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We should have used the return to flight money (and time) on SDV. We didn't.  IMHO because the Bush vison is myopic.

So go to Congress now (or in December) and say "orbiter is busted" and cannot be made safe. BUT we can fly 4-5 SDV each year from Canaveral by 2008 or 2009. Tile workers get laid off but relax Senator Nelson, your voters in Titusville will remain employed.

Exactly!

So we use SDV and ADD additional SDV based missions in the same time period for a small additional incremental cost.

In a given year fly 2 or 3 SDV to ISS (with 4 or 6 ISS payloads) and fly 2 SDV to the Moon or elsewhere. Practice landing cargo and rovers on Luna launched by SDV at the incremental cost of "the actual main tank and SRBs (which) are pretty cheap." Right?

Edit: Accomplish the vision faster and end up in 2010 or 2011 with a proven HLLV all within the current STS/ISS budget.

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By mass, shuttle C can carry 3 ISS payloads to 51 degrees and 2 by volume. Launch 2 nodes and stuff the in between space with granular payload mass.

If =ANY= do it then the Russians will be able to flight test a TLI with the cost shared between the Russian "taxpayers" and a private sector tycoon.

Seems like a "win-win" to me especially when the US chair of the House Appropriations Committee says he likes the VSE but there just is not enough money to do it.

We cannot escape taxpayer financed space missions for a long time to come (IMHO) yet why not supplement tax dollar funding in creative ways?

Nah.

If its an Apollo 10 "no land" trip then 1 additional Progress would be more than enough. And if the Soyuz is "left over" from an ISS support mission then the incremental cost would be minimal.

To fly around the Moon is still pretty cool. If people will pay $12 - $20 million to stay at ISS for a week, how much more will they pay to add a lunar circum-navigation?

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Offer a package deal to tourists. Pay us NOW for a circum-navigation Apollo 10 style with no landing and you get a guaranteed reservation for when we later build a lander.

Use the proft from the above to pay for lander development as a joint venture with the Russian government, who would love to land on the Moon before NASA got back there.

Besides, they could even sell media rights. :;):

Shaun, my concern is that George Bush will prove to be a "space tease" - - provocative and suggestive of an aggressive space policy combined with a failure to follow through.

Frankly, I may well prefer someone who we can all agree is not pro-space, if it allows space advocates to better focus their energies.

A book co-edited by Roger D. Launius (former NASA historian) is helpful here, although the title says it all:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/de … paceflight and the Myth of Presidential Leadership

Congress is where the key battles will be fought, not the White House.

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Besides we need a President with strength and wisdom - - pro-space or not.

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Edit to add an Amazon review of this book:

http://planetary.org/aimformars/study-r … ]Planetary Society report dated July 2004.

http://planetary.org/aimformars/study-s … ]Executive Summary

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.htm … 4678]Space Ref article

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Plan calls for Thiokol SRB plus LH2 upper for CEV. I recall GCNRevenger saying something about an 8 gee escape tower issue.

But 5 segment SRB plus LH2 upper could put cargo in LEO at a nice low price.

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Complete ISS with uncrewed shuttle derived HLLV? Yup. Its in there, also.

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Many thanks to clark for the tip. . .

No settlement? (Colonization is too non-PC for me) Send robots.

Its cheaper and safer and besides, whats the rush?

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Now, to settle BEFORE the Chinese do or before the asteroid or nuclear war or global warming wipes us out, okay now I see a reason to hurry.   

My fear is that the mining facility will BLEED money. What can they possibly export that will cover the cost of building the thing?

Its obviously my own bias, yet I believe the prospect of CHILDREN is the only avenue that will excite the popular imagination. Everything else is boys and their toys.

The Moon to teach us how to settle Mars? Yup. That will sell, IMHO. The Moon as a goal unto itself? Won't sell, IMHO.

Exploration without bearing children is a DEAD END.

Maybe it will take 100 years or more to learn how to have a child safely "out there" - - but if we declare today that the goal is to become spacefaring, I believe there will be popular support for the necessary intermediate steps.

To do the intermediate steps for their own sake is a waste of time and money. And the public won't support it. As we see today.

I disagree with the camel's nose theory. "Slip the nose udner the tent and sooner or later you will get the whole thing."

The goal is settlement. In that recent poll, 29% said the #1 reason for going into space was that was in our nature to do so. That can only mean to go to stay. No tangible economic benefit, an aspirational benefit.

Mars supports life far easier than the Earth because there is so much that need not be imported.

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Moon versus Mars?

The only sensible answer IMHO is BOTH! - - ASAP.

http://www.aviationnow.com/avnow/news/c … ml]Another link on ISS completion.

Bush wants to do away with shuttle in a way that requires the next guy to take the blame. Most likely a Democrat if GWB wins in 2004.

A little 2008 "Welcome to the White House" present from the GOP to the Democrats. Now you make Florida happy, Hillary.

This is why I fear there may be a "re-certification" loophole found, somewhere, somehow. GCNREvenger is exactly right, IMHO, the orbiter is the hot potato you do not want to be holding when the bell rings, so you just pass it on.

A 2010 end date allows Bush to have it both ways.

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Only an immediate transition to SDV would allow grounding the orbiter and keeping Kennedy Space Center workers on the payroll.