It is time to take a stand for the future. Not in just words, but actions. It is time to step up and demand the Vision. For by its realization we all will win, and I mean us all.

Some have questioned if we are overselling the opening of the...

I have been asked how I can so easily cross party lines during this election time, when it comes to supporting or chastising politicians based on their actions regarding the opening of space. Why do I care about opening the space frontier more than any other issue? How can I...

As I watch the U.S. election process unfold, it is sad to see the amazing revolution that is the birth of a new U.S. commercial space industry ignored or, worse, trivialized and undercut by those who should be its champions.

The iconic...

When good people do bad things, it is sad, but when they reach the point where one can predict that they will do nothing but bad things, a deeper kind of sadness sets in, almost at the level of resignation.

Having read the 2012 Republican Party Platform's section on space...

In a couple of days, as the world holds its breath, the Curiosity rover will attempt to touch wheels on Mars. After a marathon covering 154 million miles, a final flaming sprint and a spectacular entry, it will hopefully hit its mark, and as it trundles off into the Martian...

2012 will be seen as the beginning of the frontier era in space. By 2030 there will be people on the Moon, on Mars, and in the free space between worlds. The first permanent communities beyond Earth will be founded, the first major products and inventions created there will have...

It's been a couple of weeks since the NASA budget came out and fingers are still pointing as to who screwed up where, whose program ate what budget and why, and why is mine being singled out while yours is being kept alive? Meanwhile, in partial answer to that question,...

I will get back to my series on the "Why?" of space later this week. In the meantime, knowing that by the end of the week the issue will be used up and gone for a bit, I must comment on the Newt Gingrich space speech in Florida and the...

This month I began a series of postings entitled: "Why space?" as part of an explanation as to why so many of us, from geeks to dot com billionaires and others, are so passionate about what is about to happen in space, just as others decry the end of the...

Given this is the inauguration of a new science section, I thought I might step away from the moment by moment politics of the space field and do a bit of priming and explanation for what people see happening in the human space arena, yet many misunderstand -- as was...

Dear Mars Science Laboratory team,
Thank you!

In the middle of a completely absurd debate about how much U.S. taxpayer money should be put into the pockets of congressional donors in the name of not building government rockets that will not support the opening of space in any way,...

His friends call him "Norm". His grandkids call him "PaPaw". His children call him "Dad" and when he is a bit tough, driving us hard or we feel sentimental, we call him "Sarge" -- short for Technical Sargeant Norman O. Tumlinson, United States Air Force.

You see, my dad (like...

There are moments in time when a decision or set of decisions that may not seem important when judged against the cacophony of transient background noise can change the destiny of nations and indeed humanity as a whole. This is exactly such a time, and a few key decisions made...

Last week, Russia's Progress cargo vehicle, bound for the International Space Station (ISS) and carrying a load of supplies for several months to the astronauts waiting in orbit, was destroyed during launch. The vehicle, once attached to the station, was designed to also be able to fire its...

The shuttle program ended this week just as we celebrated the 42nd anniversary of Apollo. It is poetic and yet sad. It also begs the question, what next?

Some, even heroes of Apollo, whine and lament the end of exploration and what they see as the death of our American...

This week, the shuttle program ends and we "celebrate" the anniversary of Apollo, when humans first walked on the moon. Yet, many question if we ever went. Why? Because if we had why aren't we still there and far beyond?

Our national human space program has failed -- if the...

No bucks, no Buck Rogers. It's one of the tritest phrases in space policy debates, often used to wheedle more money from doubtful taxpayers.

Well, that isn't going to work this time around, no matter how pretty the PowerPoints. But we still want to do great things, and send...

Given the current fiscal climate, it is sad to see that some in Congress (oddly led by so-called fiscally conservative Republicans) are pushing hard for billions of our tax dollars to be spent on space projects that are being cancelled, sending hundreds of millions to the Russians so they can...

In the first decade of this century, the old US space establishment was handed the chance to begin an amazing quest to return to the Moon and explore Mars, and blew it -- by applying a 20th century state socialist solution to a 21st century frontier challenge, adopting the hardware...

The US space program is in the midst of a historic revolution. The White House's plan to hand over low Earth orbit activities to the rising US commercial space sector and focus the agency on far ranging exploration goals is a complete re-set of our space program.

In the last...