[FPSPACE] Anatoly Perminov says US rebuffed Russian overturesto joint ex...

[DSFPortree at aol.com]

Ed:

Oh, stuff and nonsense. You need to look at this as a non-space fan. The 
reasons that make sense to space fans don't move non-space fans. And, the reasons 
space fans often accept are often laughable.

Bush 41 purchased goods and services we didn't need - quite intentionally. 
Clinton would not have vetoed if the station had been canned by Congress - what 
a strange notion. Yes, Ralpha was in the works, but it hadn't been accepted 
(it had been in the works for a couple of years, though Bush 41 wasn't 
interested). The US piloted program would have gone on without the station - it doesn't 
matter what it does, so long as it shows the flag at a cost policymakers can 
accept. So the Shuttle would have flown periodically, flying old astronauts 
and teachers and experiments with water droplets. That's why the CEV is 
appealing to policymakers - it promises cheap flights. What they actually achieve, 
where they go, will be decided later.

Mars is not relevant to this discussion as far as I can tell - any more than 
asteroids are.

David

David S. F. Portree
author & educator
dsfportree at aol.com
(928) 226-1427
Flagstaff Arizona USA

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"It's like when you're a kid, the first time they tell you that the world's 
turning and you just can't quite believe it because everything looks like it's 
standing still. I can feel it - the turn of the Earth. The ground beneath our 
feet is spinning at a thousand miles an hour, the entire planet is hurtling 
around the Sun at sixty-seven thousand miles an hour, and I can feel it. We're 
falling through space, you and me. Clinging to the skin of this tiny little 
world, and if we let go..." - The Ninth Doctor








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