...To go to the moon:
President Bush wants to send Americans back to the moon — and may leave a permanent presence there — in a bold new vision for space exploration, administration officials said yesterday.And a permanent presence likely will include robots and communication satellites.
But beyond the nuts and bolts, Bush's call for a to return to space would give Americans something new to hope for - amid a period of permanent anxiety about terrorism.
Colonies! Vision! Robots! You can't imagine how giddy the article made me when I first read it this morning. With a domestic budget in the red, however, and a space program that's as directionless as it is traumatized, I can't see such grand objectives accomplished by the government. How could President Bush celebrate the triumph of America and the promise of space-age mankind in one sweeping gesture? One word, the same word we applied to aviation: privatization.