Save Constellation Supporters Respond

That is Mike Okuda's site (If your a Trek fan, you may know that name). He designed many graphics for NASA as well.

He has done an excellent job with that web page and it reflects the deep belief of how important many of us think NASA human spaceflight is, especailly return to moon, regardless of the Constellation debate.

And ... where is the money coming from?

Well heck, if the choice was really between the President's request and full funding for Constellation, I'd take... well, I'd still take the President's budget. But Constellation would be a lot easier to justify. Just make sure you remember to ask for a pony too while you're at it.

I am saddened to see this website supporting such a disaster as the Constellation program.

The entire plan has proven to be a cruel joke on the aspirations of Americans of all generations, has wasted billions of dollars and achieved none of the objectives set for it by President Bush - its creator.

Let's be absolutely clear, Constellation as executed had Nothing to do with going to the Moon, Mars or anywhere - and the author of this call should know better.

The new plan put forth under this administration corrects this mistake with a new partnership between the public and private sectors. The development of a more economical and growth oriented Near Frontier infrastructure wherein operational and now relatively routine jobs such as trucking and taxi services are handled by the private sector and NASa focuses on longer term technologies and developments is the way forward for all of us.

It is too bad that people can be so easily mislead today... Even as new commercial space systems are proving themselves in front of the world old school pork politics is dictating that we bet instead on the one thing we know will fail - the way things have been done for the last 30 years.

What was that definition of insanity again?
RNT

Editor's note: Are you referring to NASA Watch when you say "this website"?  News flash: not everyone agrees with you Rick. They are equally entitled to enlist support for their point of view and I try and offer them that opportunity. It would seem you haven't been visiting NASA Watch for a looooong time.  If you did, then you'd know my position on this issue.

No Rick, what you should really be sad about is how many people out there, like you, don't know anything more about Constellation than what you read in the blogs and newspapers, because you haven't actually worked it. Do you actually work at NASA ? I do. I've worked at NASA for over 20 years, 15 in research and research hardware, and the last 5 in Constellation. My center made significant contributions to Ares Ix which was a tremendous achievement along with the more recent Orion Pad Abort 1. Watch the videos of each, the scale of those vehicles, and tell me how little Cx has accomplished. In so many technology areas, Cx has and will have put our country on the verge of a new launch system that is badly needed to replace the Shuttle as it retires. Cx has been underfunded since its inception, and while that has slowed its progress, there are examples throughout the agency of hardware built, tested, and moving toward the goals intended. Constellation may have needed to be right sized for the actual budgets it would receive, but scrapping it entirely wasn't the answer either. Did you stand inside the VAB at KSC as Ares IX was being assembled ? I doubt it. Witnessing a 321 ft. tall spaceship come together and then getting to see it actually launch as a first step to a new system would have made a believer out of you. How about the Pad Abort for Orion ? Do you or any other naysayer bother to watch that footage ? Doubt it. The problem we have right now is people like yourself carrying half truths or conjecture around out there and sadly Obama's people listening. Read the Augustine report with 20+ years of experience in how NASA actually accomplishes things ? Doubt it. Every new system ever developed by NASA was more a victim to politics and misrepresentation and underfunding than to the scientists and engineers' ability to carry it out. Cx may have been slower than hoped but has progressed on plan. Was the Ares I stick the best solution to LEO ? We'll never know now but Cx was about a whole lot more than Ares I, and Ares V and the moon goals were logical next steps for our country and space industry.

I'm saddend you do not understand what it is about.

It is aboute saving NASA HSF and keeping us headed for the moon and beyond.

That site wouldn't exist if this was about just dumping Ares rockets for something better.

Nobody would have been surprised by that.

Try to understand that Constellation is the public face of return to moon that Obama is trying to kill.

If it turns into something better, nobody is going to be upset.

And note, nobody is against commercial there either.

I totally agree with you Rick; and I presume that you are referring to Okuda's website.

People are misled because of our Politicians who have come to depend on the established NASA Bureaucracy to supply jobs (spelled VOTES) to the Aerospace workforce throughout the country. Big, make-work, high maintenance NASA projects such as Shuttle, ISS,Constellation, and who knows whats next, just keep the pork rolling within the halls of Congress. And Joe Public thinks of NASA as the wizards that landed a man on the moon in 1969, or - - he just doesn't think or care about NASA at all.

The really sad thing is even if they give the program of record the go ahead and/or any other program the go ahead, it will already be too late.

By the time the money turns on, the folks that have been laid off in this mess will be off doing something else.

@Starjock,

Joe Public thinks we can land the Space Shuttle on the moon. This is mainly due to a failing educational system.

My question is what happened to Joe Public wanting to be educated? What happened to the American thirst for knowledge? Isn't that why you explore?

"They are equally entitled to enlist support for their point of view and I try and offer them that opportunity."

And kudos to you Keith for giving everyone an opportunity to express their views irrespective of your opinion on the matter. That is what keeps me coming back to this website ...