Space exploration and presidential politics

As with every other issue that the parties have made a "platform," the politicization of space will only serve to ground us.

If there’s one rule for the politics of the present decade so far, it’s been, “politicized issues go nowhere.” Climate change, energy, federal debt, environmental regulation, tax reform, and the list goes on. As more issues come under the polarized umbrella of our side/their side political posturing, those issues fall prey to the same gridlock that has been epidemic in state capitols and Washington. With the presidential campaign accelerating, one other issue is getting more attention from party leaders and pundits; space.

A recent feature in Wired, “Is Space Getting Too Politicized?” acknowledges this fact. Obama’s controversial closing of the publicly-funded manned-space flight program at NASA opened the door for greater private/public collaboration. However, largely a result of the success of Space X, the private company that recently sent a rocket to the space station and back, manned space flight is back in the news. So is Obama’s handling of it. It’s likely that opponents will be looking at Obama’s track record on space as a possible weakness, especially considering a majority of Americans are in favor of space exploration (though they differ on how it should be done).

Possible oldest galaxy in the universe discovered

A galaxy 12.91 billion light years from this planet has been observed.

Hawaii’s Mauna Kea is home to the Subaru and Keck telescopes that Japanese astronomers have used to discover the possibly oldest galaxy in the universe. The galaxy which is 12.91 billion light years away is not the first one that has reportedly been observed with some claims of galaxies just over 13 billion light years away being detected too.

There are always two sides to any story.

Space exploration is not doomed after all.

Let me repeat, there are always two sides to any story. This is good news for all you space enthusiasts and people who frequent this Space Report blog. It is like what President Obama said in his State of the Union speech: The people who think America is no longer a dominant global player are so wrong. The more I read and talk to people, the more I realize how true this is.

In other words, it is perception and the same can be said for all talk about the demise of NASA and space exploration. The dollars that NASA receives may have dwindled, but we all know that the companies or governments that spend the most money on any venture are not necessarily the ones who stand to profit the most.

The “Billionaire Age” is good for space exploration

Google bigwigs Larry Page and Eric Schmidt and famous movie director James Cameron are big names backing space projects

Man has always been somewhat mesmerized by space and the universe in general. It is the question of who are we and is there anybody else out there? It is something that has puzzled me ever since I read about this stuff in a chemistry textbook back in middle school.

Little did I know then that space exploration was such a big deal and it would gain such wealthy backers. I have already talked about Elon Musk and his SpaceX ship that will launch later this week. One of my favorite billionaires Paul Allen has always been a big backer of space and has funded a lot of projects in relation to it and other science stuff.

Get to Know Elon Musk

The preppy titan with a multifaceted personality

Any space enthusiast should become familiar with Elon Musk who is a 40-year-old, soon-to-be billionaire and the man who runs SpaceX. Elon came to America because he felt that great things were possible in this country and judging by the way he lives he has definitely eaten it all up.

Not to mention going to the best schools like the University of Pennsylvania where he studied physics and business and then a lot of science and physics at what I feel is the best university in the world: Stanford. He seems very pleased to be living in the modern age and why not with the success that he is enjoying. It is very pleasing for a space enthusiast like myself to see that the future of space, space travel and engineering is in the hands of a personality such as his.

What’s new in space?

Extraterrestrial dinosaurs, life on Mars and more

Speculation that NASA may have found life on Mars

A reanalysis of some data by NASA shows that there could be life on Mars. But this new analysis does not come without its own share of problems. The data from 36 years ago has been looked at in a different way to conclude that there may be have been biological activity rather than just the geological activity that it had originally pointed to. But this new way of looking at the data has to be proved to be useful and this is the issue.

Elon Musk’s latest foray into space

If you have been reading this blog for some time, I am guessing you have heard of the billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk who is the Chief Technology Officer at the space transport company SpaceX.

Russian Space Program Gets Ambitious About Space Exploration

Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, has an ambitious plan for building their space-faring street cred, and it all hapens in 18 years!

Roscosmos, the Russian equivalent of our NASA space program, has a pretty ambitious plan for shedding its Cold War space exploration image. In films like Armageddon and books like World War Z, the Russian space program is characterized as one of rusting Soviet-era equipment more fit for scrapyards than earth's orbit, and the cosmonauts aren’t much better. However, if documents leaked from a recent proposal by Roscosmos are true, they’re going to leave that bygone misconception behind entirely. Russian wants to put people on the moon, and that’s just for starters.

In 2014, space tourism will takeoff in the United States

"The industry is relatively brand new and growing considerably. "

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) stated that the Obama administration is getting ready for a space tourism industry to takeoff in the next two years. The industry has been estimated to have the potential to be worth about a $1 billion in a decade’s time.

I was talking about how space exploration should be privatized and this seems to be what is going to happen, thankfully. Space Exploration Technologies otherwise known as SpaceX and Orbital Sciences Corporation are two privately owned companies that NASA has hired in a mission to transport cargo to the $100 billion research complex that is the International Space Station.

NASA mission to fly Icarus-like close to the Sun in the future

Plans have been placed for NASA to fly a spacecraft perilously close to the Sun almost Icarus-like. Solar Probe Plus will give astronomers insights into how the Sun generates such enormous heat and the workings behind the solar winds. Additionally, the mission will serve to shed some light into the evolution of life on Earth and boost further exploration of space.

The price tag for the mission is estimated to be about $1.2 billion and many space enthusiasts wonder if NASA should be spending the money on trying to colonize other worlds or figuring out how to get started doing so rather than a mission to the Sun. I feel that this is a legitimate question, but astrophysicists and NASA astronomers agree that the space probe will be worth the money spent in terms of the information that will be gleaned.

The Train Wreck Cluster's Mysterious Dark Core

Huge clump of dark matter baffles scientists

What gets left behind after a train wreck of intergalactic proportions? Celestial bodies run into each other all the time, but the Abell 520 cluster represents evidence of a particularly violent incident up there among the stars. It's the result of a collision so chaotic that scientists have actually dubbed it the "Train Wreck cluster." And it's left quite the mystery in its wake. 

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