Shuttle Stupidity

I'm raging mad about this whole shuttle debacle. NASA never learns from its lessons because, at its heart, it always has a bureaucrat/politician at its head. It's very clear they fixed NOTHING regarding the system that ended up with the last crew blowing into thousands of pieces. Instead, they acted mildly embarrassed when a fuel gauge made them scrub last week's launch so they then rushed the crew up as soon as they could.

The result? Well, the International Space Station is pretty crowded with three people and it's got to be even more crowded with nine or so onboard.

People do NOT have to do space travel. The only reason we are not further into exploration is because of the insistence on having a human payload. It used to be pure PR and chutzpah that insisted humans ride. Now, I fear it's more about Bush's plans for the militarization of space, coupled with his light aptitude on the issues of human flight.