NASA to Be Overfunded in 2015

CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
Joined
May 9, 2000
Messages
75,399
Well, here’s something you don’t see much of these days; NASA is not only getting their entire budget approved, but will receive an additional $500 Million extra for earmarked projects that wasn’t requested. Hell must have finally frozen over. :D

This budget isn’t final yet — the US Senate is set to vote on it in the next few days, but it’s expected to pass. Failing to do so would result in a government shutdown, which no one is too keen on right now.
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While the vast majority of human beings will disagree with me, I believe space exploration is one the MOST IMPORTANT things we can invest in as a species.

It satisfies our natural desire to explore, and it satisfies our knowledge that something WILL destroy our way of life someday on this planet. What that thing will end up being is of great debate, but it will happen sooner or later and space exploration is not something we can master in 10 years.

There is nothing that will return a bigger long term investment then exploration. Whether it be a cave man moving from one valley to another or man exploring the blackness of space. "Divide & Conquer" is the mechanism by which all species survive.
 
westrock2000 said:
While the vast majority of human beings will disagree with me, I believe space exploration is one the MOST IMPORTANT things we can invest in as a species.

It satisfies our natural desire to explore, and it satisfies our knowledge that something WILL destroy our way of life someday on this planet. What that thing will end up being is of great debate, but it will happen sooner or later and space exploration is not something we can master in 10 years.

There is nothing that will return a bigger long term investment then exploration. Whether it be a cave man moving from one valley to another or man exploring the blackness of space. "Divide & Conquer" is the mechanism by which all species survive.
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This, and it also satisfies our need to consume natural resources. There's a hell of a lot more off this planet than on. Granted it's not fossil fuels, but that's never been a long term option anyway.
 
I guess the recent asteroid impacts scared enough brass.
 
There is still plenty of cash they can divert from the horribly over-funded military budget. But, seeing as that would be a lot of work...
 
Hornet said:
I think the F-35 development cost alone is enough to take humans to Mars
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Shit, it would be enough to do 3 trips to Mars with Dubbya's overly inflated estimate (probably thrown out there to shut people up more so than to give an honest cost analysis)... or about 50 trips if you go with more sane approaches.
 
PCunicorn said:
You can't overfund an already seriously underfunded agency.
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This. Just because they can budget adequately with the resources given to them doesn't mean they're over funded the second they get more than they thought.

They need to be given an extra trillion dollars over the next ten years.
 
No doubt the European space agency is giving them a good kicking since they are doing things NASA haven't and at a budget far less. One thing i have noticed, Americans don't like to be out done and they will throw money at it in till they get on top again.
 
This is good. NASA and other government funded research facilities clear the way in the unknowns of research for private enterprise to flourish from the findings.

We need even more increases in the sciences if we want to keep up with the rest of the world, where many other countries are outpacing us in science research. US backed brain-drain isn't going to be enough to keep us afloat forever.

Public policy should always be backed with scientific research.
 
Until we have Star Ships that can travel beyond light speed, NASA can never be overfunded.
 
I see an extra "A" in there, is that a typo? Oh wait, for 2015 only, was going to say - the NSA is always overfunded. A $1 budget is overfunding for those criminal fucks.
 
What I want to know if why we still have people deciding where ALL of our tax money goes. I want to be able to log into Turbo Tax, see how much tax was collected from my paychecks, and have the ability to directly check off roads, universities, and NASA to get some small portion of my tax money (say 10% max). Everything is electronic now so there is no excuse to not be able to do this. It would be nice to have that freedom. That way only 90% of my taxes get screwed up.
 
Don't tell the right, according to them America isn't allowed to do great things anymore. Honestly, I'm surprises they haven't decided to target the agency for elimination like they have a few others. Somewhere along the way taxes became a bad word but borrowing is okay.
 
blade52x said:
What I want to know if why we still have people deciding where ALL of our tax money goes. I want to be able to log into Turbo Tax, see how much tax was collected from my paychecks, and have the ability to directly check off roads, universities, and NASA to get some small portion of my tax money (say 10% max). Everything is electronic now so there is no excuse to not be able to do this. It would be nice to have that freedom. That way only 90% of my taxes get screwed up.
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Slaves don't have that option. ;)
 
hah, they're not being "over-funded" at all. this is a nominal increase, adjusting for inflation, is it not? no increase would equal a budget decrease. better than nothing i guess though.
 
toddw said:
Don't tell the right, according to them America isn't allowed to do great things anymore. Honestly, I'm surprises they haven't decided to target the agency for elimination like they have a few others. Somewhere along the way taxes became a bad word but borrowing is okay.
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It was under the current administration, Democrat, that we "eliminated" America's ability to send a human being into space. That's not even the kicker. We then ran a smear campaign against the only country that can actually take our people to space.

Also, do not be fooled. Space technology has massive military implications. This helps the "Neo-Conservative" Republicans that desire for pro-active war policies.

Don't forget that it was under G.W. Bush (2006) that the Air Force decided to make their own version of NASA's X37, the X37B. A classified spacecraft.
 
Yay! Everyone now get's their allowance of draft pencils upped from 1 per month to 3 per month!
 
westrock2000 said:
It was under the current administration, Democrat, that we "eliminated" America's ability to send a human being into space. That's not even the kicker. We then ran a smear campaign against the only country that can actually take our people to space.

Also, do not be fooled. Space technology has massive military implications. This helps the "Neo-Conservative" Republicans that desire for pro-active war policies.

Don't forget that it was under G.W. Bush (2006) that the Air Force decided to make their own version of NASA's X37, the X37B. A classified spacecraft.
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Do not be fooled. Democrats are not leftists. The American political spectrum is skewed beyond applicability to human capability.
 
bucketlist said:
Hmm, I wonder what NASA would be like if they swapped budgets with the military.....
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We'd be already well into landing a person on Mars by now. They might not have landed on Mars by now, but we would definitely have it in the works.

We'd have a base on the Moon to launch from as well.

We would have landed more probes/instruments on celestial objects in our solar system. Not talking about just planets either.

I wouldn't be surprised if we hadn't learned how to move an object closer to us for observation/data collecting. Putting something in orbit around the Moon for example.
 
Somebody watched "Interstellar" and decided maybe we should start funding NASA again. :p
 
You know, I think having a permanent international base on the Moon is more important that landing on Mars.

We will get to Mars eventually, but having a permanent place that we can, many generations from now, turn into an actual colony, or at least where we can experiment how one could come to be, is crucial. It won't be anytime soon, but the first steps should have more priority.

I guess it has been determined that there is nothing useful on the Moon and they best habitats are orbiters anyway?

MavericK96 said:
Somebody watched "Interstellar" and decided maybe we should start funding NASA again. :p
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I actually think that's likely. Politicians be dumb, except for syphoning money. Very smart about that.
 
blade52x said:
What I want to know if why we still have people deciding where ALL of our tax money goes. I want to be able to log into Turbo Tax, see how much tax was collected from my paychecks, and have the ability to directly check off roads, universities, and NASA to get some small portion of my tax money (say 10% max). Everything is electronic now so there is no excuse to not be able to do this. It would be nice to have that freedom. That way only 90% of my taxes get screwed up.
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You may enjoy the short story "We, The People", written in 1983 by Jack C. Haldeman II. Here it is in its entirety:

http://www.sff.net/people/jack.haldeman/people.htm
 
xJ321x said:
This. Just because they can budget adequately with the resources given to them doesn't mean they're over funded the second they get more than they thought.

They need to be given an extra trillion dollars over the next ten years.
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Quickly it's near the end of the year spend it all so they don't cut the budget we didn't use this year, because you know just because you got under budget 1 year means you'll never need to go above that number in the budget ever again. Who needs trends and long term spending goals when you can just slash any budget you didn't use at the end of the year then complain how they went over the budget in the next year.
 
Nasa should be the most funded agency on the planet. Humanity should pour our world wide resources into getting colonies off this planet if we expect to survive the next 100 years.
 
Imagine how much good this could do if they actually stayed on mission instead of the funds hijacked for purposed the public is not readily expecting out of NASA.
 
Need more funds for NASA. We piss away so much in the USA, I'm sure we could divert 20-30% more funding to them with a nick and tuck here or there.
We really are dropping the ball on a lot of stuff we should not be.
 
Hamateer said:
Do not be fooled. Democrats are not leftists. The American political spectrum is skewed beyond applicability to human capability.
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There's a label for more left than left? Please tell? The only real question is whether the Republicans are more Left of where they are reputed to be or the Democrat Leadership is more Left of their reputed position.
 
jpm100 said:
There's a label for more left than left? Please tell? The only real question is whether the Republicans are more Left of where they are reputed to be or the Democrat Leadership is more Left of their reputed position.
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Well by world standards democrats are right and republicans are far right, and they cater to different industries that vote for them.

America is right wing as a whole, the debate is are we extreme right enough or not.
 
Apparently Russia's pressure has awakened some of the cold war fears in the old guard and made them open their wallets to something beside their arms lobby, that's good news I guess.
 
Wierdo said:
Well by world standards democrats are right and republicans are far right, and they cater to different industries that vote for them.

America is right wing as a whole, the debate is are we extreme right enough or not.
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I should also clarify that the label "left" and "right" as a collective definition is so simple-minded, but blame that on our political system of two, it has trained us to think in terms of black/white, on/off, rather than pragmatic thinking.

It pains me that I fall into the same pattern as well because of that, knowing full well that I can be shades of both among other leaning depending on issues involved.
 
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