• Deflated0ne@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    Has anyone considered funding NASA?

    They made rockets that didn’t explode with duct tape and a TI-83 calculator.

    • Uruanna@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      Shouldn’t be incompatible with nationalizing SpaceX and Starlink. Just give it all to NASA, actually.

    • rottingleaf@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      What “they made” 50 years ago is of little value now. Expertise matters, and it’s lost with time passing.

      Still - yes. Nationalization is a bad solution because it gives the state power to nationalize. Seems a truism.

      Just let NASA work in its normal role. Instead of replacing that with SpaceX contracts.

    • MrSpArkle@lemmy.ca
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      6 days ago

      SpaceX and Starlink basically have no competition, and if they did, said competitor would also need to be heavily subsidized.

      • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        These last few years they’ve had very little successes, but the point is it should stay competitive and not be automatically handed to these doofuses. Even the USSR maintained a competitive rocketry sector.

        • MrSpArkle@lemmy.ca
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          5 days ago

          How has spacex had very few successes? Their Falcon 9 rocket is basically operating like clockwork. They launch more rockets than the rest of the world combined.

          The starship failures are higher profile but even those failures are typical when testing new vehicles, especially one as experimental and complex.

          • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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            5 days ago

            They weren’t as typical with previous SpaceX models, Starship is easily their least successful project.

            Since SpaceX is launching large quantities of commercial satellites, big whoop, do you also celebrate when companies buy back stocks?

            • MrSpArkle@lemmy.ca
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              4 days ago

              Why would I celebrate stock buybacks?

              Also spacex lost like 20 or so Falcons before their first successful mission. Maybe they will explode as many Starships, but they have hit that number yet.

              It’s ok to hate Elon, and there are many valid criticisms to make regarding spacex, but they’re the best in the world right now and it isn’t even close.

              The biggest issue with Spacex is that Elon needs to be removed before he ruins it like he ruined Tesla.

    • ikidd@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      NASA hasn’t take the slightest risk since Challenger. They wouldn’t have accomplished 1/20th of the launch capability SpaceX has developed in the last 5 years.

        • ikidd@lemmy.world
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          6 days ago

          It’s the specification process that’s the thing, nobody there would have gone out on a limb the way SpaceX has with their recovery systems. Look where they are on a shuttle replacement: the Apollo capsule with more room.

  • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
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    7 days ago

    Yeah, let’s give the trump administration the power to seize companies it doesn’t like, that is a great idea that def won’t be abused all the time

    • seejur@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      We are already fucked. The choices given are siding with Trump, and end up like Russia, or side with Elon, and end up like Cyberpunk 2077

      • Disaster@sh.itjust.works
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        7 days ago

        …or organize, start/join unions, get involved with your local community and build up some real resistance that isn’t based off obscene wealth, lawfare or media brainwashing. Once you have experienced something real, it’s quite hard to understand how or why anyone would fall for the alternative.

  • MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca
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    5 days ago

    I disagree.

    1. You already have a government space agency. Maybe give them more funding so they don’t have to rely on space-x to get their stuff into orbit?

    2. There’s a national telecom network already in place. It at least has the potential to be faster and more reliable, if it isn’t already… At least compared to low earth orbit satellite coverage.

    There’s no good reason to continue providing Elon or his companies with any government handouts. Pull that funding and give it to… I dunno, students who have more debt than homeowners with a mortgage… NASA… Literally anything that helps people?

    • Inucune@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      NASA is too beholden to politics… You can’t do 7 year builds and missions when the Senate flips every 4 years and has to kill everything the other side did on principle that it has a D or R attached to it. Everything is political.

  • psycho_driver@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    Lets reach a compromise. Impeach Trump (successfully) and then take away SpaceX from Elon. That way things would be fair.

    • zarkanian@sh.itjust.works
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      7 days ago

      Trump has been impeached successfully. Twice. What I assume you mean is that he hasn’t been removed from office. That could be the consequence of an impeachment, but not necessarily.

      • AA5B@lemmy.world
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        7 days ago

        For whatever reasons Musk has found himself as ceo of some wildly successful visionary companies. It has not changed that they are finally bringing the future to the present, disrupting old technologies in favor of newer and better, for a better world. And the musk from before his breakdown deserves a lot of credit.

        At this point I no longer care about musk either, but SpaceX and Tesla are critical. Or at least SpaceX is. Tesla has not yet finished disrupting vehicle manufacturing , but if we’re content to let Chinese companies go ahead, they’re ready and willing. Legacy manufacturers have been slapped up the side of the face, but if they’re still not awake at this point it’s on them

        • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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          7 days ago

          Sure, he gets credit for building hype and getting investors on board. He’s a decent salesman, and probably decent at business in general.

          I don’t care if he’s rich or not, he’s relatively harmless when it comes to things I care about. Trump, on the other hand, is dangerous because he seems to work off vibes and compliments, and that’s scary.

      • explodicle@sh.itjust.works
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        7 days ago

        I mean if we count bailouts as nationalization, then now we’ve got like some kinda national “socialism” where state and corporate power have fused.

        • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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          7 days ago

          The GM situation was a more than a bailout, they took complete control of the company, took it private, liquidated some assets, then sold it off in a new IPO.

          It’s not all that different from a private equity firm doing the same thing, the major difference is the legal protections the US had (e.g. it got priority over all other creditors). If the US wanted to keep it and run it, it could’ve.

  • postmateDumbass@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    Arrest Musk on violation of controlled substances acts, file immigration violation charges, invalidate his ownership shares due to securities fraud, as he falsified education and naturalization forms.

    Or just emminent domain the shit. The Law is just made up right now.

    • michaelmrose@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      Such an effort would be likely to fail AND take longer than the current administration is likely to exist.

  • mojofrododojo@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    I’ve been saying this for years. the footprint that spaceX represents in national launch authority is out of whack to say the least.

    • postmateDumbass@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      The only reason SpaceX exists is because Boeing and Lockheed managed to compete so badly the only solution was to merge their launch businesses.

      So we had one launch company, then spaceX made it two providers, now its back to one because B-mart is using antiquated launch systems (single use).

      • mojofrododojo@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        this isn’t incorrect. ULA is a fucking pork barrel of hideous proportions. doesn’t mean we shouldn’t nationalize spacex.

    • TrueStoryBob@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      The automotive manufacturers General Motors and Chrysler were partially nationalized in the wake of the 2008 Financial Crisis as were several banks… these were less a full government takeover and more of a government guided restructuring, but the government owned large stakes in these companies. Before that, the only full nationalization of anything substantial was the bankruptcy of the Penn Central Railroad and subsequent establishment of Consolidated Rail (branded as ConRail) the US’s only national freight rail company.

      Conrail was later privatized into what is now the private companies CSX and Norfolk Southern. The collapse of Penn Central was the largest bankruptcy in history until Enron in the 1990’s. Amtrak, our national passenger rail corporation, is also a nationalized entity created around the same time as ConRail, for similar reasons, and is still nationalized (although the Trump admin wants to privatize it).

    • zbk@lemmy.ca
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      6 days ago

      I think during world war 2. But things were worse then 15% unemployment and people still had massive economic leverage. I don’t think the US government is nationalizing anything anytime soon now. Neither party will participate in it because they are in the pockets of the oligarchs.

  • TheBannedLemming@lemmy.world
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    5 days ago

    I am not saying that I don’t agree with you. But this country is still not even close to considering nationalizing its own telecommunication infrastructure. Much less a privately held space company and a service of communication satellites. A large chunk of America believes that a for-profit business model for every good and service possible in life is the best course of action.