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  • From: Thomas Beckett <thomas AT tbeckett.com>
  • To: Internetworkers <internetworkers AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [internetworkers] get your mars on
  • Date: Fri, 16 Jan 2004 16:55:37 -0500

Stephen Messer wrote:
As usual, David Rees is dead-on and screamingly funny:

http://www.mnftiu.cc/mnftiu.cc/war30.html

Interesting. As a supporter of Mars exploration, I didn't really get
the joke, but I think this is one of those preaching-to-the-choir
things. :) The strip did remind me that it was time to renew my membership to the Mars Society, so they just got my $50 for
2004. The strip suggests that this is all another Bush administration
boondoggle designed to distract from Iraq, so I wonder if the author realizes that Howard Dean, Wesley Clark, Dick Gephardt,
and Dennis Kucinich have all expressed support for human Mars
exploration.

I think that is the point, that the Mars project is just so much cynical electioneer vaporware on the part of Bush. One also has to ask with what money Bush plans to pay for this, with the likely answer being just to increase the already-astronomical federal deficit with no plan to pay it back. That is, if the idea doesn't just quiety fade away after November 2004.

And then there's the whole militarization of space subtext.

Dean and Clark are probably the most significant
voices there, as the two top Democratic candidates in nationwide polls.

Supporting Mars exploration is one thing and having a responsible way to pay for it is something else. I am pleased that Dean and Clark support continued space exploration, but I would also expect them to be more realistic in their approach to it.

TaB





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