Fly me to the moon, let me play among the stars.......

N519AT

Ahh! This is how I change this!
By SCOTT LINDLAW, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - President Bush (news - web sites) will announce plans next week to send Americans to Mars and establish a permanent human presence on the moon, senior administration officials said Thursday night.


Bush won't propose sending Americans to Mars anytime soon; rather, he envisions preparing for the mission more than a decade from now, one official said.


In addition to a returning trip to the moon for the first time since December 1972, the president also wants to build a permanent space station there.


Three senior officials said Bush wants to aggressively reinvigorate the space program, which has been demoralized by a series of setbacks, including the space shuttle disaster last February that killed seven astronauts.


The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Bush's announcement would come in the middle of next week.


Bush has been expected to propose a bold new space mission in an effort to rally Americans around a unifying theme as he campaigns for re-election.


Many insiders had speculated he might set forth goals at the 100th anniversary of the Wright brothers' famed flight last month in North Carolina. Instead, he said only that America would continue to lead the world in aviation.


Earlier, White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters traveling with Bush in Florida that the president would make an announcement about space next week, but he declined to give details.


House Science Committee spokeswoman Heidi Tringe said lawmakers on the panel "haven't been briefed on the specifics" but expected an announcement.


Rep. Ralph Hall, R-Texas, a member of the House Science Committee, said he welcomed the move because he has tried to get the president more interested in space exploration.


"I had the feeling the last 2 1/2 years people would rather make a trip to the grocery store than a trip to the moon because of the economy," Hall said. "As things are turning around, we need to stay in touch with space" and the science spinoffs it provides.


This week, NASA (news - web sites) landed a six-wheeled robot on Mars to study the planet. However, the Spirit rover is stuck because the air bags that cushioned its landing are obstructing its movement.


Asked Wednesday whether the success of the Mars rovers could lead to a human mission to Mars, NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe said, "The rovers are a precursor mission — kind of an advance team — to figuring out what the conditions are on the planet, and once we figure out how to deal with the human effects, we can then send humans to explore in real time."


While answering questions on the White House Web site, O'Keefe said interplanetary exploration depends on "what we learn and whether we can develop the power and ... propulsion capabilities necessary to get there faster and stay longer and potentially support humans in doing so."


No one, least of all members of Congress, knows how NASA would pay for lunar camps or Mars expeditions. The last time a president pushed such ambitious ideas — the first President Bush on the 20th anniversary of the first manned moon landing — the estimated price tag was $400 billion to $500 billion.


The moon is just three days away while Mars is at least six months away, and the lunar surface therefore could be a safe place to shake out Martian equipment. Observatories also could be built on the moon, and mining camps could be set up to gather helium-3 for conversion into fuel for use back on Earth.


House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, among others, has called for an expansion of the U.S. space program, including a return to the moon. The United States put 12 men on the moon between July 1969 and December 1972.

An interagency task force led by Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) has been considering options for a space mission since summer.

Former Ohio Sen. John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth, has said that before deciding to race off to the moon or Mars, the nation needs to complete the international space station and provide the taxi service to accommodate a full crew of six or seven. The station currently houses two.

At the same time, Glenn has said, NASA could be laying out a long-term plan, setting a loose timetable and investing in the engineering challenges of sending people to Mars. The only sensible reason for going to the moon first, he says, would be to test the technology for a Mars trip.

What do you think about this? Hopefully Bush will not screw this up.....
 
Come to think of it, that was a good song!
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I think its great! It'll be interesting to see where it leads. I'm not a huge Bush fan, but...go Bush!
 
I don't know if we're ready for Mars yet.

I think it's about a 12 month mission to even get in orbit of Mars and we've got to more or less take an entire ecosystem there to sustain us in terms of food, air and potable water.

potable, not portable dorks!

We also need a workable shuttle. And a mission. And money!
 
"Hey I speak some French; you're an a$$ bite pardon my French HA!"

"My name is French"

"Yeah well who gives a damn"
 
[ QUOTE ]
I don't know if we're ready for Mars yet.

I think it's about a 12 month mission to even get in orbit of Mars and we've got to more or less take an entire ecosystem there to sustain us in terms of food, air and potable water.

potable, not portable dorks!

We also need a workable shuttle. And a mission. And money!

[/ QUOTE ]
All very true...Interesting idea though!
 
I wonder just how we propose to put a self sustaining spacecraft that can carry four people for a year's trip together. How would we put that into space? This ain't a two week trip to the moon, it's a year long trip!

And how are we going to pay for it? We've got six trillion dollars in debt and that debt is growing by half a trillion bucks a year.
 
After he builds his "moon base" Bush plans to stock the fresh water supply with sharks with "lasers attached to their fickin' heads."

Then demand a few beeeellion dollars.


I'm all for a moon base ... but it was just too easy. I couldn't pass it up!
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Bwaaaaahaaaahaaaaahaaaaaaaaaaaa



Hmmm, Dr. Evil's laugh is really hard to spell.........
 
Bush later went on to say in his speech.... "It is critical that we reach Mars and build a lasting settlement there.... it is imparative that we do it in a time critical manner, before the enemies of our country beat us to it..."

Great, something else to pay for.... why dont we figure out a way to STOP spending money... I already have to pay for all these frickin' illegal immigrants who are about to be granted amnesty
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I tell ya, with all this talk you'd think that the moon and Mars are loaded with oil or something.
 
I heard that Iraq hid its WMD on a special moon base. If the moon doesn't comply with eliminating its WMD program, we will be forced to inva...liberate it.

Sorry. I couldn' help it. I don't even feel that way but I thought some of you would like it.

We can't afford this idea. I think it would be great but something in the budget has to give. Unless he just got a new Capital One No Hassels Credit Card...
 
Come on guys, exploration of new frontiers has always paid off in the long run. Don't be short-sighted.

There is plenty of pork left in our budgets that should be sacrificed for this type of program.

Besides, if we don't do it, someone will. Maybe the next generation of explorers will all speak Chinese. (Not that there's anything wrong with that!
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I think we do need a "Manhattan Project"-style effort, however I think we'd be better off spending the multi-billion dollar budget towards discovered a renewable fuel source where we can end our dependence on oil.

The peace dividend alone from cutting our dependence on fossil fuels would probably fund the Mars (or Moon) project ten fold.
 
We've (I saw the storyo n TechTv right after Thanksgiving) discovered how to "make" crude oil. (Similar to man made diamond) Any carbon based material can be broken down to create crude oil. The story (over simplifying it of course) said they basically take natures process of compressing carbon material and speeding it up millions of times. The story was talking about how for the press conference they were using left-over from dead turkeys to creat the stuff. I'll run a search on TechTV.com and see if I can find and then I'll post it.
 
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Anything, Everything Oil
Marc Levenson seems to have the solution to just about everything, including solving the world's dependence on fossil fuels. Tonight on "Tech Live" he shows us how some smart folks are turning just about anything into oil. See it to believe it.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's all I could find ...
 
[ QUOTE ]
"Hey I speak some French; you're an a$$ bite pardon my French HA!"

"My name is French"

"Yeah well who gives a damn"

[/ QUOTE ]

HAHAHA. Celebrity Jeopardy is probably my favorite SNL skit.
 
Space exploration has always paid off huge dividends in the scientific community in terms of research and development. It is a noble goal, and I applaud Bush for pursuing it. I will look forward to our return to the moon, permanent human presence there, and our voyage to Mars.

Yes, it is expensive, but this is one of the things that we SHOULD be spending money on. I'm a Bush backer, but there are plenty of things he's done I haven't liked. This is not one of those things.

Let's roll ...

FL270
 
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