Scrap NASA

I believe that in a severe fuel crisis, the first two things we can do without are NASCAR and NASA. NASCAR is inherently pointless, as well as being an enormous waste of fuel, but I still haven't figured out what was the point of the moon landing. Still, I understand congratulations are in order, we just landed a bush-hog on Mars. Of course a radio glitch held up Mission Control's orders to start up the robotic arm, which will ultimately scoop up a load of red dust that will be analyzed and tested and found to be Mars dirt, much like Moon Rocks.

I appreciate the breakthroughs in communications and technology that the space program has given us. Thanks guys, for the cell phones. And cable television is groovy, but we've had man-made Earth satellites buzzing around since 1957. These public relations based manned missions to the space station have offered great experiments in weightless mice with cancer and entertaining space walks, but now they can't even fix the toilet, giving new meaning to the phrase, "That shit don't fly." The space race is over when we have to float on over to the Russian Soyuz laboratory to ask to use the crapper.

All that phantasmagorical ruminating about our destiny being beyond the stars has caused us to fry up over a dozen astronauts in high gimmick looksies. And other than Tang and "A-OK," what has it gained us? Our multi-trillion dollar Space Patrol is a machismo remnant of the JFK era that made our country feel good once upon a time when we could afford it. That time has passed, and we could use the jet fuel to avoid paying $15.00 for a suitcase to ride in the cargo hold of one of our clueless airlines. And what is it the Phoenix Mars Lander is looking for? Ice. Someone should tell them there's a new thing out, it's called a 7/11.

I know; If there is ice, perhaps there were primitive lifeforms on the planet millenia ago, but is this meaningful in our understanding of our human beginnings? Instead of Ray Bradbury, our country's scientists should have read more Plato and his commentaries on Atlantis. Myths and legends have surrounded the sunken continent since before the printed word, indicating that an advanced civilization existed in the time before the Great Flood that gave birth to all the societies we know today. Had we spent the resources exploring the mysteries of our own oceans' depths, we may well have advanced knowledge in medicines and increased our understanding of the origins of the species. I'll repeat; our rockets have been pointed in the wrong direction.

We have had a cultural fixation with outer-space since Orson Welles and the flying-saucer craze of the Fifties. A cottage industry of movies, music, TV, and fiction have all grown around it. I think we can pretty well conclude that, despite all the testimony of anal probing, nobody's watching us. Let NASA keep sending us the pretty pictures of deep space and the birth of galaxies, but enough with the Flying Wallenda stunt flights. I don't care what Cheese Whiz looks like in space, but I'm pretty sure that's what is stopping up the commode. Can you imagine what a plumber is going to charge for a house call to the space station? Now that's what I call government waste.