Men on Mars

[Griff]

Bush floated his Mars initiative. My gut reaction to this is that I want humans in space, lots of them. I've heard some interesting reactions, the suddenly fically responsible Dems saying no. Some left wing enviromentalists say no because they don't want anyone escaping the apocolyptic catastrophe they believe is coming. Libertarian enviromentalists saying yes because of the potential development of resources off planet making fewer holes in the ground here. Anti-Capitalists want it done by the state, anti-Statists want it done by private industry. Everyone is re-focusing their ideology to try to fit this in. It is enormous. Now its my turn.

I'm worried about the Bush plan for a number of reasons. The first is the money. UT posted a paragraph by Andrew Sullivan in another thread and he makes a good point. We are leaving the next generation some awful financial liabilities and this is just one more. Another is this administrations affection for croney capitalism. Huge contracts will build the infrastructure for these projects and connected companies will get those contracts and quite possibly the infrastructure itself when all is said and done. That needs to be addressed. Will the government provide a bridge to space for humanity or will it act as gate keeper controlling access to space? Another worry is Cheneys stated goal of having military superiority in space. Defense is important but an arms race in space would divert funds from the goal of populating space and create more negative impressions of an increasingly militarized America. I like that Bush was willing to say out loud that we need to shut down the shuttle program (why not sell it off though?) and the International Space Station.