Damned Teahadist are keeping us stuck on planet Erf!

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

Odin2005 (45,222 posts)

We should have been colonizing the solar system by now.

 In 1969 when Armstrong and Aldrin landed on the Moon everyone expected that we would keep going farther. But then in the mid 70s NASA got mauled by the small-minded deficit hawks who thought they did not need to keep up NASA's funding because we beat those Evil Commie Russians and that's all that mattered. It seems like all of a sudden nobody cared anymore, some even started bashing space exploration using the equally small-minded "we have more important things to do here on terra firma" argument.
 
I wonder if the Vietnam War and Watergate are to blame, destroying the belief in Big Government doing Big Things, making NASA a victim of the same rise of selfish Individualism that lead to the late 70s "tax revolts" in California and the election of Reagan in 1980. I suspect that also, among us on the Left that the strain of technophobic misanthropy found among many Green types who believe in the philosophy of Deep Ecology has something to do with it, thus the posts here on DU decrying space exploration as spreading the "cancer" of humanity.
 
According to astrophysicist Robert Zubrin a 3-year manned mission to Mars would cost $30 billion per mission and is perfectly feasible with today's technology. That is chump change compared to the "Defense" budget, and we would not have to pay all of that if it is set up as a multi-national mission. The problem is a lack of will. people either dogmatically assert that such a mission is either impossible, too expensive, or immoral, and all of those assertions are bullshit.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021206415

What color is the sky in your world?

xchrom (80,252 posts)

1. we can't clothe the naked. feed the hungry, comfort and support the widow.

Last edited Mon Aug 27, 2012, 06:21 AM USA/ET - Edit history (1)

we can't care for and bury the dead.

i might agree with the sentiment -- but....

And you can't fix stupid or argue with crazy.

Odin2005 (45,222 posts)

2. There is plenty money to go around.

It's just that the M-I Complex is hoarding it.

And really, it goes on like that.

Notice though, how no other nation is to blame for the lack of men in Uranus. Supposedly, we beat the commies and stopped wanting Big Government (BTW - Andrew Briebart just called on the Ouija board and said, "Thanks for the plug.") but Russia, China, India or the vaunted EU have not gotten us to Uranus either. They have big governments, why can't they do it if it's so *******ed easy?

I dunno but I'm sure it's the GOP's fault, whatever it is.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021206415#post1

[USA4ME]

Getting people into space cost money when we have vast parts of our own planet that have yet to be fully explored.  I encourage all liberals to put on cement shoes and colonize the oceans.

.

[DumbAss Tanker]

Odin2005 (45,222 posts)

We should have been colonizing the solar system by now.

It was OBAMA who decided it was more important to pander to illegals and welfare voters than to proceed with a replacement for the shuttle, which is why our astronauts are riding Russian rockets to the space station these days, you stupid ****.

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

It was OBAMA who decided it was more important to pander to illegals and welfare voters than to proceed with a replacement for the shuttle, which is why our astronauts are riding Russian rockets to the space station these days, you stupid ****.

Don't forget NASA's new mission is climate change studies.

[JohnnyReb]

The Great War on Poverty soaked up all the money....IOW, you worthless DUmmies.

[67 Rover]

Don't forget NASA's new mission is climate change studies. Muslim outreach.

FIFY

[jukin]

The Great War on Poverty soaked up all the money....IOW, you worthless DUmmies.

16 trillion dollars in national debt. 16 trillion dollars spent on the war on poverty. Coincidence? I think not.

[Bondai]

The Great War on Poverty soaked up all the money....IOW, you worthless DUmmies.

And what the War on Poverty didn't get the War on Terror and The War on Drugs soaked up. Not that it matters anyway. Following his own Socialist plan Obumbler killed the manned space program taking the US one more giant step towards third world country status.

[movie buff]

Notice nobody there blaming Obama for gutting NASA's funding.

[Airwolf]

What DAT and SBB and all the rest of you have said and more. The Space Program had some huge plans back in the late 60's and early 70's and guess which party killed them? It wasn't the Republican party it was the Democrats and their anti war and anti money going to anything but to welfare programs that to this day are filled with people that no more need welfare then Warren Buffett.

[Vagabond]

Yeah, just look at what the Teahadists in congress in the 70s did with the whole shuttle fiasco.  NASA wanted to kepp building Saturn V rockets and wanted a program with a large space station/lab for research, a crew transport module for up to seven atronauts, and a cargo module for everything else.  The teahadists didn't want to pay for that, they wanted to spend that money on dubious programs like head start among other pork barrel projects.  So they forced the Saturn V to be scrapped and then had one vehicle for cargo and crew, and it had to be the lab as well.  Oh wait, that was DEMOCRATS.

Now what is, or what was, NASA doing?  Trying to figure out how to build a Saturn V rocket.

[txradioguy]

Odin2005 (45,222 posts)

We should have been colonizing the solar system by now.

Instead this President wants to turn NASA into a Madrassa for budding space Jihadists.

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

Cleita (58,838 posts)

221. Perhaps, but really should we be rearranging the Solar System?

It really has done just fine without us for billions of years.

a geek named Bob (348 posts)

226. Cleita, I'm always suspicous of the word "should"

"should" depends on the agreed upon moral/ethical structure of the group doing the questioning.
 
I have no problems using available resources, to make sure that at least some portion of humanity survives some moment of mass stupidity.
 
Also, think of the evolving cultures we can develop, with more land areas.

Earth's not the place to have an advanced civilization. Let it become an enormous park.

Cleita (58,838 posts)

231. "Let it become an enormous park."

I can dig that. Let it become the eco-environment it used to be. Maybe we can send all the supply side conservatives to colonize out there and anyone else who has an aversion to nature. It would suit me. I would stay behind in my wiki-up and hopefully a small tribe of people who are at least 500 miles away from the nearest tribe of people.

a geek named Bob (348 posts)

233. Cleita

I wouldn't want the supply siders in my living dome. Let them get their own rock.
 
I want to live in space, away from folks like that.

Cleita (58,838 posts)

237. That could probably be arranged. Send them all to their Libertarian paradise with

no libruls to deal with. Their own rock so to speak. Of course you know they would be raiding your rock for slaves and probably supplies. They need someone to do all the work that they don't have to pay for and they are too stupid to really make the stuff they need to survive.

a geek named Bob (348 posts)

241. Cleita,

1.) defending an asteroid against an incoming ship is pretty easy
2.) why aren't the libertarians using robots?

Cleita (58,838 posts)

251. Are there robots yet in that world?

If there are, maybe they don't know how to repair them.

a geek named Bob (348 posts)

279. sigh

so...

you are building a narrative, so the libertarians can go hog wild. Why?

cheap rote-running robots are easy to build. You can buy kits now.

Cleita (58,838 posts)

284. You can buy kits out in the middle of space?

Is there a Radio Shack out there someplace?

a geek named Bob (348 posts)

288. ah... humor...

if the libertarians are too dumb to follow simple schematics, they likely won't survive a trip over to another station.
 
they are cheap robot kits NOW. No reason why the fabled libertarians couldn't cobble something together.
 
No disrespect meant, cleita, but it sounds like you are looking to create some sort of rampaging libertarian slaver fear-theme.

Cleita (58,838 posts)

290. Oh, you just got the humor? I was there all along with the Libertarian paradise meme.

Welcome to my rather demented brain.

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

avebury (1,227 posts)

33. You cannot really compare the immigration of people to the North

America to the concept of heading out into space. For a long time people were able to make a better life for themselves but with the 1% hording more and more of the wealth, an out of control military-industrial complex, and all of the continuous war mongering life today is not the same as it was in the past. Yes idealism would make it desirable to explore space however humans no longer have nobility that is once had. I look upon the exploration of space as just transporting our problems elsewhere.

Odin2005 (45,222 posts)

40. "humans no longer have nobility that is once had" What nonsense.

Read The Better Angels Of Our Nature" by Steve Pinker, the more developed a society is the less violent it is per capita.

1. "more developed" is a self-congratulating term

2. it's a horse-shit statement. Detriot, San Francisco and Chicago are better developed...except they're hell holes on Earth

[ChuckJ]

Cleita (58,838 posts)

237. That could probably be arranged. Send them all to their Libertarian paradise with

no libruls to deal with. Their own rock so to speak. Of course you know they would be raiding your rock for slaves and probably supplies. They need someone to do all the work that they don't have to pay for and they are too stupid to really make the stuff they need to survive.

If she/he/it would put out more posts like this I can see a possible challenge to nads for the DUmmie of the Year title.

[BlueStateSaint]

If she/he/it would put out more posts like this I can see a possible challenge to nads for the DUmmie of the Year title.

You are correct in the concentration of stooopid, but the amount of that concentrated stooopid isn't enough to overcome Vlada Mitty.

[GOBUCKS]

Odin2005 (45,222 posts)

We should have been colonizing the solar system by now.

This DUmmy has come a long way from bragging about shoplifting his local Wal-Mart.

[obumazombie]

I'm not colonizing Uranus if there are any Klingons there !

[ScubaGuy]

And then Cleita turns the stupid knob up to %120.

Codeine (12,096 posts)
236. The Amazon rain forest, a cave environment, and <shudder> Pandora are all

View profile
delicately-balanced, complex, beautiful ecosystems. Most of the stuff in our solar system is far different -- barren rocks make up the bulk of what is out there. There's nothing to trash, nothing to pollute, and nothing to kill.

It's really a whole lot of nuthin', just minerals.

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 10:53 PM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
245. This is the error people make.

View profile
Just because it doesn't fit into our concept of what is delicate and what isn't doesn't make it true. A lot of people have no problem picking out rocks from a cave environment, yet there is a geological record there frozen in time and fossil records that the untrained eye doesn't see and it's very destructive. There are animals you don't see, often species that are only in that particular cave, that you could kill just by dropping something in the water that seems harmless to you.

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 10:56 PM

Codeine (12,096 posts)
249. But an asteroid isn't a cave.

View profile
There is no life there. It's dead, dead, dead. We aren't losing a fossil record. There's no animal to miss, no water in which to drop a pollutant or pathogen, and nothing to kill inadvertently.

Response to Codeine (Reply #249)

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 11:02 PM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
255. How do you know?

View profile
Asteroids are so misshapen that I'm sure there are caves in them. Also, where did that asteroid come from? To tell the truth the asteroid belt looks to me like a planet that got pulled apart and scattered in it's orbit. I'm sure scientist have another take and I of course will bow to their superior knowledge.

Response to Cleita (Reply #255)

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 11:24 PM

Posteritatis (14,627 posts)
268. Are you seriously trying to argue that airless asteroids are somehow vibrant ecosystems? (nt)

Response to Posteritatis (Reply #268)

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 11:32 PM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
274. No and I don't know where you get that.

View profile
It is an important geological record of something that occurred in the past that may be useful for us to know in the future, however, if we destroy pieces of it, we won't know.

Response to Cleita (Reply #274)

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 11:51 PM

Posteritatis (14,627 posts)
286. By that 'logic' we shouldn't be mining anything, anywhere, ever. (nt)

Response to Posteritatis (Reply #286)

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 11:55 PM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
289. That would be fine with me.

View profile
All it does is tear up the planet. Without metals, we can't make bullets and guns. Without oil, we wouldn't have BP oil spills.

Response to Cleita (Reply #289)

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 11:57 PM

a geek named Bob (429 posts)
291. WTF???


Without metals, it's really hard to make scalpels, building materials, plows (wooden plows suck. Ask any of my students from Africa.)

No dense sources of energy means savagery.

Response to a geek named Bob (Reply #291)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 01:54 AM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
330. There are other materials to make those things from.


I actually have kitchen utensils even a knife made from bamboo and it's renewable. Much can be made from organic materials or discarded animal parts like sea shells. Maybe your students from Africa lost the knowledge from their ancestors. Ancient Hawaiians made an array of tools from what they harvested from the sea.

Response to Cleita (Reply #289)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 12:08 AM

Posteritatis (14,627 posts)
300. That's a really stupid thing to say via the Internet.


Either way, if you're that blindly technophobic we're well over the "this discussion is a waste of my time" line.

Reply to this post

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 01:55 AM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
332. Please leave. You only want to insult and feel superior to anyone who

has a different view of things than you. So please go away. You won't be missed.

Response to Cleita (Reply #332)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:45 PM

Star Member friendly_iconoclast (7,305 posts)
448. Did you post that with a sustainable, organically-grown computer?

Response to friendly_iconoclast (Reply #448)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:48 PM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
450. Of course not.


I was forced to get a telephone back in 1999 and a computer a few years ago because in order to get a job, get medical services or many things I need, society forces me to. I would rather not.

Response to Cleita (Reply #450)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:57 PM

Star Member friendly_iconoclast (7,305 posts)
456. So you use advanced technology to sustain life, but prefer others go without?

Response to friendly_iconoclast (Reply #456)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 03:18 PM

a geek named Bob (429 posts)
472. Oh Snap!

Response to Cleita (Reply #289)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 12:41 AM

Odin2005 (45,234 posts)
306. *FACEPALM*

Response to Cleita (Reply #289)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 01:58 AM

PavePusher (13,648 posts)
335. And you have the chutzpah to post that on the Internet?


Irony, you must be the Source....

Please, go back to the Serengeti Plain and divest yourself of all clothes and tools except a small digging stick.

Response to PavePusher (Reply #335)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:08 AM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
338. Why do I have to do that? I am a woman and I know how to spin and weave from


plant fiber and just a small frame of wood. I can weave baskets to carry things and water. I can make needles to sew from bones. I don't need to deprive myself that much. A digging stick is handy and I don't need to go to the Serengeti Plain to do those things. I can do them righ here in California. I don't need to hunt because I can gather nuts, berries, roots and other edibles. I can make bread from the acorns of the Oak trees. I can fish with my hands. I can build shelter with plants and brush. I can make fire. I have a very good working knowledge of medicinal herbs. I will be just fine as long as some asshole doesn't run me off his property, which he has no right owning anyway. The land belongs to everyone.

Response to Cleita (Reply #338)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 07:39 AM

a geek named Bob (429 posts)
349. Cleita


How many people would survive in that kind of hunter gatherer life style?

Trying to do that would spell the deaths of billions of people.

The book Directive 51 by John Barnes talks about this in depth.

As for the land belongs to everyone: I've paid for a particular patch of land. It's mine, by law.

Response to a geek named Bob (Reply #349)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:53 PM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
454. Actually, it would have to be a communal farming society like the New Stone Agers, the

View profile
guys who built Stonehenge lived. I only threw out that hunter gatherer stuff because I was challenged. The fact is, if our society broke down, and it came down to the fact that your land would no longer be yours because the laws that protect it no longer exist,I would survive where many wouldn't because I do have those skills.

Response to Cleita (Reply #454)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 03:03 PM

a geek named Bob (429 posts)
460. If it all broke down


I can have towns (MAYBE cities, depending on the troubles) back to having food and power, within 10 years.

There's no need to live like we did, 200+ years ago. We've grown past that.

Response to Cleita (Reply #338)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:48 PM

Star Member friendly_iconoclast (7,305 posts)
449. "The land belongs to everyone." How many homeless people stay at your place?


After all, it belongs to them too...

Response to friendly_iconoclast (Reply #449)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:49 PM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
452. Me, I stay at their place. I can't offer my benefactors land to anyone can I now? n/t

Response to Cleita (Reply #289)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:53 AM

Star Member Ikonoklast (18,684 posts)
342. Without either, BILLIONS STARVE.


But I think that would be just fine with some...just as long as they weren't one of the starvees.

Response to Ikonoklast (Reply #342)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:58 AM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
343. That is just a conjecture on your part.

It's never been tried, even as a sampling, so we really don't know. I think people and other living things would be better off and they wouldn't starve.

Response to Cleita (Reply #343)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 08:44 AM

a geek named Bob (429 posts)
360. It HAS been tried


there are studies of how much room hunter gatherer tribes need.

This experiment was tried in Africa.

As other groups drove HG tribes out of their lands in Africa, we found out how land they actually need.

HG living would doom all but a few million people to death.

Not Cool.

Response to a geek named Bob (Reply #360)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:04 PM

Star Member Cleita (58,847 posts)
427. After hunter gatherers, there were farmers in the Stone Age.


Archaeologist have dug up their villages, some of them inhabited for close to a thousand years. The majority did not starve as their grave remains have also been dug up. What changed everything was the discovery of metal, copper and tin or other alloys that they could make bronze from.

Yes, we have too many people in the world. That is a fact. Many are starving already, but it's not for lack of technology, but because of it. In third world country, only some benefit from it and become rich or become rich nations. Everyone else starves because they aren't allowed to be part of the system. It's know as capitalism aided and abetted by technology and greed.

Response to Cleita (Reply #427)

Mon Aug 27, 2012, 02:10 PM

a geek named Bob (429 posts)
428. Cleita

View profile
For most of human history..
...eating eggs in the early spring was risking your life (spring fever).
...winter meant old people died in the cold.
...people didn't live longer than about 40 years
...(in literate times) Only the leisured class got to read. The rest of us had to work sun-up to sun-down.
...40% of children died at birth

Too much technology? Technology freed us! The cotton gin put paid to slavery. The electric light meant fewer fires in houses. Refrigeration meant far fewer cases of lethal food poisoning.

Too many people? If we all stay here... Who gets to choose who dies?

Distance and resources make for good neighbors.

[USA4ME]

They go on and on and on about things that aren't even going to happen.  But at least it keeps them at the computer and away from molesting children, so there's that to consider.

.

[ChuckJ]

You are correct in the concentration of stooopid, but the amount of that concentrated stooopid isn't enough to overcome Vlada Mitty.

Hey BSS, based on what Scuba brought over she's trying to make a liar out of you.

 

[BlueStateSaint]

Hey BSS, based on what Scuba brought over she's trying to make a liar out of you.

 

The sheer volume of concentrated stooopid in the clitoral primitive's posts is waaaay behind the slightly less concentrated, but massively more volumnous, stooopid of Vlada Mitty.  If one has a swimming pool of the clitoral primitive's highly concentrated stooopid on one hand, and Lake Tahoe of Vlada Mitty's stooopid, Lake Tahoe will win every time.

[Jasonw560]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021206415

What color is the sky in your world?

And you can't fix stupid or argue with crazy.

And really, it goes on like that.

Notice though, how no other nation is to blame for the lack of men in Uranus. Supposedly, we beat the commies and stopped wanting Big Government (BTW - Andrew Briebart just called on the Ouija board and said, "Thanks for the plug.") but Russia, China, India or the vaunted EU have not gotten us to Uranus either. They have big governments, why can't they do it if it's so *******ed easy?

I dunno but I'm sure it's the GOP's fault, whatever it is.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021206415#post1

These made me laugh.....

[ChuckJ]

The sheer volume of concentrated stooopid in the clitoral primitive's posts is waaaay behind the slightly less concentrated, but massively more volumnous, stooopid of Vlada Mitty.  If one has a swimming pool of the clitoral primitive's highly concentrated stooopid on one hand, and Lake Tahoe of Vlada Mitty's stooopid, Lake Tahoe will win every time.

Oh, there's no doubt that nads has the volume, but once she was just a low-volumed DUmmie trying to make it to the top. Just like Cletus. Cletus will never achieve nads heights without a lot of struggle, but I think the talent is there. I also think that it's my duty to give Cletus hope that she can one day, just like nads, proudly say that she is the DUmmie of the Year.

Plus, ain't it grand to have some variety for a change?

Don't get me wrong. Nads is entertainment like DU hasn't seen in a while, but a little variety will help her from stagnating...Maybe.

[Airwolf]

Has a Dummy ever won DOTY twice in a row because Cleatas or whatever that idiots name is a shoe in otherwise.