While I am glad that it’s looking less and less likely that he’ll ever sit behind the desk in the Oval Office, I do have to commend Mr Giuliani for specifically bringing up COTS and commercial space transportation today in his op-ed article on FloridaToday.com:
We will maintain America’s technological advantage in space. We will send Americans back to the moon and onto the next great frontier in human space exploration: Mars.
We will support the Commercial Orbital Transportation Systems Program to stimulate important private entrepreneurial efforts in spaceflight.
We will expand private-sector access to Cape Canaveral launch pads. To help prepare astronauts for longer stays in space, we will fund the Space Life Sciences Lab.
While a decent chunk of his article amounts to little more than your typical political pandering, his statement about COTS isn’t your typical pandering–it isn’t really likely going to get him anywhere near as many votes in Florida as promising a couple billion to expedite Ares-I.
I just wish a candidate that I could stand voting for would say something like that…
Jonathan Goff
Latest posts by Jonathan Goff (see all)
- On Avoiding Some of the Mistakes of Apollo - July 21, 2019
- SBIR Proposaling Advice - March 8, 2019
- FISO Telecon Lecture on LEO Propellant Depots for Interplanetary Smallsat Launch - November 28, 2018
Remember that SpaceX plans to launch Falcon 9 from the Cape. That could prove the leadinge edge of the wedge to bring a well needed commercial element to the Space Coast.
As for your wish that a candidate you could “stand voting for” would show the least bit of care about space, I wish I could feel your pain, but I don’t.
Jon and I are sort of the inverse of each other when it concerns the 2008 Republican candidates so it’s very easy for me to feel Jon’s pain. I wish all the candidates would come out in favor of commercial space publicly yet differently enough to make it a debating issue –should be easy enough for them since they’re politicians ^_^
Some detailed policy papers would be nice too but I know that’s farfetched right now.