Editorial: NASA serves as example

Wednesday, Sept. 21, 2005 | 9:06 a.m.

The vision that NASA has of the United States as a can-do country that can spend hundreds of billions of dollars on space travel should be the vision of the whole country. Regrettably, over the past several decades, the country as a whole has been almost in denial about its greatness, and the great things it can accomplish with the right leadership and attitude.

On Monday NASA announced plans for returning to the moon, something that this country hasn't tried since the end of the Apollo missions in 1972. The agency did not blink an eyelash at the cost -- $104 billion over the next 13 years, and hundreds of billions more after that. The agency exuded confidence in its belief that the pursuit of greatness was well worth the cost.

Most of its announcement was centered on why the country should return to the moon. In its vision, which was stimulated by President Bush in a speech in January of last year, NASA sees the moon as a launching pad for future missions. By perfecting the next generation of spacecraft, which could carry more people and more cargo, a whole facility could be built on the moon for launching humans deeper into space. Without the pull of gravity, scientists see a voyage to Mars as far less costly and far more feasible.

We believe in space travel and we believe this is the way NASA should be dreaming. Man has never admitted to boundaries. Even when he thought the oceans were flat and feared cascading over the side of the Earth, he set sail anyway. Space is no different. Now that we know we can break through the atmosphere, there can be no setting of limits as to how far we can go. When future generations have sent spacecraft to Mars, they will set sights on leaving the solar system. It's this sense of pushing our boundaries that has characterized man since the beginning of his time.

What concerns us, though, is the declining will in this country over the past few decades when it comes to Earth-bound needs. A country such as the United States should not only say yes to space travel, but should also say yes to everything else that defines greatness. We should be ending poverty, disease and hunger around the world. We should be sending a properly equipped military when wars arise. Our infrastructure, our education system, our health care system, our social programs -- all should be models for the world, but fall well short of that status.

As NASA dreams, so should the rest of the country.