

[Herra Tohtori]

Ironically, our national debt isn't up to the level it was during World War II yet. I'm not convinced we're facing any kind of imminent budget disaster.

With or without inflation checks and a massive global war raging on?

[General Battuta]

Taken as a percent of GDP.

[TrashMan]

There was a Robot Chicken clip about NASA and limited budget I wanted to link, but I can' find it in YouTube. Oh we...

I agree. Clinton was a hellluva prez.

[Kosh]

Taken as a percent of GDP.

What was it in World War 2? I can cite one big difference: people actually saved money back then. The vast majority of our ww2 debt was financed by our own people, IIRC. Now? Everyone has massive amounts of personal, so an increasingly large amount of our debt has been financed by foreign entities. Recently they haven't been buying as much as we need, so the Federal Reserve has stepped up to buy them instead. Not a good sign.