I've been in the space business most of my life, trying to get private spaceflight off the ground for much of that time.

For a great deal of that time, NASA was an obstacle, not an aid, to that goal. Potential investors were told by NASA "experts" that spaceflight is inherently only something a government can accomplish, and then only by expending billions upon billions of dollars. The various experiences I went through with my colleagues, through a number of different endeavors, would make a pretty good book by itself, and I'm thinking about writing it. I could kill myself for not keeping a journal over the past thirty years.

At some point, not that long ago, the key was found - wealthy people who did not invest in somebody else's space company, but wealthy people who decided to start their own. After that, it started coming thick and fast.

It's obvious that NASA stopped being about delivering product a long time ago, and that recent administrations have only been interested in the space program because those Senators and congressmen from "space" states were pushing it so hard. They still are, but Obama is even less interested in space than other administrations were. We landed on the Moon for the last time almost 40 years ago. No human being has left earth orbit since then, which should tell us all we need to know about how the "space program" has worked. NASA is a giant tech employment racket, and not much more.

So I should be upset? As someone concerned with the government doing way too much, I should only get bent out of shape when cuts are made to something I like? This may actually be the boost that the private sector has been looking for.

As for "promises," SpaceX's Falcon 9 is due for its first launch this year. Eight years ago, SpaceX was just a gleam in Elon Musk's eye. That's not too bad. Look at what the Shuttle and ISS promised as far as schedules and costs were concerned, and what actually came out the other end and when.