United States Strives for Third Place in Manned Space Exploration

1. In his State of The Union Speech, we heard "I do not accept second place for the United Sates of America".

2. Well, I guess when it comes to space exploration, the high technology jobs it would create and the continued spinoffs of new technology for many civilian uses, Obama is apparently willing to accept third place, or lower, after the United States held first place for fifty years. Obama has cut the legs out from under NASA and further U.S. manned exploration of space by killing the Constellation program in the 2011 budget. Within a couple if years, the U.S. will be third behind Russia and China and maybe worse if the European Union enters manned space exploration. Obama gave two pitiful excuses, first saying that private industry will take over low orbit space flight and second that the U.S. will ultimately fund space flight to Mars. The former will never happen for many reasonsof cost, safety and risk and, without the Constellation project as the stepping stone, the later will never happen.

3. We already know that Obama wants to move the United States from first place in quality and technical superiority of health care to something much lower for the sake of government control of health care.

4. About the only area where he seems intent on keeping the United States in first place is in National Debt and annual budget deficits.

5. Where a segment of the economy ought to stay in the private sector, like health care, Obama wants to take it over in the public sector. Conversely, where a segment of the economy ought to be in the public sector, like manned space exploration, Obama wants that to be taken over by the private sector.