Robert Walker: Space Industry Must Get Public, Congress ‘Buy-In’ of New Space Vision
Walker said for the vision to become reality, “there has to be a public acceptance and a congressional buy-in.” He urged the broad space community not to divide and protect efforts that won’t move the new space agenda forward. There will be winners and losers in implementing a sharply focused plan, he said.
But if focus is lost, “it will be another 20 or 30 years before another President will step out to make a statement again,” Walker said.
“I really believe that if we can show that this program will create the base of knowledge off which we will build leadership, off which we will build new products, off which we will build economic dominance?then we?ve got a chance of having a program that?s not just a flash-in-the-pan, but is a program capable of being sustained for 20 or 30 years,” Walker said.
From FloridaToday:
“The American people need to take ownership of it, and think of it as theirs — almost as a national right that we are in space,” added Neil DeGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium in New York City. “Otherwise, it’ll float away.”
Remember those red states and blue states? If the American people are to take ownership of our space vision it CANNOT be the “Bush vision” which leads me to this quote from Space.com:
“Aldridge, a former U.S. Air Force Secretary and the Pentagon?s top acquisition official from 2001- 2003, said it is not the commission?s job to question Bush?s agenda or seek alternatives, but to recommend a strategy for making the president?s exploration vision reality.
“We are not here to challenge or modify the president?s vision,” Aldridge said. “Our role in life is to determine what it would take to successfully implement this vision.”
What Democrat will openly support the “Bush vision” when John McCain (R) has called for Aldridge to be replaced? For better or worse we live in a country divided 50/50. Also, two of the leading Republican Senate candidates in Illinois oppose the Bush vision.
Without bi-partisan ownership of the vision, it WILL float away in 4 or 8 years. Space advocates may need to hold their noses (some of them) and woo Democrats not hammer them.
It’s not only McCain questioning Aldridge, or space advocates in some cases writing off Democrat support (particularly Kerry, should he win in November). A not-small number of space advocates themselves are not merely criticizing this or that aspect of the Moon-Mars plan, but are openly hostile to it, dismissing the whole idea of a “new vision” as a “hoax”, cynical election-year politics, cronyism, etc.
If that kind of short-sighted opposition is kept up long enough and loud enough, even if it is only a minority opinion, it will inevitably lead to the question: “If even the space fanatics don’t want it, why are we even considering doing this?”
The more opinions I encounter from space advocates, the more it seems to me that they’re shooting themselves (and the rest of us) in the foot by undermining support for the Bush plan. Is the plan perfect? By no means. Is it a promising start? Certainly…and if someone wants to see human expansion into space happen for real, they’d be smart to work on changing what they specifically dislike about the plan instead of heaping scorn and ridicule on it.
This piece by Jeff Bell casts a whole new light on the “hoax” and “PR stunt” criticism of the Bush space vision:
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/shuttle-04d.html
Shuttle derived or shuttle derived plus a space hardened “up only” orbiter remains interesting to me since EELVs just seem too small to really explore space after the orbiter program ends.