If even half the money the House allocates to NASA were spent on population control, the potentially tangible and economic benefits of space exploration would all but become moot. Why such a strong push for such egregious expenditures on space programs that so far have limited very limited dividends? Rational choice theory posits that those members of Congress who vote to allocate more funding to NASA (at an extravagant $16,623,000,000 in 2006)
NASA Causes Turnabout on Fiscal Responsibility
This article describes congressional resistance to saving $20,000,000 that would be freed up if a lunar robotics office in Huntsville, AL were to be closed. In a move opposing their own usual fiscal conservatism, the majority of opposition to the closing was expressed by Republican members of Congress. It should be noted that no member of Congress mentioned jobs as an incentive to keep the office open, thereby limiting the scope of excuses that could be used to keep that money vacuum open.
If even half the money the House allocates to NASA were spent on population control, the potentially tangible and economic benefits of space exploration would all but become moot. Why such a strong push for such egregious expenditures on space programs that so far have limited very limited dividends? Rational choice theory posits that those members of Congress who vote to allocate more funding to NASA (at an extravagant $16,623,000,000 in 2006) than to the Office of Family Planning (at a mere $283,103,000 in 2006) <> derive more benefit from the NASA programs than they do from the Department of Health and Human Services’ OFP programs. What could this benefit be? Most of the benefit probably is from the campaign financing bestowed by aerospace corporations, but a more obscure but possible benefit is the discovery of a different, very efficient type of fuel that could also be conveniently used to power more destructive weapons. It will be an even greater bonus if we discover a planet with different organisms we could condition to do our bidding while we deplete their resources…A space adventure with a happy ending!
If even half the money the House allocates to NASA were spent on population control, the potentially tangible and economic benefits of space exploration would all but become moot. Why such a strong push for such egregious expenditures on space programs that so far have limited very limited dividends? Rational choice theory posits that those members of Congress who vote to allocate more funding to NASA (at an extravagant $16,623,000,000 in 2006)
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Great post Joe. It is interesting that Republicans did not point to jobs as the motivating factor for keeping the site open. Huntsville is the "Rocket City" after all. (I only know that because the Brewers' AA minor league affiliate is the Huntsville Stars, another tribute to the space program.) I would think that their whole economy relies on the $20,000,000 invested in the program. This is always a terrible situation. Pulling out that kind of cash would effectively kill the city of Huntsville. That's a hard-sell from either side of the political aisle. Yeah, that's a lot of money that I would love to have invested in HHS programs, but maybe not at the cost of destroying a city's and state's economy.
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