New Mars Forums

i have to agree w/ cobra here.  dean's comments are encouraging, but i have to say i'm skeptical.  i think he'll have to sacrifice this positive view of the space program if he wants to get the dem nomination.

i tend to lean a little left, but i've always been disappointed by most lefties' views on space exploration.  they pretty much view it as a complete waste of resources and it bums me out.  if W. came out in favor of a realistic mars mission i'd (gulp) ALMOST consider voting for him.  since he's obviously not the least bit interested in a balanced budget, we may has well go with a petroleum-powered 'battlestar galactica'-style mission.  (can we get some cylons with that?)  we can have a space program or we can have true democracy-- but not both!   

i wonder what wesley thinks?

now we have to wait for Kepler & TPF... wonder if they'll suffer the same fate?

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/e … 31107.html

they axed this AND a mercury lander in favor of a laser interferometer that'll look for gravity waves.

i'm not sure i've seen a lot indicating zealotry on his part... if you read 'entering space' he sure seems to have some enthusiasm for non-mars exploration.  i think he just puts mars at the top of his list of space priorities.  personally i think a lot of scientists whose grant money comes from robotic exploration feel threatened by him & his ilk.  i've heard space scientists speak of "the mars lobby" like it's the NRA or some kind of conspiracy that wants to eliminate all other components of the space program. 

and i have to agree about the repetition... it's necessary to get his point across to several different audiences.  he's not speaking for the benefit of those who're already familiar with his ideas, but for those who are new to them.  as for self-aggrandizement, it's never pretty, but so what?  if his mars plan needs a sidecar for his ego i'm ok with that-- as long as it doesn't cost anything extra.  let's get there first and THEN worry about egomania if necessary.

and i think his idea of funding 2 independent $30M teams to assess a mars mission would go a long way toward reining in any over-optimism.  i'd rather spend that than blindly shelling out $17B on the OSP.  (of course, the $30M per team may be overly optimistic...)

yep, pretty cynical tag there.  i did wonder myself, though, who wrote the summary for the mars society.  was it zubrin?  of course any analysis the mars soc. puts forth is going to be slanted in order to 'rally the troops.'  i read simberg's piece at fox and he seems a bit more objective...  but the society's interpretation of the hearing was certainly encouraging if true.  i do remember the senators coming back to a couple of zubrin's points, but i don't remember if this constitutes 'almost all' of the questioning involving him.  the 'post-panel' events described by the summary certainly sound almost too good to be true.  but hopefully they are true.

overall i have to say i was really encouraged by the second panel at the hearing, and i thought dr. z did a great job of presenting his case.  he drew a couple of pretty good analogies that had some impact on the senators, esp. his 'sending henry the navigator a few hundred miles off the coast of portugal to monitor the health effects on sailors' bit.  i was afraid he would simply read his prepared text (like i think tumlinson did) but this wasn't the case.  he did a good job summarizing the main points and adding some color to the presentation to drive the points home.  now i just hope somebody that matters will listen to him.