Conley Powell

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• Commented on Story Musgrave Thinks That The ISS is "an ungodly sin"

  What has the space station ever done for us, except make us look even more ridiculous than we would have anyway? A small space station is the easiest post-Gemini manned space program imaginable...and after twenty-six years the thing isn't even...

• Commented on Commercial Sector Reaction

  But, Papa, no one is proposing that NASA design and build rockets. Those days are long gone. For today's NASA to attempt anything of the sort would be a disaster. If you're suggesting that the less meddling with contractors by...

• Commented on Commercial Sector Reaction

  SpaceX isn't a hobby rocket club, but it's a long, long way from the organizations that build the Delta IV and the Atlas V...and have been building rockets for more than 50 years. But regardless of degrees of competence, all...

• Commented on Space Policy Reaction Is Still All Over The Map

  I don't think Spaceman85 is a regular on Nasawatch, but Possum is. Apparently he has missed every one of my posts griping about NASA's wasting time and effort on rockets that are no better in any way than those that...

• Commented on Commercial Sector Reaction

  Under von Braun, Saturn IBs were built at Marshall Center. This worked just fine...but then it was von Braun who was in charge. Since then, the Government has paid private companies to build rockets. These companies have by now built...

• Commented on Space Policy Reaction Is Still All Over The Map

  Under Constellation, NASA was spending a lot of money and doing very little. Under B.O.'s plan (if you can call it that), NASA will spend even more and do nothing. Of course, B.O.'s "plan" may change completely tomorrow. As someone...

• Commented on Commercial Sector Reaction

  The attempts to pretend that B.O.'s plan to kill the U.S. manned space program (such as it is) is the exact opposite of that, are getting ludicrous. I can't help but wonder what motivates them....

• Commented on Commercial Sector Reaction

  To call support for B.O.'s abandonment of manned space flight "patriotism" is like calling the Nazi's "final solution" social reform. Not that Constellation was much better......

• Commented on Commercial Sector Reaction

  I won't mention any names...but some people posting here give new meaning to the phrase "whistling in the dark". I'm all for optimism, but I'm also in favor of maintaining some contact with reality. And I'm definitely not in...

• Commented on Well, There Seems To Be A Compromise After All

  Warp, unless you're being sarcastic, I envy your dogged optimism....

• Commented on Climate Change Deniers Are Inventing a New Scandal

  Petr Bekmann once said that the "debate" over nuclear power was between those who know what they're talking about and those who don't. This isn't exactly right. It's between those who know what they're talking about (all of whom, without...

• Commented on DIRECT Evangelistas Just Won't Give Up

  DIRECT may not be as bad as Ares, but no praise could be fainter. WE'RE NOT GOING TO DO ANYTHING WORTHWHILE BEYOND EARTH ORBIT WITH CHEMICAL PROPELLANTS. WE'RE NOT GOING TO DO ANYTHING WORTHWHILE, EVEN IN EARTH ORBIT, WITH EXPENDABLE...

• Commented on I Smell A Compromise In The Making

  I agree with pawn. What happens in or to NASA has no more to do with the conquest of space than do events at the Department of the Interior....

• Commented on Worrying About Who Gets Back First

  Fred, comparisons of Chinese expenditures with American expenditures mean nothing. NASA is spending an awful lot on the Space Shuttle and the Space Station, neither of which contributes anything to the conquest of the Moon...or to anything else. And NASA...

• Commented on Titan 1 Information Request

  1800 pounds sounds too low, since an Atlas D could and did orbit 3000 pounds (Mercury)....

• Commented on Space Policy: Go Boldly

  I vehemently disagree with almost everything that Volosin says. The colonization of the Solar System is an end in itself. It requires no justification, any more than continuing to breathe requires justification. Indeed, if we aren't engaged in the...

• Commented on Going In Circles Again: America Will Abandon Human Lunar Exploration - And Much More

  By the way, I'm well aware that B.O.'s motives are completely different from mine, and are beneath contempt. I want a real space program; he wants no space program. But I'd rather have no space program than one that...

• Commented on Going In Circles Again: America Will Abandon Human Lunar Exploration - And Much More

  It causes me intense pain to say anything even slightly favorable about B.O. or anything he does...but I'm glad to see Constellation go. It was not better than nothing. No part of it was better than nothing. (Not that...

• Commented on New Poll Shows Support For Space Funding Cuts

  I don't usually have this much trouble making myself clear. It makes no sense to say that "it's not the vehicle, it's the mission that's important". With chemical-propellant rockets, we can't even get into orbit at anything remotely resembling...

• Commented on New Poll Shows Support For Space Funding Cuts

  Thanks for your second message, Mike, but your previous message indicates that I failed to make myself clear. Without real spaceships, we're not going to do anything significant in Earth orbit, much less on the Moon. As for colonizing...

• Commented on New Poll Shows Support For Space Funding Cuts

  That's certainly true today, but why are things so different today than they were in that "bygone era"? Isn't it largely, if not entirely, because of the cancerous growth of government that started with Lyndon Johnson? People have forgotten, or...

• Commented on New Poll Shows Support For Space Funding Cuts

  I heartily agree with Flash001. Not only is Constellation not worth doing, it's actually counterproductive (quite apart from the waste of money), since it gives the public the impression that space flight must be that pathetic, at least for a...

• Commented on Allegations Surface Regarding NASA Climate Data Manipulation

  There is a limit to the time I will waste bandying words with ignoramuses and liars on a given thread. I've reached my limit on this thread. You ignoramuses and liars can believe, or pretend to believe, whatever you like....

• Commented on Allegations Surface Regarding NASA Climate Data Manipulation

  Yet another ignoramus. Carbon dioxide accounts for about 3% of the greenhouse effect, and the burning of fossil fuels accounts for about 3% of the input of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. These are facts. Anyone who denies them...

• Commented on Allegations Surface Regarding NASA Climate Data Manipulation

  Papa couldn't do a better job of reciting the NASA party line if he were reading from a script. Perhaps he is! I happen to be a "working scientist" myself. When I was a student, I wouldn't have believed...

• Commented on New Poll Shows Support For Space Funding Cuts

  "Cutting the NASA budget" and "cutting back on space exploration" are not at all the same thing, since almost all the money NASA spends might as well be thrown into the fire. There's no one to whom the conquest...

• Commented on Allegations Surface Regarding NASA Climate Data Manipulation

  So there's still at least one person besides Hansen who is still pretending to believe that anthropocentric global warming is the successor to Sagan's "nuclear winter" hoax. (To be fair, Hansen may actually believe it. What can we expect from...

• Commented on Creating Starfleet Academy (Ongoing)

  Why are all these people discussing this (sometimes at considerable length) as if it meant something? If we don't have a space program, the last thing we need is a Space Academy!...

• Commented on Buzz Writes: Washington, we don't have liftoff!

  Because the Shuttle was so expensive as to be next to useless! It was going to carry 65,000 lb, at $160/lb, and was going to fly once a week. The mission just ended carried 30,000 lb, and the cost (which...

• Commented on Buzz Writes: Washington, we don't have liftoff!

  How many times must it be said (when it should be far too obvious to have to be said at all) that a vehicle that has a payload-to-orbit cost of $5000/kg, or even $500/kg, is no more like a real...