40 Years After Moon Landing, Time to Launch the Next 'Giant Leap for Mankind'

I'm not quite sure what John W. of AL means when he calls our ex-Nazi's "the best of the crop." If so, they were the best of a very bad crop indeed. von Braum held the rank of SS-Major. He witnessed and even requested the use of slave labor from concentration camps to work on his V rockets. He was also a pilot with a plane at his personal disposal during much of the war. He could have easily flown that plane to neutral Sweeden, not far from his rocket research facility. Yet he stayed with Hitler's Germany to the bitter end.

The point is America's Moon landings were the product of some terrible moral compromises. Directed by participants in one of the world's most prolific criminal acts, it also went forward seemingly blissfully unaware of the grinding poverty existing both at home and abroad. Not surprisingly considering the context, all the astronauts were white males. What little new science the manned space program created were incidental by-products of one huge cold-war publicity stunt that benefitted a relative few.

Maybe America and the world needs a renewed focus on science and technology, but America's manned space program should not be the example to follow to acheive that goal.

Mike of IN 10:08AM July 20, 2009