KNAPPSTER George Knapp is a longtime reporter and anchor for KLAS Channel 8.

Thursday, January 22, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Knappster: Bush's space plan: Where's the beef?

By George Knapp

Somewhere in the bowels of the Martian Pentagon, a military public affairs staffer is probably getting ready to send out a pithy news release that might go something like this:

"Reports of a URO (unidentified robotic object) on the surface of the planet are greatly exaggerated, according to Commander Zotz, director of Martian Air Defense. Witnesses who have reported seeing a strange contraption crawling around in the dirt are either drunk or crazy. Furthermore, the area in question is known to be infested with Martian swamp gas and has been used extensively for the testing of advanced military weather balloons. UROs cannot exist, therefore, they don't."

Finding out whether Mars has ever supported life is just one of the compelling reasons for humans to explore the Red Planet. It seems doubtful that Mars has ever been home to intelligent life, but the same might be said about Earth, especially after hearing the pitiful, pandering plan announced a few days ago by President Bush.

The joke going around is that Mr. Bush wants to go to Mars because that's where Iraq hid its weapons of mass destruction. Other cynics say the Prez wants America to return to the moon because, back in 1969, he was too stoned to remember the first lunar visit by U.S. astronauts.

That's probably too harsh. I'd guess Mr. Bush knows exactly what he's doing by announcing this grand adventure.

For one thing, he's fishing for electoral votes. In his space speech, the president singled out for praise the congressional representatives from Texas and Florida, two states that might profit handsomely from a reinvigorated space program, and two states that--coincidentally, I'm sure--happen to pack considerable electoral punch.

By waxing eloquently about mankind's true destiny and about the importance of reaching for the stars, Mr. Bush is letting us all know that he is a deep thinker and that he has somehow overcome the "vision thing" that eluded his dad. Well, he certainly does have vision when it comes to political gamesmanship. The announced plan is as crafty and crass as anything to ever come out of this White House, and that's saying plenty.

The space initiative is to space exploration what Bush's education initiative was to education. He announced the No Child Left Behind program, then left it up to the states to figure out how to pay for most of it. Oh, and don't forget the massive AIDS initiative that was supposed to rescue millions of Africans from the plight of this terrible disease. That too was announced with much fanfare, then left to die from lack of funding. Anyone remember the big promise about expanding AmeriCorps? What happened to that one?

By committing a measly $1 billion over five years to the Mars and moon projects, Mr. Bush reveals to us that this space initiative is all about politics and not about space at all. A mere $200 million a year won't do squat for NASA. It isn't even a downpayment on future manned missions to the stars. As with so many other Bush programs, the president wants to bask in the warm glow of positive PR, then let others--specifically future generations--figure out how to pay for his little publicity stunt. Tax cuts for the rich? No problem. Someone else can pay off that massive budget deficit after President Cheney...I mean Bush...is long gone from Washington. Ditto for the $150 billion or more it will take to get to Mars.

As it stands, the plan advanced so far is a limp-wristed, mealy-mouthed, namby-pamby, flim-flam job. It's snake oil in an astronaut suit. In the end, it might end up harming space exploration far more than it will help when the public sees it for what it is--a pure political ploy. It isn't surprising at all that opinion polls show more than half of Americans would rather the money be spent on problems here on Earth rather than far-flung space ventures. It's kinda hard to generate a lot of enthusiasm for a project with no definite timetable and highly dubious underpinnings. Oh goody, we might launch a man to Mars 30 years from now? Where do we go to get a ticket for big event? (And you thought the wait for the third installement of The Lord of the Rings was a long one.)

A strong argument can be made that we simply don't have the money right now for something this ambitious. If that's the criteria, then we will never go, because there will always be pressing problems on good ol' terra firma and there will never be enough money to solve them all. (Seems to me I remember something about a trillion-dollar budget surplus a few years back, a surplus that has now been transformed into a crushing deficit.) I won't go into all the arguments for reinvigorating the space program, but there are plenty. This kind of a project--if it was legit--would benefit the whole world in ways that we can't even fathom right now.

Space will be the platform for all science in the 21st century, according to a friend of mine who works in the space program. There is simply no question about it. A strong human presence in space is inevitable. The only question is whether those humans will be Americans, or whether they will be Chinese, Russian or otherwise. At the moment, we don't have a truly compelling and imperative reason to go, as we did back in the Cold War era of John Kennedy's initiative. Maybe if the Chinese forge ahead with their plans for a moon base, it will get our attention and get us back in the race. Right now, our space program is a wreck.

If you think the top guys at NASA are jazzed about the president's plan, you're wrong. That troubled organization couldn't possibly undertake a bold plan to go to the moon or Mars. It lacks the people, it lacks the technology, it lacks the money and it lacks the vision. Someone would have to blow up NASA with dynamite and start from scratch to get something like this plan off the drawing board. Space industry people I know say they are worried that the lip service being paid to the new and improved space program will end up hurting the few successful scientific ventures that we do have (such as the impending abandonment of the Hubble telescope) but will not see any well-funded replacement programs.

We need to get back to space, and we need to get going soon, not in 30 years, and not on a shoestring budget. If NASA can't get the job done, at least it should get out of the way of commercial space projects. NASA has long been a hindrance to the commercial development of space. If Mr. Bush is serious about his "vision," he should order NASA to move over and let private enterprise carry the ball, that is, unless this announced plan is really just an excuse to funnel big contracts to the usual suspects at Boeing and Lockheed.

The president has literally promised us the moon. It smells like pie in the sky to me.