NASA As A Global Source of Inspiration

"What is it that they understand about what NASA does"
NASA explores space and pushes the future and that kicks ass.

New NASA tagline?

Most people I know, when I alert them to things NASA is doing, agree too that it does indeed kick ass.

Pretty much everyone posting to NASA Watch is too close to the issue. We know or think we know the technical merits or demerits of different paths forward, and we each have ideas as for what is best for NASA.

Any motivation burnout and cynicism comes from being too close to the sausage-making.

Americans, on average, think that 24% of our Federal budget expenditures are spent on NASA. In reality of course, less 0.6% of the Federal budget is spent on NASA. And even during the height of the Apollo development era, less than 6% of the total Federal budget was spent on NASA.

So most Americans have an extremely distorted view of how much tax payer money is really being spent on our space program which has actually created a lot more wealth for the general economy than what we've spent to support it.

Marcel F. Williams

Maybe these youngsters are aiming for the stars, while the rest of us argue about calling a cab....

NASA stopped inspiring me as soon as I stopped being impressed with Computer Generated Art being called a "vision". It stopped inspiring me when they started sending teachers into space and catering to the under-10 crowd. It stopped inspiring me when instead of planting flags (which does matter), they hyped microgravity research.

Sure, in the abstract NASA and Space Exploration is important, breath taking and inspiring. But look at the agency that does it. Aiming small and living off a legacy that's older than I am is all the agency has been about.

To this very day, NASA still justifies the ISS with bulletpoints about Osteoperosis medication, microgravity, new manufacturing materials, medical research and so forth. So rarely do they say that the ISS is an end unto itself: to construct massive engineering and building infrastructure in space.

What's more inspiring? An Agency that justifies itself by building a space station because its hard, or an agency that justifies itself by saying it is building a space station to help treat brittle bones in aging senior citizens?