Future of NASA

So it appears that were on the verge on a private boom in the space industry. Bush has said that we are going to the moon...again, and then hopes springboarding from the moon to mars, but no real advancements being made (e.i. man on mars) until well after 2020. Why is it that NASA seems to be stagnating, is it going to take another communist nuclear threat to get this agency of its butt??

In a roundabout way you've hit the nail on the head. What is the point of having big national agencies if they're only good when some big idealogical conflict is going on and governments need to show that they are the best?

I look at it this way. Technological development and progress in most areas works on evolutionary principles. Competition breeds ideas that are better suited to the job in hand as those that are not so good are not developed until a purpose is found for them.

The private industry is well suited to such a system as there will always be a hell of a lot of competition between companies. Unfortunately the big agencies don't really have a reason for deep competition most of the time so for the space industry to develop, private involvement is necessary.

yeh, necessity is the mother of all invention right, i'm just hoping that the business spurred from things such as the x-prize will jump start NASA. It feels like we have just tipped our toes into what we can achieve in space, and i hope that NASA will wake up and decide to jump into the deep end and just do something.

NASA seems good at putting money about for pure scientific research and exploration. These are areas that the private sector would be hard pressed to invest in, so why not make that NASA's goal?

In time, lifting things to orbit, orbital construction, manufacturing, all of these can be done by our fledgling space industries. I say fledgling, but you can bet your last buck that the giant aerospace companies wont sit around waiting for the private sector to nip at their heels.