We Have No Space Strategy

TW: As a spaceophile this NYT piece is thoroughly depressing. It attempts to summarize the results of the Augustine panel whose purpose was to lay out recommendation on the future of the U.S. space program. As you will read the prognosis is aimless and in many respects circular (we have goals but not enough money, we have money but not enough to do anything). I suspect the Chinese will be the next to blaze new paths in space. To many Americans this is likely fine, to me it is a great tragedy.

From NYT:
"A blue-ribbon panel said...that a lack of financing has left NASA’s current space program on an “unsustainable trajectory...

With growing federal deficits and bruising battles over health care, it is unclear how much political capital Mr. Obama might spend on expanding the budget for the space agency...

NASA, under its Constellation program, is developing a new rocket called Ares I and a new astronaut capsule called Orion, and the system is to begin carrying astronauts to the International Space Station in March 2015. After that, development of a larger rocket, the Ares V, and a lunar lander was to lead to a return to the moon by 2020.

The panel said that those plans were “reasonable” when they were announced in 2005, but that largely because NASA never received the expected financing, the first manned flight of Ares I would probably be delayed until 2017, and the International Space Station is to be discarded by 2016 under current plans. And the projected financing for NASA would not allow enough money for development of Ares V and the Altair lunar lander.

The panel in fact could find no program that “permits human exploration to continue in any meaningful way” within the $100 billion for human spaceflight over the next decade.

For $30 billion more, the current Constellation program is feasible, but would still not reach the moon until 2025, the panel said.

The panel asserted that it would be “unwise” to throw away the space station in 2015 after only five years of full operation, but that operating the space station would draw away money from the rest of the program.

...Beyond the question of rockets is one of destination. The ultimate goal is Mars, but that is currently not practical, the panel said."
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/science/space/09nasa.html