What does Donald Trump mean for our Space Program?

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-05-04 10:55:59

What do you think is going to happen in a Trump Administration regarding space?
I have a thought, what if you married Lockheed's compact 100 MW fusion reactor to an orbiting space laser, and the North Koreans then did something foolish, such as firing at one of our naval ships? The US and South Korea fire back, not only that, they bomb North Korean ports from which those ships came and they sink as many ships as they can so the North Koreas don't to it again. In response the North Koreans launch nuclear tipped missiles at Seoul. Tokyo, Honolulu, and Los Angeles, and that's where the fusion powered orbiting space laser blows up each incoming warhead, one by one, then the United States and South Korea mass their troops along North Korea's border and invades!

Terraformer · 2016-05-04 14:43:00

Hasn't he said something about space not being important right now? I don't think a Trump presidency would be good for NASA, or even just meh...

SpaceNut · 2016-05-04 18:07:13

Will let the article speak for its self... Potholes Trump Space In Trump Space Policy

Trump Praises NASA, But Dodges Funding Questions in Aerospace America Q&A

What a Clinton and Trump Presidency Would Mean for NASA Space Exploration

Excelsior · 2016-05-04 20:29:06

When and if he takes office, commercial space will have nearly all the pieces needed to go back to the moon in earnest. If he directed the full power of his ego towards an all commercial architecture, we could do a lot more the same amount of money.

Last edited by Excelsior (2016-05-04 22:00:51)

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-05-05 01:50:15

Depends on how you phrase the question. If you ask a question like, "are you willing to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to send a four man mission to Mars?", you may get a predictable answer from him, by supplying all the givens. Also Trump says he wants to rebuild the defense department, one particular direction it can go in would be missile defense. As we know, Trump is a bit of an America first isolationist, but Isolationism only requires that we don't enter into unnecessary alliances, it doesn't mean we have to be vulnerable to nuclear weapons of we don't have to be. That technology also would have civilian applications for going to Mars.

Mars_B4_Moon · 2024-06-04 03:54:24

both are very unpopular and both running, one of them can be a 2 term President and one of them could be a 1 term President

politics has become divided in the USA and across much of the world

Biden reacts to Trump's conviction, says verdict shows no one is above the law
https://www.yahoo.com/gma/biden-reacts- … 38344.html

Elon Musk Calls For Hosting Biden Vs. Trump Debate On X As Race To White House Gains Momentum
https://www.benzinga.com/news/24/05/388 … s-momentum

Nitish Pahwa
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/inconven … 00420.html

The Inconvenient Truth About Elon Musk’s New Love Affair With Trump

On Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal reported on Elon Musk’s increasingly close relationship with Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, which has flourished to the point that the two “talk on the phone several times a month.” The conversation subjects tend to cover Trump’s attempt to regain White House control and the potential opportunities for Musk and his companies, like Tesla and SpaceX, under another potential Trump administration.

Musk rejected the report’s central conceit—that Trump had discussed an advisory role for him should the former president be reelected—but he certainly keeps behaving like a typical Trump supplicant. Just look at his X posts following Trump’s 34-count conviction in the New York hush money trial, in which he refers to the process as “troubling,” endorses a Sequoia Capital partner’s $300,000 donation to Trump’s campaign, proclaims that “great damage was done today to the public’s faith in the American legal system,” and reply-guys a couple of characteristically lame Babylon Bee headlines. President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign has responded with a scoff, declaring that, “Despite what Donald Trump thinks, America is not for sale to billionaires, oil and gas executives, or even Elon Musk.”

It was his hijacking of Tesla Motors in the mid-2000s, for which he raised money, forced out existing employees, designed and kickstarted production of the pioneering electric Roadster model, and secured a hefty government loan, that kept the company going as the financial crisis shellacked the automotive sector. He further invested in the then-burgeoning domestic markets for solar panels and energy-dense batteries, and spoke out about why addressing climate change was a motivator for his business. He even inspired other environmentally conscious celebrities and encouraged them to boost his profile, putting Tesla models in movies and all. Yes, the space rockets, intergalactic dreams, and NASA contracts played no small part. But it was part and parcel of a futuristic goal that also included lots of green tech, including sleek gas-free cars.

This was such a defining aspect of Musk that it even colored his relationship with Trump, early in the former president’s term. Despite having voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016 (and for Barack Obama, who offered some lucrative federal contracts, in the preceding presidential cycles), the Tesla CEO joined one of Trump’s executive advisory councils in early 2017, justifying the decision by saying it was better for “more moderates to advise” Trump as opposed to “only extremists.” Yet he didn’t last long, choosing to resign when Trump withdrew the United States from the Paris Agreement, after claiming to have “done all I can to advise directly to POTUS … that we remain.”

Still, he didn’t brush aside the possibility of voting for Trump in 2020, telling Kara Swisher that Trump was “as supportive as he can be” of the electric car industry despite his policies in favor of gas cars. Musk was likely alluding to Trump’s professed endorsement of his desire to keep his California Tesla plant open in the thick of the pre-vaccine COVID pandemic.

The SpaceX CEO has said repeatedly that he voted for Joe Biden in 2020, although biographer Walter Isaacson reported that Musk stayed home because he didn’t think his vote mattered in blue state Cali. Isaacson likewise mentioned that Musk grew angry with President Joe Biden after he was not invited to a 2021 presidential event on EVs.

Elon Musk talks space, AI, and more
https://finance.yahoo.com/video/elon-mu … 10155.html

Biden and Trump Want a Presidential Debate Safe Space
https://reason.com/2024/05/16/biden-and … afe-space/

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2024-06-04 18:10:55)

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#1 2016-05-04 10:55:59

What does Donald Trump mean for our Space Program?

#2 2016-05-04 14:43:00

Re: What does Donald Trump mean for our Space Program?

#3 2016-05-04 18:07:13

Re: What does Donald Trump mean for our Space Program?

#4 2016-05-04 20:29:06

Re: What does Donald Trump mean for our Space Program?

#5 2016-05-05 01:50:15

Re: What does Donald Trump mean for our Space Program?

#6 2024-06-04 03:54:24

Re: What does Donald Trump mean for our Space Program?

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