Ah, yes. It is the responsibility of the rest of America to make sure that Alabama has jobs and mansions. Not the responsibility of Alabamians but of everyone else. Apparently Alabama has gone blue. Jeff Wright is one of those advocating that NASA should be a jobs program rather than an exploration organization. Forget about free market capitalism; it generates so much prosperity that people end up living too well.

Last year, I thought that Alabama and its populace were mature enough to take care of themselves, but this year I am learning that they aren’t adult enough to compete with any other country, state, or business. Even the seamstresses aren’t very good, in Jeff’s eyes.
https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/nasa-to-buy-spacesuits-from-commercial-market/#comment-1125666

Or maybe Jeff is right, and we really have it out for Alabamians. It’s not business; it’s personal.

Fauci, the Greens, Randians-haven’t you done enough damage?

Real people get hurt by idealists in their drawing rooms.

Libertarian/Conservatives carryed the water for corporate America-and in the way of thanks…you get thrown over for their latest new girlfriends in the Build Large Mansions movement-and still, you want Red State Alabamians at Marshall in the poorhouse instead?

DougSpace: Which is exactly the final most important point of my next book, coming in very soon.

I have-for years-tried to get people to quit calling infrastructure ‘pork.’ Imagine if-years ago- JSC was to have all responsibily…all other centers shuttered BRAC style.
Every “Rand-something-or-othern” would have clapped….and NASA simply would have been seen as that one state’s pork-and there would be no HLS for Elon to win had libertarians had their way. That type thinking is every bit as damaging as Greens who would also kill off space infrastructure.

Now-you can argue that it shouldn’t be this way-but I think it is great that so many people are employed by space-that so many states have a vested interest in it. That’s the nature of the beast guys. Just know that America’s enemies are rooting for those of you who can put the most engineers out of work.
Musk may just live long enough to see Old Space die….and to see New Space be the next target…with no allies left to side with:

“And then they came for me, but…”

Perhaps JPL would be better off as an independent private (e.g. Cal Tech) space exploration organization that is hired by NASA to do planetary exploration.

George C: Thank you. Stupid mistake. Now fixed.

That’s how you know when Democrats just don’t care about an issue-because…if he really believed in privatization…he’d support that across the board and not be a Democrat anymore, right?

But Charles just knew that all really came from the long standing hatred of defense/aerospace infrastructure that liberals and libertarians alike are both guilty of.

I miss Charles Krauthammer .
If I were Q from ST:TNG–I’d bring him back to life…and able to walk…having him trade places with the Marshall haters who would look good in a pine box next to Proxmire.

David Eastman: Your skepticism is wise. I agree with it.

Steve Golson asked, “What would your Table 4 and 5 look like updated for 2021?”

Essentially, the numbers would make SLS look much worse, and private space much better. Though it is five years since I compiled those tables, SLS has still not completed a launch, while SpaceX and Orbital ATK/Northrop Grumman have been sending more cargo capsules AND manned capsules into space.

As for budget, the numbers for SLS have not changed much, other than adding two years to the total, about $5 billion, so that SLS/Orion’s total appropriated cost through its first manned flight will likely be just under $50 billion.

What would your Table 4 and 5 look like updated for 2021?