Video: Rep. Posey Rips NASA Initiative to Reach out to "Muslim" Countries

If we Americans are going to spend X amount of money for NASA, these funds ought to go towards the improvement of our economy and not necessarily another nations.

I don't mind being frankly nationalistic about this.

Would the Chinese 'invite' us onboard whatever HLV they are going to design to "plant their flag" on the moon? I think not.

Would the Soviet's have 'invited' to participate in their L-1 rocket? I think not.

Technology R & D needs to benefit the USA first before it is exported to other nations.

Additionally, is it wise to facilitate the advancement of nations whose governmental philosophy may not be grounded in Western pluralism and/or Western liberalism (ie the Bill of Rights etc).

The Soviet Union was not defeated by Apollo-Soyuz. A waste of an Apollo capsule in my opinion (should have been used for a Skylab 4/5 mission to boost it's orbit).

It was defeated because it's political mechanism had ceased to benefit the general population. The Soviet economy was in very bad shape.

Another hysterical Congressman? He seems to be very concerned about American jobs. Funny, but I don't remember those stories about NASA reaching out to Muslim nations talking about exporting jobs there. The point seemed to be more along the lines of engaging them on cooperative science payloads and programs. He didn't make any comments in the past about our cooperative science and payloads programs with the Europeans, Canadians, Japanese or Indians. I wonder why he's so worked up then? Could it be about something else? I'm sure it's just a coincidence that his district includes a big chunk of the Space Coast. Maybe his [b]Constellations[/b] are just not in alignment today...

Oh, for crying out loud. The Indonesians have been piggy-backing on U.S. and ESA missions for years. This one article does not represent any appreciable change in the status quo, except perhaps squeezing some good P.R. out of the partnership.

There are certainly legitimate concerns about the Bolden plan and Obama's policies, but this in particular is really is making a mountain out of a molehill.

Nations that are "Muslim" are often officially Muslim, and do not have our kind of religious tolerance and religious freedom.
Recognizing nations as "Muslim" nations is contradictory to our concept of separation of church and state.
There may even be a First Amendment issue in favoring foreign nations based on their religions.

"[Bolden] mentioned new opportunities with Indonesia, including an educational program that examines global climate change," Rep. Posey said.

"Am I the only one who thinks there's something wrong with this picture? We need jobs for Americans."

No, Rep. Posey. You are not the only dumb racist who thinks that.

> It was defeated because its political mechanism had ceased to benefit the general population. The economy was in very bad shape.

This is strange.

I am a little shocked that the comments posted thus far are criticizing Rep. Posey. I am in total agreement with the congressman. While it is nice if my tax dollars can benefit other nations as show of good faith, that is secondary to benefiting Americans. It does not seem to make sense to lay off so many American NASA workers only to employ members of other nations with my tax dollars. If we have excess money to spend in the space field then why did we kill Constellation or at the very least why are we not using those dollars to employ Americans in other space endeavors?

Well, NASA just signed an agreement with Israel and I didnt hear any complaints. Don't tell Posey that Italian Catholics built the MPLMs. We'll have to throw them away to avoid the Papal cooties.

> It does not seem to make sense to lay off so many American NASA workers only to employ members of other nations with my tax dollars.

You've been misinformed.

If you were talking about buying trips to the ISS from Russia for $50,000,000 USD per astronaut because of government incompetence to develop an STS replacement on time when they had 30 years to think about it, you'd have a good point.

If you were talking about buying RD-180 from Russia instead of building it in the US or developing a domestic alternative from an engine development competition, you might have a good point.

But you're talking about diplomacy with third world countries. There are no American NASA workers going unemployed because of diplomacy with third world countries.

We choose not to go to the moon, because it is hard. We choose instead to use NASA (thats the National Aeronautics and Space Administration) to reach out to "muslim" nations and be used as foreign policy tool.

Muslim and moon start with the same letter.
Close enough for Obama I guess?

MASA?

Ugh. This is a nightmare.

rc: "No, Rep. Posey. You are not the only dumb racist who thinks that."

Correction...
No, Rep. Posey. You are not the only nationalist who thinks that.

Racism is when one's race is favored over another. Nationalism is when one's nation is favored over another. See the difference?

Man, you guys are easy. This is a purposeful red herring distraction from the main issues to get some people all worked up over trivialities. The results are predictable. O looks like a hero to his fan base while the responders apparently self-vilify themselves and lose sight of the main problem, reducing their political capital. Part of the overall plan. NASA is nothing but pure DC politics now. Too bad. This is pure beltway behavior.

I beg to differ. I currently work with a number of foreign national who were brought here to this country under similar international outreach programs. The funds that payed for their travel here to the U.S., their room, board, paychecks and the equipment they do research with all came from the U.S. State Department. In short, your tax dollars are currently being used to fund foreign national instead of going towards employment of Americans, despite the fact that those Americans payed the taxes which help fund these foreign nationals. Don't get me wrong, the people I mention are good people and I call most of them my friends, but it does into change the fact that American tax dollars are being used to fund people who did not pay into the American treasury, instead of those who did. This middle eastern outreach program is no different. In order to entice these nations, NASA and the state department will pay money out of their pockets to employ many of them here in the U.S. as opposed to Americans.

There's an old joke, The greatest time saver of today is... I'll do it tomorrow. This sums up the Obama space plan. Pretty much the opposite of leadership. Can't wait for our dollar to collapse under $1,400,000,000,000 trillion dollar per year deficits.

You are not the only dumb racist who thinks that." ...

If someone else were POTUS, and that President announced that he wanted NASA to make a special effort to cooperate in space endeavors with Christian nations, would you sanctimonious liberals all be fine with that?

I just love the way people scream 'RACISM!' at the drop of a hat. Racism really means 'I hate you for not agreeing with my political views' nowadays.

Back on topic: If the US doesn't have the money to fund Constellation, it don't have the money to fund other countries' space programs. Really, we shouldn't be putting one dime into another countries space program at all. They can purchase our services just like we have to pay for seats on the Soyuz. That's right. We're paying for other people's services while giving ours away for free. This should bother people that Failbama is so generous with *our* money. Oh and NASA isn't a tool for diplomacy. Diplomats are tools for diplomacy. Leave NASA alone and let it do its job of exploring space.

Since when is the sole purpose of the federal government to provide jobs? While maintaining an atmosphere conducive to a job-creating economy is important, diplomacy is a critical task of the government as well.

It seems to me it all comes out to be one and the same in the end -- by creating technological and economic ties to other countries, along with ITAR reforms that are being rumored, we stand to have a boom in the space industries as we finally allow other people to buy what we build. The fact that they're Muslim nations has little to do it. At any rate, we're talking about Indonesia here, a vibrant multi-cultural democracy, not a repressive Islamic regime.

This administration does see NASA cooperation as a tool for diplomacy, but this is no different than in the past. Apollo was about diplomacy as well, projecting soft power to demonstrate the superiority of capitalism and a free society. Otherwise that money would probably have gone to buy some more aircraft carriers and tanks and missiles.

The US was doing diplomacy long before NASA and can do so without it. NASA is underfunded as it is and heaping extra duties on it exacerbates the funding problems even further. And last time I checked, the government's duties is to its own people first. If NASA's going to be cut, put the money back into economy through tax cuts and not into worthless, feel good gestures of 'diplomacy'. If only the Russians emulated our 'diplomacy', NASA wouldn't have to fork over $50 million of taxpayer money per seat to rides to a space station that we did the lion's share of the work putting together. Charge Indonesia for our 'diplomacy' just like the Russians do us. Our leaders on both sides of the aisle is going to bankrupt this nation with their brand of 'diplomacy', and yes, it goes way beyond the deal with Indonesia so don't say it's not costing us much because it's just the tip of the iceberg in taxpayer-funded 'diplomacy'.

The fact that they're Muslim nations has little to do it. ...

So why did the Prince specifically specify Muslim nations, instead of all non-sectarian sorts of vibrant multi-cultural democracies?

> NASA is underfunded as it is and heaping extra duties on it exacerbates the funding problems even further.

How much does diplomacy with third world countries cost?

How much does Constellation cost?

How much is NASA underfunded?