Op-ed | Why we’re not on the moon now (and how we can stay next time we go)

[Elderberry]

Space News by Rick Tumlinson — July 18, 2019

As we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first humans to walk on the moon, you might notice we aren’t celebrating it on the moon. Why? Having achieved the greatest feat in human history, why is all we have to show for it flags, footprints and footage? 50 years after the Wright Brothers, anyone could buy a ticket to fly around the world. 50 years after Henry Ford’s first Model T, regular people around the world were driving their own cars. 50 years after Apollo, we’ve got a few government employees orbiting around this world and no one flying to the moon, let alone any of us.

Why? Two simple reasons: Who’s in charge, and their goal.

The Wright Brothers were citizen engineers who wanted to open the sky so the people could fly. And they did. Ford was a businessman who wanted to give people the freedom to travel. And he did. The U.S. government wanted to beat the Russians to the moon. And it did. It’s that simple. NASA achieved its goal – but it wasn’t opening the moon or the Solar System to the people, no; the goal was just to get that amazing propaganda shot on the TV for all to see. We won! We won! Look at us! We won! And…we’re done.

The reason there is no one on the moon and Mars today to celebrate Neil and Buzz taking those small steps is because the goal of the Apollo program was to create a historic moment, not to change the course of history. And while it did both to some degree, imagine if, instead, the goal of that heroic effort had been to open the Solar System to the people of Earth. Who knows where we’d be today and how many of us would be somewhere out there, far from Earth?

More: https://spacenews.com/op-ed-why-were-not-on-the-moon-now-and-how-we-can-stay-next-time-we-go/

[truth_seeker]

The Space Programbecame a costly budget item, when it was far more popular to enslave yet more generations and geoups,, to subsidized housing, food stamps, costly but subpar education,  free health care, etc.

[kidd]

... imagine if, instead, the goal of that heroic effort had been to open the Solar System to the people of Earth...

Um, gotta take that first step sometime.

If the motivation was to beat the commies, so be it.
The motivation of Columbus was to make a buck.

I don't know if the numbers work out, but we sure have enjoyed the benefits of the advances that the 60s space program gave us. This compared to its enormous price tag - estimated at $100 billion in 2019 dollars. But Obama pissed away 10 times that much for his phony infrastructure program - that was mostly used to shore-up public employee pensions. Not that I like big government programs - but why point at NASA when the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was an order of magnitude worse?

[Fishrrman]

"Why? Two simple reasons: Who’s in charge, and their goal."

No.
That ain't "why".
THIS is:
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$