Sunday Sunday 14th, 1996 Vol. 3, issue 4 "Bisexual: Because specialization is for insects." What the hell happened with the space program? In ten years we went from doing one lap around the Earth to landing on the moon. What have we done since then? We've sent up lots of probes, but let's face it, we've done less probing then most priests do in a day of choir practice. I was watching the news with a friend the other day until suddenly we heard, " ...and the space shuttle had a successful landing today..." We didn't even know it was up there! My friend said he had to watch the news more often, but in reality the news probably said very little about it. Does anybody remember back in the days of yore when people actually got excited about the space program? I remember watching one of the launches in anticipation of take-off. The only thing NASA seems to do now is send up superfluous crew members, malfunctioning satellites and the all important TESTING THE EFFECTS OF WEIGHTLESSNESS!!! Hey, guys, we KNOW weightlessness is bad for you. You don't have to be uh...a rocket scientist to figure that one out. NASA, let me give you some advice: take all those engineers that say, "Oh man! Weightlessness is really bad for you. I wonder what tests we can do to measure it," and send those bastards up for ten years and let them figure out a solution. They'll figure out a way around it in 6 months, guaranteed. Testing the effects of weightlessness on the common people isn't any more exciting, except when you reduce one plebeian to many bite size chunks care of faulty o-rings, which you then sprinkle (or splatter) liberally over the Gulf of Mexico. A teacher, a dentist, a four year old with attention deficit disorder in space; Jesus, I can put a four year old in low earth orbit by kicking him in the ass and draw more attention than NASA's lame launches. Seen it, done it, had it, been there. You want people to become interested in the next lift off? Let us give you a passenger list: OJ Simpson, Michael Jackson, and Lorena Bobbit. What a crew list! Hell, ninety two percent of the US population has heard of all of these characters. A spousal abuser, an accused child molester, and a woman who went into mutilation mode against her spousal abuser. It would be on every channel. Or better yet, you could just turn the whole space program over to Spielberg. It's painfully obvious what NASA needs: Some good old fashioned Cold War paranoia. After the Soviet Union bit the big one, it looked like our countries could cooperate scientifically and financially on space exploration. But cooperation isn't as exciting as competition, especially for Americans, and the language barrier between scientists could have been disastrous (I said put water in the cooling systems, not vodka!). Besides, the Russians have all the budget problems of American public schools. They're down to nuclear secrets as their main export, forced to accept the prices of any Third World dictator or would be James Bond Villain just to pay the heating bill. If they sold Siberia to another country (say, Yemen) and weather-stripped the new border they could cut way down on heating costs. They won't because then they'd lose the Lake Baikal region (home of "The Deepest Lake in the World" Theme Park) to newly proud Yemenites, breaking the secret honor code held among industrial nations to ensure that Third World countries have nothing to be proud of¥. Besides, this would result in the loss of their prestigious "U.N. Security Council" status. NASA's best hope is to get the CIA (another Cold War agency left out in the warm) to convince the Chinese government to start up a competing space program. China has all of the right qualifications: Communist, huge population to tax, long history of gunpowder and fireworks expertise, Tibetan monks to get rid of, and no pesky "human rights" ethics. Meanwhile...back at the ranch, NASA could shrug off that festering bureaucratic tumor called Congress (motto: Budget Plan, Schmudget Plan) and be turned over to free enterprise. Think of the wonderful unregulated competition (Ayn Rand would be proud). Rockets being sent up held together with duct-tape (only a buck a roll), superglue, and elastic bands. The casualties would be high, but think of the news salability! "Happy Spaceman Rocket Collides with Hang-Glider. News at 11." We'll be Terrorforming§ Mars in no time. ¥ Please excuse the rambling sentences. I just read James Joyce. § Move over Rimmer.