I know that criticisms of NASA's waste of valuable taxpayer money on same old, same old round n' round LEO activities for 40 years after Apollo 11 is not well received here but here are the Apollo astronauts' opinions on the topic. NOT complementary.

"We've spent a lot of money up there (ISS) for almost nothing. It's almost a white elephant," Apollo 13 commander Jim Lovell said. "Until we can really get a return on our investment on that particular project, then it was money wasted. I want to see the space station have a return on our investment. I think it can,"

"We now seem to think it's too much to put 0.6 percent into the NASA budget," said Apollo 7 astronaut Walter Cunningham. "That is idiotic in my opinion. What are we doing today, what investment are we making today that will ensure that we have that kind of return for the next 30 years? I don't see it out there," he added."

Yah, let's spend far more taxpayer confiscated earnings bailing out failed financial institutions and subsidizing our union voter bloc in failed auto companies. I'm sure the Chrysler & GM payoffs will make the US great in the 21st century. (/sarcasm)

Gullible fools like me still have hope that the new NASA admins may actually try something different for a change. We'll see.