Why did Space X get the contract ?

[gotsnowgotslush]

Thank you, Ronald Reagan for wrecking the Space Shuttle program
and all of the other rotten things you did to the USA.

You whored yourself into the Whitehouse, and brought George Herbert Walker Bush.
You died in June, and we are glad you are dead.

SpaceX rocket heading to Space Station explodes minutes after launch

Minutes after a SpaceX rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral on Sunday (Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station)

It disintegrated and burst into flames, destroying 5,200 pounds of supplies, research and hardware for the International Space Station.

Falcon 9 and its cargo, a Dragon resupply space capsule, lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Sunday at 10:21 a.m. At 139 seconds into its flight, NASA video showed a white cloud emitting from the rocket before flames appeared and debris fell from the sky.

The rocket was about 27 miles high and traveling at 2,900 mph when the failure occurred.

This marks the third space station resupply mission lost within a year from three different launch providers.

In April, a Russian cargo ship spun out of control and burned up upon re-entry, along with all its contents.
Last October, an Orbital Sciences Corp. supply ship was destroyed in a launch accident.

http://m******.com/29793-despite-rocket-explosion-new-crew-will-fly-to-space-station.html

 

[Sean Renaud]

Space X is an amazing step for private industry that everybody should be proud of. The article claims this is their seventh ressuply mission to the ISS, did they fail the other six? If not I'd say it's not exactly a track record to be ashamed of. Prior to Space X space travel was only something large industrial countries could accomplish.

Not sure what Reagan did to NASA, thought this was mostly the fault of Obama's Congress.

 

[sr71plt]

Obama's Congress.

Obama's Congress being Republican, right?

 

[Sean Renaud]

Obama's Congress being Republican, right?

I'd have to look back at when the defunded it but I'm fairly sure it was still a democrat congress.

 

[phrodeau]

Budget cuts are sometimes necessary, as they were during the recession.

Trouble is, the deepest cuts made to Nasa's budget were for climate research and education. Guess who wanted those things cut.

 

[Sean Renaud]

Budget cuts are sometimes necessary, as they were during the recession.

Trouble is, the deepest cuts made to Nasa's budget were for climate research and education. Guess who wanted those things cut.

As Greece in particular but much of Europe and even a few US states can tell you budget cuts during a recession don't exactly help anything.

It didn't help that the Shuttle was retired which wasn't *really* the fault of the budget cuts but seems to have been related last I checked. i'd have to go look it up.

Regardless as I've looked up Space X has had 18 sucessful launches and I believe 6 to the ISS so this wasn't a bunch of rank noobs we sent up for no reason.

 

[homewa]

So we have three accidents from three entirely unrelated entities. Were they using the same rockets? The same fuel sources? That's profoundly unlikely. It's just bad coincidences (accidents happen, hell NASA had it's share of them) all happening at the same time, so we give them extra importance.

Now I do feel that the Space Program is one of the most critical things that we've killed. I also doubt that either party is to blame, it's been a joint effort from both parties that was needed to fuck this that badly. And now we're too busy tossing blame around to demand that it be reversed.

I don't think commercial space travel is that bad, but I think that the government should also be involved, after all if we don't space may one day be the domain of only the rich, and that would be unfortunate.

 

[Sean Renaud]

A joint effort? No, not really. This was pretty much all Republican all the way with cowardly Dems failing to put the breaks to it but I'm not clear even in hindsight what alternatives they had.

 

[homewa]

A joint effort? No, not really. This was pretty much all Republican all the way with cowardly Dems failing to put the breaks to it but I'm not clear even in hindsight what alternatives they had.

There have been plenty of blows at the space program from both sides of the aisle. Cutting NASA funding is pretty much one of the only budget things there's not been large argument about, there's no lobbyists from space, and NASA can't afford to purchase themselves any congresspeople.

 

[Sean Renaud]

Examples please.

 

[homewa]

Examples please.

https://www.aip.org/fyi/1996/1995-house-vote-cut-nsf-and-nasa-funding

In 1995, that's more than twice as many Dems voting to slash NASA funding. The most recent attack was the one spearheaded by Ted Cruz. I think that's sufficient to show that both parties have had their turns taking shots at NASA funding.

 

[Sean Renaud]

Thanks.

 

[homewa]

Thanks.

Not a problem. The whole thing is a travesty, and it's very easy for both parties to point the finger and distract us while they continue with the bullshit.

 

[Sean Renaud]

Not a problem. The whole thing is a travesty, and it's very easy for both parties to point the finger and distract us while they continue with the bullshit.

The thing is I find that most often when people say "both sides do it" (and I'm not going to ask you to dig up each and every cut for obvious reasons) that it's only true if you squint really hard. I believe the proper term is a False Equivalency and it's basically shortened to if you can find one Democrat who says "I want to raise taxes to 100% and set an income cap!" That it even out with 150 Republicans saying they want to remove the income tax and eliminate the minimum wage." (Examples chosen for the numbers not the positions.)

Also you don't seem to have taken it personally but me asking you for a citation doesn't mean I'm calling you a liar or stupid or even misinformed. (You'll know if I mean any of those things.) It either means that I would like to know more or that I find the statement to be a bit off and I also find that people often times believe stuff that they heard from Billy who heard it from Mario who heard it from Duke Nukem who's mother told him his grandmother once said it.

 

[homewa]

The thing is I find that most often when people say "both sides do it" (and I'm not going to ask you to dig up each and every cut for obvious reasons) that it's only true if you squint really hard. I believe the proper term is a False Equivalency and it's basically shortened to if you can find one Democrat who says "I want to raise taxes to 100% and set an income cap!" That it even out with 150 Republicans saying they want to remove the income tax and eliminate the minimum wage." (Examples chosen for the numbers not the positions.)

Yes, it's a kind of political trick they use to make it seem like it's not just one party doing things, when often it is. Like I said, NASA doesn't have the money to buy congresspeople, you can actually see a lot of bipartisanship spring up where there's an easy target for funding cuts that they can tout out to pay for whatever bullshit their lobbyists are paying for.

To be fair, currently it's been the Republicans cutting space funding, but it's historically been split between both sides. So you could blame the Republicans for certain issues.

Also you don't seem to have taken it personally but me asking you for a citation doesn't mean I'm calling you a liar or stupid or even misinformed. (You'll know if I mean any of those things.) It either means that I would like to know more or that I find the statement to be a bit off and I also find that people often times believe stuff that they heard from Billy who heard it from Mario who heard it from Duke Nukem who's mother told him his grandmother once said it.

I don't mind being asked for citations, sometimes (although not on this forum but on others), when I've had to look up citations, I'll find out that I am misremembering or was misinformed. And fixing that is a big deal.

 

[Sean Renaud]

Yes, it's a kind of political trick they use to make it seem like it's not just one party doing things, when often it is. Like I said, NASA doesn't have the money to buy congresspeople, you can actually see a lot of bipartisanship spring up where there's an easy target for funding cuts that they can tout out to pay for whatever bullshit their lobbyists are paying for.

To be fair, currently it's been the Republicans cutting space funding, but it's historically been split between both sides. So you could blame the Republicans for certain issues.

I don't mind being asked for citations, sometimes (although not on this forum but on others), when I've had to look up citations, I'll find out that I am misremembering or was misinformed. And fixing that is a big deal.

Yeah it is a political trick, but it takes a while to notice it (even when you're the one doing it sometimes) and my entire point there was simply no hard feelings. I notice you haven't even hit 1k so you don't know who I am.

While I do blame the Republicans at current I'd have to go look it up but if I recall the Space Shuttle was always technically an experiment and one that failed as hard as an experiment can while still being technically functional.

I don't ask for cites to much (unless you're the OP) or like I said something just sounds really odd. Otherwise I tend to be decently cool.