Look, Tom! If it wasn't for the
[American] media getting all worked up
over the Sputnik launch, and over Gagarin's Vostok flight, there might
not have been much of an American
space program over the last 45 years!
If wasn't for critical American
newspaper editorials back in 1957 - 1961
complaining about how 'America lagged behind the Russians in space', it's
possible that Project Apollo, Skylab, the Shuttle program, even ambitious
unmanned planetary missions like
Voyager and Viking might never have happened!...
Please don't vent your criticism against media types, you might offend someone like Alan Boyle!

Tom? How the hell are we going to
get the message out to the public that
space-travel and space-exploration
benefits all humanity if we don't try
to get reporters, editors and journalists on our side?
Answer me that!

Tom? You and I and everybody here,
[who is a sincere space-enthusiast]
has AN OBLIGATION to contact and educate these reporters, editors and journalists science/engineering because
we call ourselves space-enthusiasts.
Don't you agree?

Just to give you an example, Tom,
did you know that the medical technology involved in MRI equipment
[full-body scanners] comes directly
from NASA's space-technology?...I didn't know that beforehand!...And how many lives have MRI equipment saved?
And I haven't even mentioned microelectronics, which allows you and
I to use the internet and a cellphone, etc., also direct spinoffs from NASA's
space-technology.
Sorry for such an admonishment, Tom.
But what I say had to be said.

Jacob