Current mood:	contemplative
Current music:	www.pandora.com

Ways to fix the US Space program
1: Take more risks
The current space program is too reliant on '80's technology. Combined with being so overcautious that they have reverted to using a capsule instead of trying innovative new designs, such as the excellent Venturestar design. One of their first tasks should be to design, build, and launch a new design every two years.

2: Specialize the craft
Building an all-purpose craft was fine when we were just getting going, and such a design worked for well over fifteen years. But at the same time, dependence on that design has caused stagnation within NASA. We need to start launching specialized craft built to handle specific tasks. Small, unpressurized construction frames/cargo movers. Heavy load launchers. Drydock building facilities. Asteroid mining ships with spin force rings to allow for resource collection to build more, bigger ships without pulling any materials from Earth. Repair tugs. Planetary and cross-station shuttles.

3: Modernize the equipment.
The entire computer system of the space shuttles could be replaced with a single first-generation Panasonic Toughbook. They are so old that the only people who would buy them are those with a personal space museum.

4: Make space travel, mining, and manufacturing profitable
The same reason is why air travel is so common and reasonably priced today. As well as why it's cheaper to manufacture goods outside the US. Even simply being able to make better equipment using null-gee manufacturing methods using materials pulled from a debris field the size of a planet would be worth the expenses and risks involved in developing such infrastructure. Even using public funds to build manufacturing core stations that companies add their own modules onto at the Lagrange points would be beneficial.