An overview of the space war situation by Clark Lindsey
Clark Lindsey has written a very nice and short summary of the present political battles over NASA’s budget and its future manned space rockets.
Tag: budget
Residents Overturn Township’s Plan for New $1.5 Million Office
A citizen rebellion overturns a township’s plan to build a $1.5 million headquarters for itself.
Starbucks CEO calls for business boycott of campaign contributions until debt is solved
The CEO of Starbucks, a big time contributor to past Democratic candidates, is organizing an end to all campaign contributions until a long term solution to the federal debt is solved.
The immediate consequences of the Progress freighter failure
The immediate consequences of the Progress freighter failure:
- The next manned space ship launch from Baikonur likely to be postponed.
- ISS crew may be cut to 3 until Progress situation clarified.
- Russia postpones Soyuz rocket launch after crash (different launch than the manned mission above).
The longer term consequences? Congress will anguish over the lack of a shuttle. Some will demand more money for the program-formerly-called-Constellation, while others will demand more money for the new commercial companies. In either case, they will ignore the reality of a bankrupt federal government that simply can’t afford either at the moment.
Budget Office: this year’s deficit to hit $1.28 Trillion
According to the Congressional Budget Office, this year’s deficit will be about $1.28 trillion, the third highest deficit in history, exceeded only by the previous two budgets of the Obama administration.
Note also that any cuts mentioned in the above article are not cuts, merely reductions in the overall growth of government. (Another example of a journalist lying for the government.) All told, the federal government will still continue to grow in the next few years at a pace that far exceeds inflation, the economy, or anything you can imagine in the real world.
NASA’s costs estimates too low for Congress’s heavy-lift rocket
Surprise, surprise! An independent analysis of NASA’s budget estimates to build Congress’s heavy-lift rocket, the program-formerly-called-Constellation, are untrustworthy and likely low.
“All three program estimates assume large, unsubstantiated, future cost efficiencies leading to the impression that they are optimistic,” the team said in its key findings. A risk assessment revealed the funding reserves projected for all three programs are insufficient, according to Booz Allen Hamilton. NASA has not disclosed its internal cost estimate for the Space Launch System. “Due to procurement of items still in development and large cost risks in the out years, NASA cannot have full confidence in the estimates for long-term planning,” the executive summary said.
This project is nothing more than Congressional pork. It will never get built. Sadly, it might waste a lot of money before it never gets built.
Federal debt increased $4 trillion under Obama, the most under any president
Just remember, it is never his fault: The federal debt increased $4 trillion under Obama, the most by any president.
University shutters manned sub research program after forty years
Feeling the pinch: A Florida university has shuttered its manned submersible research program after forty years of operation due to lack of funds.
NASA pushes for funds to save the James Webb Space Telescope
NASA pushes for funds to save the James Webb Space Telescope.
Social Security disability on verge of insolvency
The day of reckoning looms: Social Security disability on the verge of insolvency.
One man’s response to Obama’s demand that taxes on the rich be raised
One man’s response to Obama’s demand that taxes on the rich be raised.
I deeply resent that President Obama has decided that I don’t need all the money I’ve not paid in taxes over the years, or that I should leave less for my children and grandchildren and give more to him to spend as he thinks fit.
and
Governments have an obligation to spend our tax money on programs that work. They fail at this fundamental task. Do we really need dozens of retraining programs with no measure of performance or results? Do we really need to spend money on solar panels, windmills and battery-operated cars when we have ample energy supplies in this country? Do we really need all the regulations that put an estimated $2 trillion burden on our economy by raising the price of things we buy? Do we really need subsidies for domestic sugar farmers and ethanol producers?
Read the whole thing.
The new commercial space companies question NASA contracting policies
The new commercial space companies are challenging NASA’s new contracting policy.
The article covers the conflict that I described in this post, whereby NASA is abandoning the more flexible contracting approach used for the commercial cargo contracts of SpaceX and Orbital Sciences and going instead with the contracting system it used for all past NASA subcontracts.
The article is errs badly when it calls the new contracting approach that NASA wants to use “non-traditional.” It is instead the way NASA has been doing things for decades, whereby the agency takes full control of everything and requires contractors to fill out so much paperwork that the costs double and triple.