Some Tea Partiers love govt spending, so long as it's NASA

[justinc.1089]

Ugh I don't get how you guys can say government is inefficient and wasteful, and that forcing people to pay for something is wrong, but then say NASA is efficient and its ok to force people to pay for NASA. It sounds hypocritical to me too.

Military satelites could be made by private businesses for the military. Thats not a problem... NASA already uses some private businesses for some things.

As for whether or not we would have sent a man to the moon without NASA, we really don't know because the free market has not had a shot at space exploration yet. If it is something people want, then the free market will make it happen because people want it lol. And if they don't want it, it won't happen in the free market.

At the very least there would be money to be made in satelites though.

I'm really shocked there are people on here that really wouldn't want to radically downsize NASA or eliminate it entirely. I mean most people that disagree with us about cutting spending in other places do agree NASA's funding could be dramatically reduced...

 

[phill4paul]

Sure I'd love to see private space companies make it. They aren't there yet.

-t

They are not there because of government intervention and regulation.

You worship an industry that should be held,rightfully, by private individuals.

-t being a member of these forums I would think that you would have realized that.

 

[phill4paul]

Ugh I don't get how you guys can say government is inefficient and wasteful, and that forcing people to pay for something is wrong, but then say NASA is efficient and its ok to force people to pay for NASA. It sounds hypocritical to me too.

.

-t was employed by NASA. 'nuff said. Kinda like saying "I'm an ex SEAL and did work for the fed and the shit I did is so important that we need to steal from citizens so I can make some bread and I don't need to know who I have to kill to make the bread."

 

[legion]

Ugh I don't get how you guys can say government is inefficient and wasteful, and that forcing people to pay for something is wrong, but then say NASA is efficient and its ok to force people to pay for NASA. It sounds hypocritical to me too.

Hypocritical, like Jefferson commissioning the Lewis and Clark expedition?

I don't get the hand waving ancap kids that think its possible to throw away the entire US government overnight. Even if Ron Paul was President tomorrow that wouldn't happen. Just because we are realists does not make us hypocrites.

 

[justinc.1089]

Hypocritical, like Jefferson commissioning the Lewis and Clark expedition?

I don't get the hand waving ancap kids that think its possible to throw away the entire US government overnight. Even if Ron Paul was President tomorrow that wouldn't happen. Just because we are realists does not make us hypocrites.

I already said TWO OR THREE TIMES I'm not an an-cap. There will probably always be at least a small kind of state in a society.

That does not equate to NASA being a necessary function of government.

I also don't think Jefferson governed perfectly either. He had great ideas and philosophies, but his presidency fell short at times, with the Lewis and Clark expedition being one of those times. It should have been done, just a little differently than how it was handled.

As it compares to space exploration, the similarities are small if there even are any. If you have some point to make about the Lewis and Clark expedition in comparison to modern day space exploration I don't know what it is unless you say it. If its that Jefferson used the government to explore, meaning we should use the government to explore space today, I fail to follow the logic and reasoning behind that point since those are very different things. And since I don't think that was Jefferson's greatest decision either. (not that it was wrong, but more of the way it was handled)

 

[NYgs23]

Hypocritical, like Jefferson commissioning the Lewis and Clark expedition?

Jefferson was a hypocrite for approving the Louisiana Purchase in the first place.

I don't get the hand waving ancap kids that think its possible to throw away the entire US government overnight.

Cutting NASA's budget is not "throwing away the entire US government overnight"! Problem is everyone wants their piece of the pie.

 

[legion]

As it compares to space exploration, the similarities are small if there even are any. If you have some point to make about the Lewis and Clark expedition in comparison to modern day space exploration I don't know what it is unless you say it. If its that Jefferson used the government to explore, meaning we should use the government to explore space today, I fail to follow the logic and reasoning behind that point since those are very different things. And since I don't think that was Jefferson's greatest decision either. (not that it was wrong, but more of the way it was handled)

So the free market should have handled the Lewis and Clark expedition, too?

 

[Brian4Liberty]

UGH! - though that is what you can expect from defense companies. Low bid and go over budget.

-t

Overschedule too.

Perkin-Elmer was the sub that made the flawed mirror, not Lockheed.

 

[NYgs23]

So the free market should have handled the Lewis and Clark expedition, too?

Thank goodness we have the government funding land exploration. Without a massive federal government we'd still be living in the Great Rift Valley in Africa.

Point #2: Given that the land was already occupied, some would characterize the expedition as the beginning of an aggressive invasion.

 

[phill4paul]

So the free market should have handled the Lewis and Clark expedition, too?

Well, yeah. Welcome to the forums.

 

[eOs]

I like Harry Browne's idea: would you be willing to give up your favorite government program if it meant you never had to pay income taxes again? A lot of us are techies, and are very interested in NASA. But suppose more private companies were involved in going into space. That would be even more interesting than a bumbling government bureaucracy.

How does a private company make a business out of going to space? I'm very interested in learning this business model...

 

[silus]

Private industries do not need 50 years to duplicate a single feat. Yet NASA apparently needs 50 years to get back to the moon. That is the definition of wasteful.

 

[phill4paul]

How does a private company make a business out of going to space? I'm very interested in learning this business model...

How does a private company enter any field? First it takes a vision. Second it takes investment capitol with the hopes of return on investment.

I don't understand your question e0s. The government created a monopoly of space exploration that lead to a monopoly on launching satellites.

Companies were more than happy to have taxpayers fund the investment capitol so that they could pay a pittance for putting their eyes in the sky.

 

[silus]

How does a private company make a business out of going to space? I'm very interested in learning this business model...

Ask billionaire Richard Branson.

 

[tangent4ronpaul]

Overschedule too.

Perkin-Elmer was the sub that made the flawed mirror, not Lockheed.

eh? - I was pretty sure it was Ball Aerospace in Boulder Colorado.

-t
.

 

[tremendoustie]

Wait.. I don't get this, are you guys for or against NASA?

I always thought Ron was for NASA.. He even signed something with a bunch of other Congressmen instructing the guy who runs things at NASA (forgot what he's called) directing him to not follow Obama's budget cut of NASA because it was an infringement on previous agreements that money which is already allocated to NASA can't be cut (or something like that)..

Also, isn't NASA like 1% of the Federal Budget? It seems to me like cutting NASA is as insignificant as complaining about Earmarks...

The government has no business extorting money from people to pay for space adventurism. It's blatantly immoral. If educational institutions, individuals, and others, want it, they will sponsor it -- and they'll get exactly what they want, not what some bureaucrat wants.

 

[tremendoustie]

How does a private company make a business out of going to space? I'm very interested in learning this business model...

Here are a few off the top of my head.

1. Educational institutions pay for instrument time.
2. Space tourism (a-la virgin's spaceshipone and two)
3. Donors who like particular science or exploration -- they can be rewarded with exclusive glossy prints, even space rocks, etc.
4. Industries interested in zero gravity research, other scientific research
5. Industries interested in asteroid, planet mining.

 

[tremendoustie]

-t was employed by NASA. 'nuff said. Kinda like saying "I'm an ex SEAL and did work for the fed and the shit I did is so important that we need to steal from citizens so I can make some bread and I don't need to know who I have to kill to make the bread."

I am employed by nasa (for now), and I would convert funding to voluntary contracts, ASAP. Government funding makes it an unaccountable, wasteful, ineffective behemoth. Private contracts mean accountability.

I am glad -t appreciates space science, as do I. I suggest he contributes his own money to that cause, and helps raise money from others who are interested, as well as industrial and educational institutions. I suggest he does not support extorting the money from his neighbors, at the point of a gun.

 

[tremendoustie]

UGH! - though that is what you can expect from defense companies. Low bid and go over budget.

-t

You have no idea ...

 

[BlackTerrel]

If NASA hadn't of ever existed, a man would have walked on Mars ten years ago sent there by a private business.

I doubt it. How much would it cost to go to Mars Vs. what kind of revenue would you gain by going to Mars?