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From: price@chinet.chi.il.us (Doug Price)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: space news from Oct 6 AW&ST
Summary: Why do I do it?
Message-ID: <1990Dec07.153442.14503@chinet.chi.il.us>
Date: 7 Dec 90 15:34:42 GMT
References: <1990Dec4.025945.15482@zoo.toronto.edu> <20634@crg5.UUCP> <1990Dec6.174515.2343@zoo.toronto.edu>
Organization: Chinet - Public Access UNIX
Lines: 26

Every year, I receive my renewal notice from the Planetary Society, and I
wonder why I bother doing it.  The history of the Planetary Society has been
checkered with a private fiefdom mentality.  When I joined, I thought I was
supporting an organization with the goal of the the exploration of our
solar system within the context of the larger effort to explore the universe.
How wrong I was.  Instead, the Society quickly degenerated into a, "Let's do
MY experiment next at the expense of everyone else." group.  "Hey!", said
Carl Sagan, "I can make this operation my anti-nuclear war platform using
someone else's money, and I can bash the manned program for taking money
away from MY favorite projects at the same time!"

This was amply demonstrated by Sagan's anti-manned space editorial in the
Planetary Report a few years ago.  I was surprised by the abrupt about-face
of the Society in support of a manned mission to Mars a few issues later.
I suspect the hate mail was so intense that the Society figured out quickly
that bashing manned space was probably a bad move from the membership point
of view.

I do not dispute that a lot of good science can be done for a lot cheaper
for a few more years using robots.  This zero-sum, "zap his budget so I can
get my budget" stuff has got to go.

-- 
						Douglas H. Price
						price@chinet.chi.il.us
						price@vfrot.chi.il.us