Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

bananas

(27,509 posts)
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 01:49 AM Jun 2012

Scientists to Hold Bake Sale for NASA Saturday

Source: space.com

Scientists are trading telescopes for aprons this week to sell Milky Way cupcakes, Saturn cake, and chocolate chip Opportunity cookies in an effort to salvage U.S. planetary science projects.

The 2013 budget proposal submitted by the Obama administration earlier this year would cut funding for NASA's planetary science projects by about USD 300 million. While Congress is still deliberating over the federal budget, groups of scientists are planning a series of demonstrations —in the form of bake sales, car washes and other events —for Saturday (June 9) to plead their case.

Though planet-studying spacecraft usually cost millions, or even billions, of dollars, every penny helps. That's the reasoning behind the Planetary Exploration Car Wash and Bake Sale to be held by University of Central Florida students and professors who hope to sway lawmakers into providing more money for studying the solar system. It is one of nearly 20 planned demonstrations for Saturday at sites across the country, organizers said.

<snip>



Read more: http://m.yahoo.com/w/legobpengine/news/scientists-hold-bake-sale-nasa-saturday-221048232.html

45 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
Scientists to Hold Bake Sale for NASA Saturday (Original Post) bananas Jun 2012 OP
Why doesn't Gingrich do something positive with his miserable life aint_no_life_nowhere Jun 2012 #1
+1 red dog 1 Jun 2012 #2
Because the lunar colony was just bullshit posturing to win over the Space Coast. joshcryer Jun 2012 #4
Spam deleted by Morning Dew (MIR Team) Heather4 Jun 2012 #3
This country is getting beyond pathetic Confusious Jun 2012 #5
And even more embarrasing that we still call ourselves... Beartracks Jun 2012 #6
+1,000! Word! n/t Surya Gayatri Jun 2012 #8
Too true nt Confusious Jun 2012 #29
Precisely Sherman A1 Jun 2012 #9
+ 5,000 MBS Jun 2012 #10
Thank congress we let get elected. joshcryer Jun 2012 #11
+1. nt awoke_in_2003 Jun 2012 #17
If you want to be the greatest nation in the future, you must have the best space program. tclambert Jun 2012 #7
Oh yeah, fuck quality of living, disease prevention, personal happiness! boppers Jun 2012 #34
They aren't mutually exclusive Mz Pip Jun 2012 #38
Compare the top ten places to live and the top ten space programs. boppers Jun 2012 #39
Those top ten places to live use a lot of technology developed... PavePusher Jun 2012 #41
Ah, the tang and velcro myth. boppers Jun 2012 #42
We should also compare budget allocations for NASA vs. the social net programs... LanternWaste Jun 2012 #43
But we can buy 180 F-22s that we don't need at $200M each. baldguy Jun 2012 #12
I remember when we used to want to reduce the Pentagon to holding bake sales... freshwest Jun 2012 #40
Romney could pay for it out of his offshore accounts Rosa Luxemburg Jun 2012 #13
NASA needs to be move off government payroll and into the private sector may3rd Jun 2012 #14
Then why hasn't the private sector done it already? aint_no_life_nowhere Jun 2012 #18
It was actually illegal for the private sector to do so until a few years ago. Posteritatis Jun 2012 #19
The U.S. is not the only country in the world aint_no_life_nowhere Jun 2012 #20
The US is one of the better locations to do so Posteritatis Jun 2012 #22
Northeastern Brazil is only 100 miles from the French Guiana launch site aint_no_life_nowhere Jun 2012 #23
Proximity to the equator is helpful for prograde orbits. If you need a polar orbit, 24601 Jun 2012 #37
Space travel and research are absolutely being privatized, right now. woo me with science Jun 2012 #30
This message was self-deleted by its author woo me with science Jun 2012 #31
Exploration isn't necessarily a profitable venture 4th law of robotics Jun 2012 #25
You forgot the :sarcasm: tag. baldguy Jun 2012 #28
It's not only NASA but NOAA, too. KoKo Jun 2012 #15
What, no space cookies? nt awoke_in_2003 Jun 2012 #16
on average .. padruig Jun 2012 #21
Yeah. It bugs me how much people overestimate the expenses here Posteritatis Jun 2012 #26
For a tenth of the military budget we could have colonized mars and then some 4th law of robotics Jun 2012 #27
Reminds me of the imperial chinese treasure fleet 4th law of robotics Jun 2012 #24
Remember that old bumper sticker, woo me with science Jun 2012 #32
The problem with that sticker OrwellwasRight Jun 2012 #44
In other News, "China plans manned space launch this month" NorthCarolina Jun 2012 #33
So, in another 50 years, they may what, send drone robots to mars? boppers Jun 2012 #35
"I'd like 300 million of those oatmeal raisin cookies, please..." Unite2DefeatGOP Jun 2012 #36
Nothing says "To boldy go where no man (person) has gone before" like a Uncle Joe Jun 2012 #45

aint_no_life_nowhere

(21,925 posts)
1. Why doesn't Gingrich do something positive with his miserable life
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 02:45 AM
Jun 2012

now that he's at the end of his political career? He supports the idea of lunar colonies and many people associate him with the idea. Why doesn't he dedicate the rest of his life to hitting up his rich fat fuck friends in the Republican party for donations for the advancement of space science instead of continuing to be a lobbying parasite, or shall I say an historian? If he did something like that, I might have an ounce of respect for the evil toad.

When I was a kid in the 60s seeing our country's first manned space efforts on TV, I never would have guessed that our scientists would have had to go begging for funds through bake sales and car washes. I honestly thought we would have been to Mars and beyond by now.

joshcryer

(62,265 posts)
4. Because the lunar colony was just bullshit posturing to win over the Space Coast.
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 04:55 AM
Jun 2012

Obama cancelled Cx (which was going to be a meager lunar colony), and the Space Coast is bitter at Obama over it. Too bad for them that commercial space is making waves, because in the end Obama's move to cancel that crony project is going to open up space in a big way.

Confusious

(8,317 posts)
5. This country is getting beyond pathetic
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 06:13 AM
Jun 2012

Lets have a bake sale for NASA, for schools, for the fire and police dept so they can buy things that are not optional, but necessary.

It's an embarrassment.

tclambert

(11,080 posts)
7. If you want to be the greatest nation in the future, you must have the best space program.
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 06:48 AM
Jun 2012

Where do you want America to be in 20 to 30 years? The nation with the best roads, best schools, best space program, best health care; or a nation of people sitting in their recliners reminiscing about how great our nation used to be?

"Why, we sent men to the Moon! 70 years ago. We don't even launch weather satellites any more, but back in the day we were sumpthin'. Hey, get off my lawn! Hippies!"

boppers

(16,588 posts)
34. Oh yeah, fuck quality of living, disease prevention, personal happiness!
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 10:31 PM
Jun 2012

Space is what makes a nation great!

Mz Pip

(27,404 posts)
38. They aren't mutually exclusive
Sun Jun 10, 2012, 12:53 AM
Jun 2012

We should be able to do both - have a good quality of life and a wonderful space program.

 

PavePusher

(15,374 posts)
41. Those top ten places to live use a lot of technology developed...
Sun Jun 10, 2012, 03:57 PM
Jun 2012

directly from the space program.

boppers

(16,588 posts)
42. Ah, the tang and velcro myth.
Sun Jun 10, 2012, 06:18 PM
Jun 2012

What technologies would those be? Most space programs made use of pre-existing technologies. Like Tang, Velcro, etc.

 

LanternWaste

(37,748 posts)
43. We should also compare budget allocations for NASA vs. the social net programs...
Mon Jun 11, 2012, 03:49 PM
Jun 2012

We should also compare budget allocations for NASA vs. the social net programs...

 

baldguy

(36,649 posts)
12. But we can buy 180 F-22s that we don't need at $200M each.
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 08:01 AM
Jun 2012

And 10 Ford-class carriers at upwards of $10B each.

freshwest

(53,661 posts)
40. I remember when we used to want to reduce the Pentagon to holding bake sales...
Sun Jun 10, 2012, 01:35 AM
Jun 2012

I still feel that is good idea...

 

may3rd

(593 posts)
14. NASA needs to be move off government payroll and into the private sector
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 09:24 AM
Jun 2012

Thats the only way to 'make jobs' happen.

A bake sale?

aint_no_life_nowhere

(21,925 posts)
18. Then why hasn't the private sector done it already?
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 01:18 PM
Jun 2012

Because there's no immediate profit to be made. There are some things private enterprise isn't equipped to do, such as taking on enormous long-term risk where the returns may or may not come for quite some time. What shareholders are going to fund that? There are very few like billionaire Elon Musk who risked hundreds of millions of his own money to build a space rocket. Most investors are more like Romney and prefer to risk someone else's money. Private enterprise is ready to collect taxpayer money by landing government contracts but they're not willing to go it completely alone, with no certainly of payoff. I'm all for private enterprise getting involved but the government has to prime the pump and establish an infrastructure in outer space by the mass shared effort of the taxpayers. It's the same as when European governments, the monarchies funded the first efforts to colonize the new world in the 1500s - 1600s.

Posteritatis

(18,807 posts)
19. It was actually illegal for the private sector to do so until a few years ago.
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 02:22 PM
Jun 2012

Legal restrictions against spaceflight that didn't go through NASA or the Air Force didn't go away until shortly before the X-Prize shot, at which point a bunch of companies immediately started work on trying to get themselves up there.

aint_no_life_nowhere

(21,925 posts)
20. The U.S. is not the only country in the world
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 02:52 PM
Jun 2012

If a multinational corporation felt they could reap big profits by going into space, they would have rented a portion of a third world country to try it. In fact, I vaguely recall a German company having leased many square miles of an African country back in the 70s to try that very thing and their financing never went anywhere. And the X-Prize does not represent an example of private enterprise completely going it alone. It's a competition to win a NASA contract.

Posteritatis

(18,807 posts)
22. The US is one of the better locations to do so
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 03:11 PM
Jun 2012

The list of candidate countries that are stable, open to that sort of thing, and have access to good launch sites close to the equator with easy overland access to the facilities where much of the pretty large and often fragile hardware is getting built isn't exactly a huge one.

You can't just launch from anywhere; you need a safe location as close as you can get to the equator. There's a reason NASA tends to launch from Florida, and Russia launches from southern Kazakhstan, and the ESA launches from Kourou. If you're casting a wider net you end up in places with much more problematic weather, or no useful infrastructure, or currently-insurmountable security problems, or where you have to deal with airspace issues for several countries (which often themselves have additional security problems, mind).

There's a reason that German attempt never went anywhere - if I had the resources to try to set up a spaceport somewhere I'd need to take a whole load of stupid pills to try to do so in central Africa.

The initial X-prize was not a competition to win a NASA contract; it was the initial attempts for private enterprise to try to get something with a person in it outside of the atmosphere, and that attempt could not be made on US soil until doing so was legalized around '04 or so.

aint_no_life_nowhere

(21,925 posts)
23. Northeastern Brazil is only 100 miles from the French Guiana launch site
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 03:53 PM
Jun 2012

Last edited Sat Jun 9, 2012, 04:24 PM - Edit history (1)

and in the same latitude. The area is politically stable and sparsely populated. Florida is far from the equator and there are many countries located closer to it, with weather that is no more unreliable. The fact is, no corporations have been scrambling to step forward and partner with governments to start a space program from scratch because it would be too risky and investors don't like extreme risk. If it's not a good risk with a reasonably certain and quick return, they won't go for it. They'll put their money in better risks. There are certain things governments do best and those are the big risky things, like Rachel Maddow says in that MSNBC spot with the Hoover dam in the background: development of outer space, basic scientific research, the Internet, the interstate highway system. Privatization is not the solution to every endeavor. Private companies are good at cherry-picking the profitable activities once the infrastructure has been established. And the the reason I mentioned Elon Musk is that he's an unusual capitalist. He's a believer who isn't in it just for the profit. He couldn't find investors willing to risk their money in the development of a rocket. He was almost universally called a fool by the business community when he dumped several hundred million of his own fortune into the research and development of his rocket. And 'yes' he was trying to win a NASA contract. Once the rocket worked, the plan was to get funding.

24601

(3,940 posts)
37. Proximity to the equator is helpful for prograde orbits. If you need a polar orbit,
Sun Jun 10, 2012, 12:41 AM
Jun 2012

launch site latitude isn't relevant. If you need a retrograde orbit, and sun-synchronous orbits are slightly retrograde, you should get as far away from the equator as possible.

woo me with science

(32,139 posts)
30. Space travel and research are absolutely being privatized, right now.
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 06:34 PM
Jun 2012

Commercial flights to the space station, mining asteroids....

Private Spaceflight's Rise Gives NASA a Boost
http://www.space.com/16064-private-spaceflight-nasa-exploration-goals.html

As NASA scales back, commercial adventurers look to new horizons
http://triblive.com/news/1827623-74/nasa-space-million-commercial-projects-station-private-science-shift-astrobotic

Tech Billionaires Plan Audacious Mission to Mine Asteroids
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/04/planetary-resources-asteroid-mining/

Response to woo me with science (Reply #30)

 

4th law of robotics

(6,801 posts)
25. Exploration isn't necessarily a profitable venture
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 04:29 PM
Jun 2012

and if it is then certainly not in the lengths of time most companies are willing to invest in it.

Not everything has to be run for a profit.

KoKo

(84,711 posts)
15. It's not only NASA but NOAA, too.
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 09:47 AM
Jun 2012

Last edited Sat Jun 9, 2012, 10:18 AM - Edit history (1)

Relative who works in research for NOAA sent us info about the cuts and the state he's in doesn't allow Bake Sales or Car Washes (because of water restrictions)...so they are going to the malls and offer to shine people shoes...

I kid you not! This relative has a Ph.D. he worked hard for and does statistics for our weather monitoring. Now he's going to be shining shoes (to call attention to the cuts) with his fellow NOAA employees because the country can't afford NOAA statisticians?

What have we come to?

padruig

(133 posts)
21. on average ..
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 02:54 PM
Jun 2012

On average about 1/4 of one penny of your tax dollars go to the funding of NASA

Imagine what would happen if we increased that from 1/4 of on penny to 1/2 of one penny

Space is not the Final Frontier, it is the Next Frontier and your tax pennies spent on NASA, NOAA, USGS (and National Forest Service, National Park Service, United States Coast Guard) is some of the best things tax monies can buy.

People like to say we know more about the moon than we do the bottom of the ocean, then lets increase the funding for NOAA and oceanographic research

This nation went up against 34 other nations in terms of the character and quality of its math and science education ... funny thing, we put men on the moon but scored 14th internationally in math and 17th in science

In the meantime China who likes to play the 'developing nation' card when accused of not paying attention to its environmental policy (the air quality in Beijing is one of the worst in the world) has developed its own launch capability, has a manned program well in operation, is planning a manned landing on the lunar surface, their own space station and lunar base

(as a point of reference we outspend China in military expenditures by over 5 to 1)

As to the recent success of SpaceX and their launch of the Dragon capsule it should be noted that they are not really doing anything differently than has been done before by our space program.

SpaceX is operating under contract, a 2 billion dollar, multi-year contract, to provide launch, supply and transport capability.

So while some may crow about the "commercialization" of space, its always been a commercial venture, with Federal Contract guarantees.

Posteritatis

(18,807 posts)
26. Yeah. It bugs me how much people overestimate the expenses here
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 04:46 PM
Jun 2012

NASA spends less on its budget than Canada does on its military, and that's after the prime minister decided we need to vastly expand the armed forces up here, but a lot of people guess its costs in the hundreds of billions.

 

4th law of robotics

(6,801 posts)
27. For a tenth of the military budget we could have colonized mars and then some
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 04:50 PM
Jun 2012

assuming we were spending that all along.

Sigh.

 

4th law of robotics

(6,801 posts)
24. Reminds me of the imperial chinese treasure fleet
Sat Jun 9, 2012, 04:27 PM
Jun 2012

Such an impressive feat, unparalleled in the history of the world and with such amazing potential.

Ultimately burned in the docks when it went out of favor.

But hey, think of all the money China saved by turning inward and becoming a stagnant, failed culture that was ultimately enslaved by foreigners who looked outward?

OrwellwasRight

(5,170 posts)
44. The problem with that sticker
Mon Jun 11, 2012, 04:00 PM
Jun 2012

is that we now have the bake sales for NASA, but we still never got the schools right (no matter what the Republicans say about greedy teachers making too much money).

Schools still don't have money for field trips, science labs, awesome libraries, and such. Many kids go to school in inesct-infested nasty old buildings that leak.

Uncle Joe

(58,112 posts)
45. Nothing says "To boldy go where no man (person) has gone before" like a
Mon Jun 11, 2012, 04:18 PM
Jun 2012

banana nut, chocolate chip muffin.

Thanks for the thread, bananas.

Latest Discussions»Latest Breaking News»Scientists to Hold Bake S...