Do you support public space exploration?

[Virginiá]

I'm not sure I agree with manned missions outside of LEO, because it doesn't seem very useful at the moment. However, I think we should significantly increase NASA's funding for R&D and other space-related investments.

Earth is set to undergo significant resource shortages for certain types of elements in the coming decades, and we need to prepare for this. Mining asteroids in space (particularly the asteroid belt, between Mars and Jupiter). We will need much more advanced technology, especially in energy and robotics, to take advantage of these truly enormous amounts of resources.

That is where things are headed no matter what we do, so we should begin investing now so we can be prepared. So many discoveries will likely be made while developing the technology to do this and it will inevitably benefit mankind in ways that are hard to imagine, just like previous large R&D projects have.

No, and as long as there are still people who do not have healthcare, as long as there are people who cannot afford an education, the US should cut back on its expenses in space and invest in more important areas that, you know, actually affect people's lives.

I see what you're saying, and it's perfectly understandable, but NASA's budget is already far smaller than it used to be, save for the small bump it got recently, iirc.

However, as I was rambling on about above, we will need to begin taking advantage of the resources in space no matter what we do on Earth and it's best we focus more resources on speeding up the exploitation of those space-based resources. IMO that should be a primary objective for NASA & private industry, rather than symbolic manned missions.

[Virginiá]

I agree. Id take it a step further get rid of Nasa and allow it to be contracted out.   Its been 40 years since they did anything noteworthy.   Use the funds for something else like you know.. roads and Bridges or maybe highspeed rails.   

What do you mean? Maybe they haven't been walking on the moon lately, but NASA contributes a lot towards astronomy / physics and other sciences. Maybe it's because a lot of that stuff is very dense and hard to understand that people freely blow off the need for NASA, but NASA's scientific contributions are noteworthy at least to scientists who help advance society's knowledge of our universe.

Boy, I guess society really takes for granted science and technology these days.

[Virginiá]

To be fair, it does make more sense to build closer to where you're going to utilize said product. (And, if I remember correctly, Boeing has a huge production facility in Everett.) You're thinking bigger scale in terms of large public works projects and the like. I think space exploration can and should be part of that. If I had my way, NASA's budget would be something along the lines of $100-200 billion. If that involved moving some money from the DOD, so be it. To be honest, I think that could be one of the most acceptable ways to reduce the defense budget while advancing all of humanity. I'm sure many defense contractors could easily move from military-based operations to space-oriented operations.

This is really what we should be doing. Not dumping enormous sums into wasteful military programs. We could be so much further ahead if we invested like that into R&D/space.