Hi All

I think you're wrong about the program. It's goals and current research are good - there are decent studies coming out extending NASA's manned range all the way to Saturn. What's really, really wrong is the f***ed up presumption that the "business as usual" choke-hold on LEO access will be an acceptable underpining for the whole program.

And that's just plain nuts. No price improvement from NASA for LEO access in 30 years should be a scandal, but it's not. It's a tidy pork-barrelling earner for States and companies with a vested interest in the status quo, all of whom can conveniently use NASA as a scapegoat. Sure there's a self-serving bureaucracy, BUT who controls the purse strings? Who decides what stays open and what gets shut-down? Really, I mean.

Aerospace is a big part of the US economy and it wasn't shut-down because law-makers woke up and realised that. But they aren't business leaders are they? So we've had this weird NASA "holding pattern" for years with no realistic plan for tomorrow. Bush Snr and Bush Jnr have had their hearts in the right place re. space, they just need some of that entrepreneurial willingness to risk making real headway - to lead Congress etc forward into a more outward future. The new venture is a good start but it'll choke without a plan for CATS.

Maybe I'm naive. Gary, I need some of your cynical insight...

Adam