Space, the final frontier

A post at Samizdata pointed to this interview with Burt Rutan:

One gets the feeling that in restricted niches of the Mojave Spaceport here, work is already underway on bigger and better spaceships. Asked directly about that prospect, Rutan is quick with a "no comment" that comes wrapped in a guarded smile.

"You think this is cool?" Rutan asked, pointing to the freshly flown SpaceShipOne. "Wait 'til you see SpaceShipTwo . . . it is erotic," he added, alluding to the smooth lines of a craft that would seem tangible and touchable — not a minds-eye image of vaporware.

My favourite part of the interview is this:

"Look at the progress in 25 years of trying to replace the mistake of the shuttle. It's more expensive . . . not less . . . a horrible mistake," Rutan said. "They knew it right away. And they've spent billions . . . arguably nearly $100 billion over all these years trying to sort out how to correct that mistake . . . trying to solve the problem of access to space. The problem is . . .it's the government trying to do it."

Depending on government to solve any kind of problem is a long, long step on the road to serfdom. Allowing government (any government) a monopoly on access to space is one of the worst mistakes we could ever make; this is a wonderful, but overdue, correction of that mistake.

Ad astra!