Sequester Cancels NASA Outreach
universetoday.com
universetoday.com
The truth is, America has a priority problem. We have more than enough money to spend. The toddlers in DC are used to getting their way and free spending like crazy (thus the trillion dollar deficits). Now they're being forced to make choices, and they're openly attempting to scare the public.
The best example of the sequester con is the White House tours. It's a big lie that they can't keep it open, pure propaganda.
The things we're free spending money on right now are disgusting. We have money to drone the planet and murder thousands of civilians, but not to hire teachers and fix bridges. We can keep Guantanamo open and spend money torturing people, but we can't keep our schools open. We can give the theocrats in Egypt lots of money, but we can't keep a simple NASA outreach program. We can spend a trillion dollars on the mostly pointless and highly dysfunctional F35 that will barely ever see action, but we supposedly can't keep the FAA operating at max capacity. Biden can spend a million dollars on one night hotel stays in Paris and London, but the White House has to cancel various Easter celebrations.
The great irony is that the party that was spending freely a decade ago is now talking about fiscal responsibility.
"The things we're free spending money on right now are disgusting."
I'm not partisan, but one party in particular is pushing for boosting the defense budget at the expense of the other priorities in this country.
And the other party was constantly complaining that too much was being spent? No, just the opposite: They were clamoring for more, whether it was "state and local aid", a more generous Medicare Part D and CHIP, extended unemployment benefits, special education costs... The list goes on.
And, by the way, the budget deficit in 2007 was, with two wars in full swing and all the Bush tax cuts in effect, a mere $158B.
I'll take a party that at least sometimes talks and walks fiscal restraint over one that still thinks we're not "investing" enough with $1T annual deficits any day.
It may be a difference of opinion, but it's a justified opinion and thus not outright insanity. The conversation is never going to move until both sides try to understand each other in reasonable and non-extreme terms.
"And, by the way, the budget deficit in 2007 was, with two wars in full swing and all the Bush tax cuts in effect, a mere $158B."
The budget deficit is where it is now because of the collapse which, to a very large part, was due to deregulation and other effects of the early 2000s. Bush was riding on the effect of the Clinton-era reforms.
They control the House, which in turn controls the federal government's purse strings[1]. It's the only thing they have direct control over. Plus, the most vocal and influential wing of the party at present was elected in large part on an austerity platform.
Also, NASA has gotten so far away from its core mission that it deserves its budget to be cut. It used to be run by visionaries, but at some point it got taken over by scientists.
You're right: Curiosity is cool. But you're also wrong because it did inspire the American people when it landed successfully, and it continues to inspire us with the data it sends back. Visionaries are the people taking 360 degree panoramic HD images from Mars and posting them online for free. NASA is not sending those images back because they serve any substantial scientific purpose, but because we flew a badass robot with a camera to Mars. Because we can.
And hey, while were up there, we might as well look for signs of water and life. Not because of some abstract scientific knowledge, but because what if there was/is life there?
That is visionary caliber stuff.
If anyone hasn't seen the Curiosity pictures, or they're otherwise not inspired, that's not the fault of the visionaries--nor does it lessen their status as such. A group of really smart people got together and pulled off something incredible just because they could; just because we want to know what's out there.
Oh, and here you go, travel Mars: http://www.360cities.net/image/curiosity-rover-martian-solar...
That's nothing, my parents remember when Lance Armstrong walked on the moon!
OK, let me rephrase an earlier comment someone made in the thread: we fly semiautonomous nuclear-powered robots with cameras to Mars, and make it seem like no big deal.
That last bit is the true triumph of the engineer. The hardest part is making it look easy.
Ask your grandparents how cool the first jet aircraft seemed at the time!
Define "U.S.", because you surely aren't talking about the population.
We also incidentally live in the most peaceful time in history, largely as a result of American military superiority. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Americana.
I guess we have vastly differing definitions of well-being. I see a whole lot of addicts that will be very hard to re-integrate into a sustainable society.
you think taking such a disproportionate share of the earth's resources happens without also having a disproportionate share of the earth's weapons?
And of course, once you have the weapons you need to find things to do with them; like putting more of your own population in prisons than the whole rest of the world combined. But sure, war has done a great job of distracting the population from being fucked, and it pays off nicely for those fucking them; this much I'll grant. And then there's the widgets and gadgets.
The reason we put lots of people in prison is racial animosity. After segregation was declared illegal, all the middle class folks fled the cities, leaving urban cores ghettoized. Crime, naturally, went up as a result. Then we introduced the drug war, which got liberals ("just say no!" moms) and virulent racists (looking for a way to get blacks out of mainstream society now that segregation was over) on the same platform. Of course it was wildly popular, and the mainstream didn't care because the media portrayal was black people being put in jail for doing "black drugs" (crack cocaine). Then the police and prison unions got involved, and well now we have the situation we have today. It's really horrible and atrocious, but it has zilch to do with the military.
For example, you mention 'Biden can spend a million dollars on one night hotel stays in Paris and London.' I looked into this, and indeed two one-night stays in each city totaled up to about that amount. But in each case, they booked out over 100 rooms. Now the VP certainly has an entourage of secret service agents and personal assistants, but the majority of those rooms were likely occupied by policy administrators of one sort or another there to meet their opposite numbers in Paris and London. This is why state visits are a big deal; on TV we just see handshakes and maybe a snippet of a speech, but all sorts of diplomatic work - trade negotiations, extradition discussions, etc. - takes place out of sight of the cameras. State visits are planned months in advance so that bureaucracies can coordinate the international dimension of their activities around them. A million bucks is cheap at the price if it advances economic progress.
Now you may not have noticed, but one of the more interesting things in the state of the Union speech the President gave last month was a commitment to a new US-EU Free Trade Agrreement, which would be the largest trade deal in history: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21439945 which would be worth hundreds of billions annually in increased economic activity. You bet I want the VP to take a bunch of policy wonks along with him when he goes overseas.
I think the first step in getting beyond tantrum politics is to address things on their merits and in their proper context, not in the form of zingers and stereotypes.
How about we just send the experts next time.
On privacy: http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/12/joe-biden-private-em...
On IP: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110413/12094013882/joe-bi...
On major internet issues: http://gizmodo.com/5041044/vp-candidate-biden-is-no-friend-t... http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10024163-38.html
[1] http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/09/california-par... [2] http://blogs.kqed.org/newsfix/2012/07/23/whats-next-for-the-...
This is why I'm tempted to think the right answer is to look back at the White House and say, "OK, let's keep the sequester. More cuts."
Kind of a game of chicken, and maybe a course to self-destruction, but that doesn't stop me from thinking about it. Part of me says, "so maybe there's a little collateral damage today, but nothing we can't rebuild tomorrow." It's that way with building muscle mass. Bulk up, cut down. You lose a little muscle in the cut, but you get it and more back later.
Science was a pretty lousy career choice before all this started, but these budget shenanigans will only drive the smartest and most capable young people out of science for better paid, less uncertain vocations.
The upside I guess is that I will likely attempt to create my own company instead. A far riskier proposition. But I'm on the far end of the spectrum - few of my peers are doing that though - they're finding jobs in other industries.
Another outreach example that allows you to rove the same terrain as the Mars Science Laboratory: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/explore/freedrive/ . I'd say this is pretty damn cool, and actually informative.
The folks who do this work are rather nervous right now.
Remember, science isn't just so the scientists can learn. It's so the scientists can learn and then present their finding to the public.
Of course, NASA didn't cut outreach because they carefully looked at their budget and decided this was the 1% that produced the least marginal value. They decided to cut outreach because it would generate public outrage.
I think NASA's budget should be increased, FWIW, but I recognize when I'm being played.
Sadly I worry these cuts are more political than practical, but then again it just says the programs are being suspended until they are reviewed so hopefully they'll still come back and maybe some waste will be discovered in the process too.
The decision makers are foolishly creating a massive technical debt.
Sorry, but I have a feeling education and science will survive the Sequestocalypse just fine. Although if we don't get the budget under control today, our kids won't have the money for space exploration in the future.
*and acting as cover for sending up military satellites, of course
Obviously the F35 is more important though. Who honestly thinks the future of air warfare will be with drones. </sarcasm>
"American turnpikes were stock-financed corporations seemingly organized to pay dividends, though acting within narrow limits determined by the charter. [F]or the American turnpikes the hope of dividends was merely a faint hope, and never a legal obligation. Odd as it sounds, the stock-financed "business" corporation was better suited to operating the project as a civic enterprise, paying out returns in use and esteem rather than cash."