Space...the final frontier

A news article caught my eye. It was entitled, "New Orleans gets a boost from NASA" and it details how the next generation of rockets are scheduled to be built in the New Orleans area which will bring some very high income jobs to New Orleans for many years to come. It talked about the Constellation Project which is the US' next big project to put men on the moon by 2020 at the latest. Have you heard of it?

I vaguely recall hearing about it as part of a budget report or some other barely covered report from NASA. This is a huge shame!! It's a very exciting project to not only put men on the moon (been there, done that....I saw it on TV), but to keep them there in a regular outpost. This is a huge step for humanity and no one seems to notice. For the first time, we are going to become extra-terrestrials!!

For those of us who regularly read science fiction, we can tell you that this will open up a vast array of socio-economic and political issues. Who owns the base? Who taxes it? Who governs it? (Think of England dealing with the colonies in the "New World". We all know how that turned out) Are we ready for an independent planet to keep up with? Anyone for the Mars v. Earth Solar Series in October? The implications are staggering. Keep watching at http://www.nasa.gov/ or http://www.spacefoundation.org/.

Thoughts anyone?