I heart NASA

On July 8, NASA's Atlantis zoomed up into outer space for the last mission in the cash hungry space program, creating an atomic-sized plume of rocketship pollution and producing a deafening racket through highly technical noise generating equipment that blew the crap out of anything resembling an eardrum that happened to be within a few miles radius of the launchpad.  In a nutshell, rockets are cool. 

Barack Obama decided to axe the 40-year-old space program because it was gnawing away at funds that he preferred to spend on useless government programs that did nothing but create more bureaucracy, more socialism and more welfare dependent citizens.  The U.S. spends about US$2.2 trillion on health care every year, with about US$1 trillion of that being squandered through wasteful practices in urgent need of reform. 

The U.S. space program has devoured US$196 billion over the years (around US$450 million per mission), but it is, without a doubt, one of the best things to come out of the United States.  You could almost forgive the U.S. for giving the world Paris Hilton, the Kardashians and other rampant trashbags, because they had cool space shuttles.  Well not anymore they don't. 

Apparently the 9,000 or so folk who work at NASA are out of a job tomorrow, so they'll be packing up their kevlar reinforced deskspaces and taking their plastic rocket booster stress balls and heading off to the local employment agency that specialises in genius rocket scientists, astronauts and world class aeronautical engineers.  Something tells me they'll be okay.  The Russian space program is about to skyrocket (boom boom).

Since they blasted the Atlantis out into the great whoop whoop earlier this month, NASA have been running a real-time stream from their Mission Control Centre in Houston, the nerve centre of all things NASA, where one can watch those crazy command centre kids racing about with toy rocket ships above their head, surfing Google and Facebook, and spending hours upon hours chatting to their fellow aeroengineering geek colleagues about all things rockety. 

Oh wait, that's my workplace; except without the rocket scientists and toy space shuttles and talk of sonic booms.  All you see on the NASA live stream is a bunch of very serious looking middle-age men doing actual WORK; or at least it looks like work because they have many serious looking screens with lots of serious looking graphs and mapping data on them.  Maybe, like any true public servant, they know how to look busy.

On this occasion, Atlantis' mission was simple; deliver a years worth of supplies to the International Space Station.  So basically they were just the delivery boys (and girl) of several tonnes of food and vodka that will tide the Battlestar Gallactica crew over until the Russians come for them.  

I don't know what the big woop is with astronauts.  Just minutes before she landed, the Atlantis was travelling ten times the speed of sound, which is actually slower than the speed most people do down Canberra’s Tuggeranong Parkway during the morning peakhour. 

All of NASAs shuttles (except the two that blew up) will be placed on eBay under reusable space vehicles, if you are in the market for one.  Which you might be.  I'm not judging, I just think perhaps you should try and fit it into your garage before you buy.  Because there are no refunds.  Barack Obama doesn't do refunds. 

Another version of the truth that is actually true is that the shuttles are heading to a museum to become oversized dustcatchers.  Very sad state of affairs.  It's high time we got a Republican back in the White House, before this idiot dismantles anything else that has inspired generations.