Jay Honeck wrote:
....

Still, in my lifetime, I can point to just one real Gubmint success story:
Apollo. Every other government program, from the "Great Society", to the
"War on Poverty," to "No Child Left Behind," has been a dismal, utter waste
of money and time.




Social equations are always more difficult to solve than technical ones,
but their results may be a lot more important part of our everyday
lives. Velcro is good, social justice is better. Be careful that the
technical "successes" are not just head-in-the-sand escapism from
life's real problems.

"Hell, when a bunch of *pilots* can't even support manned space
exploration, we are surely doomed as a nation."

I would think that the vast majority of pilots and other "technical"
people (including myself) do support space exploration. But there does
seem to be just that little extra skepticism of motives, which is healthy.

Hopefully it is a sign that cast-in-concrete blind partisan support is
finally giving way to some real *discussion* of issues.