12 thoughts on “Chairman Beyer”

  1. NASA is half of 1 percent of GDP now, and wasn’t it 3 or 4 percent of GDP when we went to the moon?

    Translation: In other words, from a government perspective, Space is not all that important. It wasn’t really that important at the height of Apollo, why should it be now?

    I’m curious to know what we’re spending on Climate Science as a percentage of GDP when that’s considered solving an existential problem? Unlike Space.

    1. He is right that NASA gets a lot of bipartisan support. NASA isn’t likely to face any significant cuts to their overall budget. This is important because NASA’s budget compared to inflated deficits isn’t as important as what it would be compared to a sane and responsible budget.

      NASA probably gets a fair amount of money for what they do right now. Everyone always wants more money for their thing and why not if we are just printing trillions of dollars every year? Think of your personal interest (from the Democrat POV).

      The horrible reality of it all is that our budget is f’d with a capital F. It was nice of Beyer to note Republicans were right in pushing for ending Russian dependence and changing types of contracting. This positions NASA well for the cuts that are coming and to deal with global instability.

    2. “””NASA is half of 1 percent of GDP now, and wasn’t it 3 or 4 percent of GDP when we went to the moon?

      Translation: In other words, from a government perspective, Space is not all that important. It wasn’t really that important at the height of Apollo, why should it be now?””””

      Percent of GDP has nothing at all to do with smart spending. If going to one of your kids baseball game costs 1% of your GAI (Gross Annual Income), it’s a safe bet that you won’t be attending games.

      1. Actually, NASA’s budget during Apollo was 4% of the federal budget, not GDP. If NASA today had a budget that was 0.5% of GDP, it would amount to $115 billion.

  2. It’s a “round-off error” on the Federal Budget so don’t worry about whether it does anything, right? Or “We aren’t funding it as a Priority so sit back and be happy for anything you get, peasant!” ?

  3. Why not had target for a date the lunar manned exploration ends, and Mars manned exploration begins.

    The delay to start lunar manned program, has been annoying, I don’t forward to delaying the Mars manned program.
    It seems having end point to lunar program could speed up, it’s start.

      1. Well, we don’t know if there is mineable water on the Moon.

        It seems obvious to me, that if we knew there was mineable lunar water, it would be mined. And do want to spend much resources on the Moon if there isn’t mineable lunar water.
        If Moon is important without mineable water, why has NASA basically ignored it for decades?

        It seems we discovered the Moon could have mineable water over two decades ago. And at the time, I imagined, NASA would explore the Moon, and they didn’t- instead spent many billions of dollars exploring Mars.
        So, I have been happy NASA is thinking of exploring to Moon, but it seem one purpose of exploring the Moon, is to allow Mars exploration [crewed missions- which everyone knows allows much more exploration as compared to solely using robotic missions- but do think we should increasing amount of robotic mission while we do the crew exploration [of Moon and Mars, just did with Apollo program- but I have manned and robotic mission more connected- or both enabling the other}.
        Anyhow, NASA has yet to throw amount robotic missions to Moon as it has been doing with Mars. NASA could throw dozens of lunar robotic missions at the Moon and they should, because with Mars crewed, they should increasing Mars robotic mission when the crew explore Mars. But presently, Trump didn’t do much, and Biden’s most significant move, has been to delay lunar exploration.
        And NASA can’t decide if lunar water is mineable, NASA job should be to explore the Moon to see if and where their could be mineable lunar water. And likewise NASA can make towns on Mars, but it can explore Mars to determine where there could be towns.

        1. And I think the grand plan of Lunar and Martian Exploration is to get to point in time, where we can have such things as Space Power Satellite.
          And it seems possible we could get SPS for Mars, before we get them for Earth.
          Or the big thing for NASA is exploring Mars. If moon has mineable water, this helps explore Mars and helps allow settlements on Mars.
          Say we are at 10 years into Mars Crew exploration program, and then we finally get lunar water mining making thousands of tons of lunar rocket fuel- that will help allow NASA to explore Mars for next decade. And bring us closer to SPS for Earth.

  4. It is interesting that he thinks the threats come from the left and their hatred for billionaires and anyone spending money on anything Democrats don’t like. Can’t even spend a paltry $20 billion without them trying to vacuum it into their graft services agencies.

    “But if the incentive is to win the contract again next year and keep moving forward little by little by little, in cost-plus there’s no profit incentive.”

    Nooo. Boeing is making a profit whether or not whatever they make functions or how long it takes for it to not function. The incentive to fixed price is you either get your stuff together or you don’t make any money. However, the main difference between the two has to do with mindset.

    Boeing isn’t making more money off the services they provide NASA because they choose to limit themselves to only having NASA as their customer. SpaceX is making more money off the services they provide NASA because they find other customers for those services.

    What went unsaid was the Artemis Accords. This accelerates countries taking sides in space and Russia will be left out. The Artemis Accords will prove to be very influential in the not too distant future. Ukraine is a signatory and postwar, who knows what they will do in space.

Comments are closed.