NASA has its ways of doing things, and when it comes to rocket construction, they go back to the lessons of rocket pioneer Werner Von Braun, who brought the rocket expertise he used to help Germany during World War II over to the United States and helped us reach the Moon. Von Braun felt that the best way to do things was to manufacture the rocket on-site, where the engineers lived and worked, thus controlling both costs and production for as long as possible. The problem is that in this time of record public debt and shocking deficits, where every dollar has both an economic and a political value attached to it, money for innovation and execution can be hard to come by, and NASA, well, they are the innovation people and the thinking in Washington is that maybe they ought to concentrate on what they do best. According to BusinessWeek:
The agency looks headed for a course correction. The White House has set up a blue-ribbon commission to help decide the future direction of man...
By Charles M Cooper ยท July 23 2009
small business, nasa, spacex, commercial space flight
