Of all the quotes from President John Kennedy, my favorite is one of the most over looked. When Kennedy announced, at Rice University, that America was going to the moon in ten years and we achieved it for most Americans that was the end of the story.
But like Paul Harvey's "The Rest of the Story" that was not the end of the story.
President Kennedy was visiting New Mexico and was questioned by the press about the future of America's space plans for the future
Here is Kennedy at a press confrence in 1962, I think he had a pretty good grasp of where he THOUGHT American would be headed in space.
" 11.] Q. Mr. President, after your trip to Los Alamos Laboratory,
New Mexico, is it your intention to ask for more money to speed up
Project Rover, or for nuclear propulsion in space?
THE PRESIDENT. We’re going to let these tests go on, of the reactor.
These tests should be completed by July. If they are successful,
then we will put more money into the program, which would involve
the Nerva and Rift, both the engine and the regular machine.
We will wait until July, however, to see if these tests are successful.
It should be understood that the nuclear rocket, even under the most
favorable circumstances, would not play a role in any first lunar landing.
This will not come into play until 1970 or ‘71. It would be useful for
further trips to the moon or trips to Mars." QUOTE
Progressive Democrats do not seem to know THIS was our future plans. We were going to literally be the Star Trek generation. Even though kennedy said the moon in ten years, that was not the end, it was the BEGINNING.
Star Trek's crew flew through space in the Star Ship Enterprise. It utilized three different propulsion systms. Thrusters, for flying around a planet. Impulse engines, for flying from planet to planet inside a solar system and warp engines, for flying between stars.
Kennedy did not envision warp engines, but he DID believe we would have impulse engines for flying between planets and it is clearly expressed in my FAVORITE QUOTE:
"It should be understood that the nuclear rocket, even under the most
favorable circumstances, would not play a role in any first lunar landing.
This will not come into play until 1970 or ‘71. It would be useful for
further trips to the moon or trips to Mars."
The landings on the moon, using chemical rocket propulsion, were to be the begining NOT the end. Kennedy and the Progressive Democrats was the father of the Star Trek generation not Gene Rodenberry. Eighty-five percent of the American public know and respond favorable to Star Trek.
It crosses ALL gender, age, policital, economic, cultural, ethnic and religious lines.
Why the Democrats fail to understand this, and use it as THEE MOST UNIFING factor Progressive Democrats could grab onto is beyond me. Democrats talk about President Bush's war on science and can list a liteny of areas he has failed. Then mention manned space spending and it is like they all suffer from culturial amnesia and what the roots of the Progressive Democrats were on space and why we REALLY ARE the Star Trek generation. Here are some of the most common complaints about NASA and space spending. I have seen some of these stated on the Daily Kos.
"stop sending money into space"
"NASA should spend more money for education"
"NASA should spend more money for energy"
When I see "stop sending money into space" I want to ask them, what do they think NASA does, load up suit cases full of moeny, pack them onto a rocket and launch it into space? There is no stores in space, every dime gets spent here on earth and primaraily in America.
NASA doesn't have to fund education, that is what the Dept of Education is for and there budget is 20 times bigger then NASAs. NASA should only be funding the education they need for future programs.
NASA doesn't have to fund energy programs unless it is mission driven. That is why we have the Dept. of Energy, they also get a bigger budget then NASA.
When NASA was carrying out the Progressive Democrats and Kennedy's Apollo program the peak funding was about 4% of the budget. In today's terms that would be about 130 billion a year. Unfortunately that is not the case today, not even close. NASA just got 20 billion, about 6 tenths of one percent but manned programs only gets half of that.
Kennedy's New Dream ( page 78 - 80 )
"Despite the end of the nuclear airplane,
Kennedy did not lose his enthusiasm for nuclear
technology. The nation had also been working on
a nuclear space initiative since 1955, and this was
the brave new world that Kennedy wanted to explore.
Less than two months later he delivered his
famous "Urgent National Needs" speech before a
joint session of Congress about landing a man on
the Moon before the decade was out. He said,
"Now it is time to take longer strides—time for
a great new American enterprise—time for this
nation to take a clearly leading role in space
achievement, which in many ways may hold the
key to our future on Earth." He wanted the entire
nation to commit itself to achieving this goal
quickly and efficiently as before its rival superpower,
the Soviet Union, could do so. What is often
forgotten about this speech is that Kennedy
also advanced an even more compelling dream.
Though just months before he had cancelled the
nuclear airplane, now he called for increased funding
to develop a nuclear rocket. He said, "This gives
promise of some day providing a means for even
more exciting and ambitious exploration of space,
perhaps beyond the Moon, perhaps to the very end
of the solar system itself."
Audio tapes of Kennedy are always used to say Kennedy didn't care about space. That does not matter because regardless of how important he thought it was my point is about where he THOUGHT it was going.
Someone can not care about cars and the automobile industry but could also make comments on where they think it is heading. Kennedy, acting as the top reporter for the US, said in that press confrence where America and the Progressive Democrats where heading in space and where we would be in 1971, the moon and mars using impulse engines.
America, the bastion of capitalism, is not the leader in space tourism, Russia holds that exclusively to itself. Kennedy's fears do seem to have come true. America is not the leader, but, after 2010, will be going cap in hand to the Russians to beg a ride to the ISS, and I can promise you, we WILL be paying a PREMIUM for those rides.
The following poll is to try and get a feeling on how Progressive Democrats can Recapture our true beginnings as the Star Trek Generation and where should America concentrate some space dollars to achieve that goal. I am for robotic space missions but I actually do not care about robots in space just like I do not care about robotic vacumn cleaners, robotics for building cars, robots for mowing the lawn. They are machines without feelings. SO I do not care about sending robby the robot into space as much as I want to send Robby the AMERICAN into space to bring back those HUMAN feelings and experiences and how those can advance humanity's dreams, not robby the robots.