[kwelstr]

I've been reading the life of Napoleon III (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon_III).

He <<commissioned the grand reconstruction of Paris. He launched similar public works projects in Marseille, Lyon and other French cities. Napoleon III modernized the French banking system, greatly expanded and consolidated the French railway system and made the French merchant marine the second largest in the world. He promoted the building of the Suez Canal and established modern agriculture, which ended famines in France and made France an agricultural exporter. Napoleon III negotiated the 1860 Cobden–Chevalier free trade agreement with Britain and similar agreements with France's other European trading partners. Social reforms included giving French workers the right to strike and the right to organize. The first women students were admitted at the Sorbonne, and women's education greatly expanded as did the list of required subjects in public schools. >>

But then, he was Emperor of the French (the last one) and had absolute power... What you propose we do with NASA is something similar in long term vision, but then again, we live in a (?flawed) democracy where any long term investment is hotly contested and annihilated. I wish we could find a better way, a new age of enlightenment so we could finally do great things again.

[oh_sigh]

The investment wouldn't be contested if it was fully funded immediately. But, if every year you need to decide what to do with newly collected revenue, what right do old generations have to lock new generations into paying for programs that they don't believe in?