Re: NASA and White House Play Planetary Politics

[James McEnanly]

I'm surprised that astronauts who travel on the Shuttle do not remember April 12, as it also happens to be the Anniversary of STS-1, from Columbia's first voyage in 1981.

LARRY KLAES <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

I can remember during one of the early US missions to Mir circa

1995 how the cosmonauts expressed surprise that the Americans

did not recognize or celebrate Space Day on April 12, when Yuri

Gagarin became the first human in space on Vostok 1 in 1961.

 

It wasn't so much that the Russians expected Americans to

celebrate a Soviet event, but they looked at it more as a

major milestone for all humanity.

 

Ah well, don't they realize America still doesn't like the metric

system?

 

Don't worry, I don't think Communism is a superior system or

have any desire to live in Moscow.  Just making the point that

the public better wake up to the fact that we live on a pale

blue dot and life won't get better if we keep acting like it's

all there is to existence.

 

Larry

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Gregg Geist

Sent: Thursday, November 13, 2003 8:34 AM

To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Subject: Re: NASA and White House Play Planetary Politics

 

Wow

Here I am, looking at back e-mail, and I get a chance to complain again
about science reporting in the US.

At 11:59 AM 11/5/2003 -0500, LARRY KLAES wrote:

>Worlds in Collision: NASA, White House Play Planetary Politics
>
>http://www.space.com/news/nasa_bush_031105-1.html
>
>For those hungering to move humanity to move beyond the confines of Earth
>orbit, the words from U.S. President George Bush are clear and decisive:
>"Back to the Moon; back to the future. And this time, back to stay. And
>then a journey into tomorrow, a journey to another planet: a manned
>mission to Mars."

This was spoken as part of the 20th anniversary "celebration" of the first
moon landing.  I was in the Soviet Union when Bush said it.  One of the two
papers, Izvestia or Pravda, had this speech and the anniversary as front
page news, and devoted a full-page spread to th! is and Apollo 11 within the
paper.  This was a big deal.  These were generally about 10-sheet
newspapers.  There was a lot of talk in Russia about big-time space
cooperation with the US for a joint Mars mission and this looked like the
start of it.  When I got back to the US, people remembered that there was
stuff on July 20 about the moon landing but few heard this quote, and fewer
cared.

Gregg




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Sincerely

 

James McEnanly

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