one giant step backwards

[stereocuuple]

Originally Posted by finnbow

Honestly, I don't buy the spinoff argument. Plus, I find it ironic for one to criticize government waste, incompetence, etc., but then argue in favor of outrageously expensive government programs based upon the possibility of "pennies on a dollar " returns on spinoff technologies.

P.S. I don't like Tang and I think our republic would do just fine without it.

Originally Posted by Boreas

But Dave, all those calendars, lunch boxes and coffee mugs that'll never get made now.

What a wasted opportunity! (For the Chinese)

John

Originally Posted by Boreas

Ah, but Velcro!

John

Originally Posted by finnbow

The conventional wisdom is that Velcro was a DoD spinoff technology. It was actually invented by a Swiss fellow on his own in 1941.

FWIW, I personally think the whole spinoff argument was likely developed by the "military-industrial complex" in an effort to garner support for expensive endeavors for which conventional benefit/cost analyses didn't fully pan out for them.

i never get tired of the self loving and self important leftwing commies. why dont you guys just sell the U.S.A to our enemies and that way you can make friends with your foriegn buddies who will surely save us all

[stereocuuple]

Originally Posted by Fast_Eddie

Math isn't my thing, but I'll give this a shot.

Federal budget 2009: $3,550,000,000,000
Nasa budget 2008: $17,300,000,000

Okay, if I recall correctly, to find a percentage you divide the little number by the big number.

17,300,000,000/3,550,000,000,000=0.00487323944%

Maybe I'm doing it wrong. Maybe my numbers are off. But I can't find any info that says anything else. NASA is less than 1% of the federal budget. I don't give a crap if they don't create jobs, or lead to new cookware. It's worth it just to discover. 1 flippin' percent. Too much to ask to feed human curiosity.

That's just sad. We could cut that much out of the military budget and not even notice it. Hell, even the trivial savings in Medicade that we would have seen from the health care deal would be more than that. Of course, we won't see that at all now. So we're left to cut NASA because that is the 1% that will put us in the black. Please. You have to be kidding me.

i agree however this isint about $$$ its about putting the nation in the backseat. my parents genaration would never have done this. america is the greatest nation in the history of the earth. we did not get here by placing 2nd and we wont stay here that way either. maby obama should give advice to olympic athleats to just slow down and let the other guys win

[Boreas]

Originally Posted by stereocuuple

i never get tired of the self loving and self important leftwing commies. why dont you guys just sell the U.S.A to our enemies and that way you can make friends with your foriegn buddies who will surely save us all

My new avatar works!

John

[finnbow]

Originally Posted by Fast_Eddie

Math isn't my thing, but I'll give this a shot.

Federal budget 2009: $3,550,000,000,000
Nasa budget 2008: $17,300,000,000

Okay, if I recall correctly, to find a percentage you divide the little number by the big number.

17,300,000,000/3,550,000,000,000=0.00487323944%

Maybe I'm doing it wrong. Maybe my numbers are off. But I can't find any info that says anything else. NASA is less than 1% of the federal budget. I don't give a crap if they don't create jobs, or lead to new cookware. It's worth it just to discover. 1 flippin' percent. Too much to ask to feed human curiosity.

While your math is fine, if every programs' advocates made the same argument, no cuts in the budget could ever be made. Just like the saying
“Don’t tax you, don’t tax me, tax that man behind the tree,” a similar statement could be made about budget cuts.

[westgate]

"hmmm, one of my flock has paid attention.
mega dittoes from me and mr. snerdley to you, sir."

[finnbow]

Originally Posted by stereocuuple

i agree however this isint about $$$ its about putting the nation in the backseat. my parents genaration would never have done this. america is the greatest nation in the history of the earth. we did not get here by placing 2nd and we wont stay here that way either. maby obama should give advice to olympic athleats to just slow down and let the other guys win

Your parents' generation didn't have a total national debt of:


As for being the greatest nation on earth and not wanting to place 2nd, geopolitics and establishing national priorities aren't just silly games designed to stroke your ego. Without question, we are the greatest nation on earth in one key area - size of national debt.

[Boreas]

Originally Posted by finnbow

http://www.usdebtclock.org/

John

[d-ray657]

Originally Posted by Sandy G

From what I've seen, read & heard, the dream of "Star Trek" interplanetary travel will remain just that-a dream. We CAN'T go fast enuff to decently make a stab at the tremendous distances involved. Mars is what, an 18 month round trip ? And that's about the same sort of thing as toodlin' over to yr next door neighbors' house, relatively speaking. The next stars are several light-years away...And that's assuming we could travel at the speed of light-Which we can't. Aren't even gonna come close. Even if we COULD somehow build the awfulest hot-rod spaceship that would make Cap'n Kirk green w/envy, there's the small matter of physial laws that state that as a body approaches the speed of light, it gets INFINITELY heavier & shorter... Even the Gambinos can't break THOSE laws. We may, some day, get to communicate w/another species from another planet, but that will prolly be about the best we can do. Personally, I wish it WASN'T like that....

From what my son tells me, I am nowhere near up on this, we have a better chance of entering another dimension than another galaxy.

Regards,

D-Ray

[westgate]

Originally Posted by Sandy G

From what I've seen, read & heard, the dream of "Star Trek" interplanetary travel will remain just that-a dream.
.
.
.
Personally, I wish it WASN'T like that....

my sentiments too. after growing up on a tv 'diet' of star trek, star wars, etc, it's always been my dream that we'd get to see some serious space travel in my lifetime.
but without a 'warp' or whatever you wanna call it, drive, we ain't going nowhere, maybe mars eventually, but that's about it.

and that greatly saddens me.

[BlueStreak]

Originally Posted by Writewing

I think we have far too many things to do on this planet, lets fix this one before we ruxh to leave it. There is plenty of things to work on based on what we have already discovered.

Agreed. +1.

And this coming from an amateur astronomer.

Dave