Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

kbd512 · 2016-02-03 14:05:45

GW Johnson wrote:

I don't really believe that would come to pass. Cruz's real history is only telling whoever he is talking to whatever he thinks they want to hear. His actual actions bear little resemblance to what he tells various constituencies, excepting the tea party extremist crowd. It's all lies, lies, lies.

Like Obama?

Ted Cruz just sounds like another politician to me. I think you'll be hard pressed to find a politician that doesn't tailor his or her speeches to a specific group.

GW Johnson wrote:

He really does act to oppose the Democrats in any way possible just because they are Democrats (not for any valid reason), no matter how much that mode of opposition might actually do harm to the state and the country. This is a man for whom party politics and getting elected outweigh any possible considerations of civic duty. I consider that a violation of his oath of office, and would recommend that oath-breaking be a crime (it currently is not, unfortunately).

How well has the Affordable Care Act worked for you?

We're spending thousands more on health care now. My wife is a diabetic. She became diabetic after our last child was born.

I've yet to see a penny in savings on our health care costs. Our rates and costs didn't simply go up, they tripled or more, depending on what the service or product was. Affordable Care my rear end.

If oath-breaking was a crime, Obama would be in jail by now. Last time I checked, he gave weapons to terrorists in Syria, his BATFE gave weapons to drug cartels in Mexico, and he has refused to enforce immigration laws he doesn't agree with and tried to override actual laws he is sworn to enforce with executive orders. Much of what he and his administration has done is dictionary definition illegal. I thought the Bush policies would end when Bush was out of office. Boy was I wrong.

Wild Bill was nearly impeached because he couldn't keep his fly zipped. That wasn't even a crime, as far as I know. Obama has committed real crimes and it's public knowledge. No calls for impeachment. Astonishing. Mr. and Mrs. America care more about what the President does in the bedroom than what he or she does in the name of the United States of America.

The current so-called democrats went off the deep end with nuttier-than-thou politics overriding the more moderate influences in the party in much the same way that the tea partiers overrode conservatism. America is not a social engineering experiment and our military is most definitely not a social engineering experiment. Both parties need that point hammered home.

GW Johnson wrote:

Now you know exactly (1) why I consider him to be an embarrassment to the State of Texas, and (2) why I did not, and will never, vote for him.
GW

I'm also from Texas. However, I consider nearly all of our politicians to be an embarrassment to our country.

Just curious, but of the available candidates to choose from, who in your mind is more likely to give more funding to NASA?

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-02-04 11:43:04

kbd512 wrote:

GW Johnson wrote:
I don't really believe that would come to pass. Cruz's real history is only telling whoever he is talking to whatever he thinks they want to hear. His actual actions bear little resemblance to what he tells various constituencies, excepting the tea party extremist crowd. It's all lies, lies, lies.
Like Obama?
Ted Cruz just sounds like another politician to me. I think you'll be hard pressed to find a politician that doesn't tailor his or her speeches to a specific group.
GW Johnson wrote:
He really does act to oppose the Democrats in any way possible just because they are Democrats (not for any valid reason), no matter how much that mode of opposition might actually do harm to the state and the country. This is a man for whom party politics and getting elected outweigh any possible considerations of civic duty. I consider that a violation of his oath of office, and would recommend that oath-breaking be a crime (it currently is not, unfortunately).
How well has the Affordable Care Act worked for you?
We're spending thousands more on health care now. My wife is a diabetic. She became diabetic after our last child was born.
I've yet to see a penny in savings on our health care costs. Our rates and costs didn't simply go up, they tripled or more, depending on what the service or product was. Affordable Care my rear end.
If oath-breaking was a crime, Obama would be in jail by now. Last time I checked, he gave weapons to terrorists in Syria, his BATFE gave weapons to drug cartels in Mexico, and he has refused to enforce immigration laws he doesn't agree with and tried to override actual laws he is sworn to enforce with executive orders. Much of what he and his administration has done is dictionary definition illegal. I thought the Bush policies would end when Bush was out of office. Boy was I wrong.
Wild Bill was nearly impeached because he couldn't keep his fly zipped. That wasn't even a crime, as far as I know. Obama has committed real crimes and it's public knowledge. No calls for impeachment. Astonishing. Mr. and Mrs. America care more about what the President does in the bedroom than what he or she does in the name of the United States of America.
The current so-called democrats went off the deep end with nuttier-than-thou politics overriding the more moderate influences in the party in much the same way that the tea partiers overrode conservatism. America is not a social engineering experiment and our military is most definitely not a social engineering experiment. Both parties need that point hammered home.
GW Johnson wrote:
Now you know exactly (1) why I consider him to be an embarrassment to the State of Texas, and (2) why I did not, and will never, vote for him.
GW
I'm also from Texas. However, I consider nearly all of our politicians to be an embarrassment to our country.
Just curious, but of the available candidates to choose from, who in your mind is more likely to give more funding to NASA?

I'd say Ted Cruz, he doesn't agree with Global Warming, so he'll spend more money exploring the Solar System and less on looking inward and studying the Earth's climate from space, he has said so himself.

RobertDyck · 2016-02-07 10:24:42

Not sure where to post this, so I'll put it here.
Space experts warn Congress that NASA’s “Journey to Mars” is illusory

John Sommerer...National Research Council
“While sending humans to Mars...it is only with unprecedented cumulative investment, and, frankly, unprecedented discipline in development, testing, execution, and leadership, that this enterprise is likely to be successful.”
He implied that NASA presently had none of this in sufficient quantities.
“It might be better to stop talking about Mars if there is no appetite in Congress and the Administration for higher human spaceflight budgets and more disciplined execution by NASA,”

Tom Young, former director of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and former president and chief operating officer of the Martin Marietta Corporation...
“What we do not have is a plan, strategy, or architecture with sufficient detail that takes us from today to humans on the surface of Mars,”
Young said he favored continuing with a mission to Mars but that following such a course required hard choices and narrowing NASA's focus.

Despite the lack of a well-defined pathway, NASA's Bolden warned in late 2015 that the space agency was “doomed” if Congress or the next president refocused the space agency’s human spaceflight goals away from Mars. With a transition looming next year to a new president, the panelists were deeply skeptical that such generalities would survive the scrutiny of a new White House.

Two of the three experts...favored...stepwise exploration by moving from low-Earth orbit to cislunar space near the Moon and then to the lunar surface itself. This would allow NASA to both achieve meaningful exploration goals and engage the burgeoning private space sector, which has been hungering to develop lunar resources.
This approach appeared to intrigue some Republican legislators...This group seemed eager to consider a Moon-first approach...

I am pleased they acknowledge that they don't have a plan, and that constant talk about a human mission to Mars is disingenuous. However, I'm concerned about the conclusion. They actually want to abandon Mars? This is a problem.

SpaceNut · 2016-02-07 18:18:19

There are several topics that are effect by the view from up high in the senate such as the SLS, Deepspace habitat, asteroid mission ect.. and mars in the long run... notice no direct reference to the moon but we all know that its important as well for the commercial industry to get a piece of the pie within what Nasa is planning to do for the next half century....or Nasa will not have the funds to do all of it.

RobertDyck · 2016-02-07 19:20:03

Not "Mars in the long run". As long as you say that, nothing will be done. That's a politician's way of saying he has absolutely no intention of allowing this to move forward. At all. Period. Either do it now, or it won't be done.

And I'm sorry, but you're wrong about the Moon. It's actually not important. It was in the 1960s due to fear of establishing missile launch facilities with nuclear warheads. The launch of Sputnik demonstrated the Soviet Union had an ICBM that could drop a nuclear bomb anywhere in the world. The space race became a proxy to demonstrate to countries of the world that America had high technology, while the Soviet Union did the same. That part was about winning allies, and access to the resources they possessed. America was losing the race, so JFK moved the goal post. He changed the goal to the Moon because he hoped a long run at a more distant target would allow American to catch up and pass the Soviet Union. It worked.

But what resources does the Moon possess? Metal asteroids have gold, silver, platinum, rhodium, and other platinum group metals. They also have industrial metals in highly concentrated metallic form, but precious metals can be brought to Earth for profit. Carbonaceous chondrite asteroids have carbon compounds and water, which can be harvested for propellant as well as gasses needed to smelt metals from metal asteroids. Unfortunately those working on Constellation, spacecraft for the Moon, wanted to use stuff they were already working on for an asteroid mission. Do I again have to explain why bringing an asteroid toward Earth is bad? And Mars has all the resources necessary for a self-sustaining settlement. It has atmosphere, water, carbon, nitrogen, glass, metal. It has everything you need to smelt metals. It has resources to make propellant. NASA orbiters have even identified thorium, useful as fuel for a nuclear reactor. The Moon has none of that.

Then there's spacecraft design. A surface habitat for Mars can be easily used as a Moon base. A habitat to carry astronauts to Mars can easily be used to carry astronauts to an asteroid. And yes, to an asteroid, not bring an asteroid here. Designing for the Moon results in Orion, an oversized spacecraft with 3 week duration. Apollo had 2 weeks of life support, so that is one week more. But Mars is 6 months one way. It's 8.5 months if you take a Hohmann transfer orbit. Asteroids are similar time as Mars. Especially considering an asteroid has to be about as far from the Sun as Mars to retain ice. So designing for Mars, and Mars first, opens up everything else.

GW Johnson · 2016-02-08 11:34:22

If you look at actions and ignore the words (talk is cheap, and worthless), it's quite clear NASA has no intention of sending men to Mars, not in the late 2030's, not even in the 2040's. Not until Congress demands it and forks over the cash to keep monopoly ULA fat and happy while doing it. And that WILL NEVER happen, not in a giant corporate welfare state.

If they had any intention to send men to Mars anytime in the next 30 years or so, they'd be working on the right stuff to go there, which includes artificial gravity, radiation shielding, and a spacious deep space habitat with one or another level of recycling in its life support. The closest to any of that is them tinkering around (fairly ineffectively) with life support recycling on the ISS.

Also, they would have made it clear to Congress that SLS/Orion is a moon rocket not a Mars rocket. They have not; that rocket is still being falsely advertised to the American public as a Mars rocket, when it is anything but. That capsule is still being falsely advertised to the public as something that will carry crews to Mars, when it so obviously cannot.

It's not about the budget or lack of budget anymore. It's about corrupt congressional politics and a corporate welfare state in which the money goes to the giants, who then need produce nothing for it anymore.

LOOK NOT to the government for men on Mars. Look instead to Musk and others like him. Cassandra has spoken!

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2016-02-08 11:38:12)

SpaceNut · 2016-02-08 19:34:49

Here is another area that needs improvements on...

is power as the size of the solar arrays for ISS is eight solar arrays with each being 112 feet long by 39 feet wide capable of generating 84 to 120 kilowatts of electricity when in the sunlight, about 60 percent of the electricity that the solar arrays generate is used to charge a total of 16 battery charge/discharge cycles per day. That places the typical power level at 50 kilowatts average for station 24x7 useage. Energy from the sun (solar power) is collected by the solar arrays, coarsely conditioned by the Sequential Shunt Unit (SSU), tightly regulated by the Direct Current (DC) to DC Converter Unit (DDCU), and stored in the batteries for future use. Each battery is composed of nickel-hydrogen cells which consists of two 365 lb Orbital Replacement Units (ORUs). Starting in 2017, the nickel-hydrogen battery ORUs will be replaced by Lithium-ion batteries. Each Li-ion battery will weigh about 425 lb, and each adapter plate will weigh 65 pounds, for a weight savings of 299 lb. It appears from the drawing that there are 4 sets of 9 batteries to support the solar arrays.

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-02-08 22:45:42

RobertDyck wrote:

Not "Mars in the long run". As long as you say that, nothing will be done. That's a politician's way of saying he has absolutely no intention of allowing this to move forward. At all. Period. Either do it now, or it won't be done.
And I'm sorry, but you're wrong about the Moon. It's actually not important. It was in the 1960s due to fear of establishing missile launch facilities with nuclear warheads. The launch of Sputnik demonstrated the Soviet Union had an ICBM that could drop a nuclear bomb anywhere in the world. The space race became a proxy to demonstrate to countries of the world that America had high technology, while the Soviet Union did the same. That part was about winning allies, and access to the resources they possessed. America was losing the race, so JFK moved the goal post. He changed the goal to the Moon because he hoped a long run at a more distant target would allow American to catch up and pass the Soviet Union. It worked.
But what resources does the Moon possess? Metal asteroids have gold, silver, platinum, rhodium, and other platinum group metals. They also have industrial metals in highly concentrated metallic form, but precious metals can be brought to Earth for profit. Carbonaceous chondrite asteroids have carbon compounds and water, which can be harvested for propellant as well as gasses needed to smelt metals from metal asteroids. Unfortunately those working on Constellation, spacecraft for the Moon, wanted to use stuff they were already working on for an asteroid mission. Do I again have to explain why bringing an asteroid toward Earth is bad?

Just like allowing the state of Iran to develop and possess nuclear weapons is bad, but we are doing it anyway! Asteroids add no additional capability to destroy civilization that nuclear weapons don't already possess. Take any asteroid in the Solar system that we can move and impact on Earth, and there is a nuclear weapon that we can build which will release just as much energy that impacting that asteroid on Earth will yield. There is no upper limit on the potential of thermo-nuclear weapons. I think the real danger is people with nuclear weapons that think they can conquer the World, and will therefore try to do so. I think a bunch of religious fanatics with nuclear weapons is more dangerous than an asteroid. Asteroids help us to survive the ravages of mankind, by taking us off the Earth and allowing us the resources to live in space. It is unfortunate, that we currently have to share a planet with a bunch of religious sociopaths in the Middle East that are developing nuclear weapons, the sooner some of us get off the Earth, the better!

And Mars has all the resources necessary for a self-sustaining settlement. It has atmosphere, water, carbon, nitrogen, glass, metal. It has everything you need to smelt metals. It has resources to make propellant. NASA orbiters have even identified thorium, useful as fuel for a nuclear reactor. The Moon has none of that.

Mars is also further away, we need to provide a habitat for the humans in transit from Earth to Mars, whereas transport to the Moon requires only a giant rocket launched from Earth, no exotic drives, a simple chemical rocket will do, no need to provide artificial gravity in transit, 3 days of weightlessness won't kill the astronauts in transit.

Then there's spacecraft design. A surface habitat for Mars can be easily used as a Moon base. A habitat to carry astronauts to Mars can easily be used to carry astronauts to an asteroid. And yes, to an asteroid, not bring an asteroid here.

It would be easier to shape an asteroid into a space colony, if it is orbiting Earth, rather than the Sun separately in an inconvenient orbit! Remember the closer an asteroid is to Earth's orbit, the harder it is to reach, as the launch windows are less frequent. If such an asteroid were orbiting Earth, we could have continuous access to it.

Designing for the Moon results in Orion, an oversized spacecraft with 3 week duration. Apollo had 2 weeks of life support, so that is one week more. But Mars is 6 months one way. It's 8.5 months if you take a Hohmann transfer orbit. Asteroids are similar time as Mars. Especially considering an asteroid has to be about as far from the Sun as Mars to retain ice. So designing for Mars, and Mars first, opens up everything else.

Besides the likes of Putin, or the Chinese are not likely to listen to you, if he wants to bring an asteroid into Earth orbit, no amount of argument is going to dissuade him, he is willing to break treaties, so signing treaties with him is worthless.

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-03-31 10:39:58

It appears Ted Cruz is a step closer to being President, thanks to Trump's recent blunder. If Trump falls short of the delegates he needs to become the Republican nominee, then the most logical figure for the anti-Trump forces to rally behind is Ted Cruz. I believe Ted Cruz is less in favor of an "Earth-centric" space program than Obama is, so that can only be good for the exploration of Mars. There will be less of these Global Warming studies, and more of a program designed to establish a message in space.

SpaceNut · 2016-04-03 20:23:00

Neither party clearly offers more for NASA and KSC in the upcoming election.

But if you look at today’s leading presidential candidates, a stronger pattern emerges:
• Sanders has consistently voted to cut space exploration since the 1990s.
• Cruz and Kasich, from space states, are space advocates.
• Earlier this year in New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton said “I really, really do support the space program.” Campaign rhetoric? Perhaps. But in her 2008 campaign, she spoke out for reversing funding cuts in NASA. And she’s often said she wanted to be an astronaut.
• Donald Trump said this about space programs: “Right now, we have bigger problems — you understand that? We’ve got to fix our potholes

How space could decide presidential race

It has three components:
• Military space, balanced between exploiting space as a military asset and funding the rest of our defense needs.
• Commercial space, its value to Brevard a function of the needs of the marketplace and the ability of agencies like Space Florida and our Economic Development Commission to convince the rocket “shooters” (and perhaps soon, manufacturers) to operate here.
• NASA space and especially the KSC component for science and space exploration, its value determined by funding decisions made in the Federal Budget.

We would hope that space was not seen in this light but that the candidates would step up and make a difference.

An enlightened presidential campaign should see its position on space matters as central to its overall strategy to winning in these four swing states. Our job is to make these campaigns see the light. We can do this three ways:
•Through the press forcing candidates to be clear on their plans for NASA. This newspaper has a key role, as do the other media outlets here and in the other swing states that care about space.
•Secondly, space advocacy organizations in these four states aggressively pushing space into the central campaign strategies of those candidates smart enough to listen.
•And third, the insiders in each of the swing-state presidential campaigns and at the national level seeing and acting upon the high potential that the candidate’s position on space could win or lose the election.

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-04-03 21:26:26

For one, I think a President like Cruz maybe more likely to tear up the UN Space Treaty, and once that is done, we can have the ownership of private property in space.

I do not think a President who apologizes for America and believes it is the cause of most of the World's problems is going to be a Pro-space President, why should he?

I think it should be possible for a country to pursue a space policy that is also in its own national interest rather than generally for the benefit of all mankind. It is after all, not all of mankind's tax money that is going to pay for that space program, but rather the taxpayers of that particular country. Now maybe if NASA was seen as doing something in America's national interest, it might receive more funding. There is a cost and benefit for every taxpayer dollar spend. NASA often acts as the World's Space Agency, but it is being funded by the United States. My suggestion is how about claiming an asteroid and mining it? Would the World object to that? There are plenty of asteroids to go around after all. Perhaps if we could significantly change the orbit of the object in question, we could claim it as US territory. This leaves out objects such as Mars or Venus, since we can't budge those, they are stuck in the orbits we found them in.

New Mars Forums

Announcement

#76 2016-02-03 14:05:45

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#77 2016-02-04 11:43:04

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#78 2016-02-07 10:24:42

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#79 2016-02-07 18:18:19

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#80 2016-02-07 19:20:03

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#81 2016-02-08 11:34:22

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#82 2016-02-08 19:34:49

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#83 2016-02-08 22:45:42

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#84 2016-03-31 10:39:58

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#85 2016-04-03 20:23:00

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#86 2016-04-03 21:26:26

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

Board footer