[FPSPACE] re: Re: Nazis on the Moon and other alternate space histories

[Robert G Kennedy III]

From: DwayneDay <zirconic1 at earthlink.net>
>I think that one could actually make a pretty good argument that Heinlein's
>writing has been very influential on the alt-space community... and that
>this is not necessarily a good thing.  I think that in many ways his
>writings created a false impression that spaceflight is relatively simple
>and it was only the US government that made it hard.  After all, in
>Rocketship Galileo, a scientist and three boys are able to build a
>nuclear-powered rocketship in their backyard and fly to the moon,
>so why does it require a massive government bureaucracy?

OK, this must be a troll.

I have been having an offline conversation with people about this. I don't
know if I should respond in this forum, or just wait for the articles to
come out, then write a letter to the editor.

Let me say this, as someone who was weaned on the works of Heinlein (almost
literally; I read /Revolt in 2100/ when I was 8 or 9). Heinlein never
underrated the difficulty of getting space. In "Misfit" (written before the
war!), "Logic of Empire", "If This Goes On...", "Destination Moon",  "The
Man Who Sold the Moon" and much later /Friday/, he makes it clear that
Space Is Hard. People in alt-space or whatever who think it can be done out
of a backyard, or interpret his works as a libertarian /
anarcho-syndicalist call to arms, have seriously misread Heinlein. I
believe I can prove this (what Heinlein says, not what alt-spacers think).

The so-called "juveniles" were written for a different audience, for a
different purpose, and it has only become clear since /Grumbles from the
Grave/ what Bowdlerizing editors RAH was stymied by at first.

--
Robert Kennedy, PE
http://www.ultimax.com