[jwells89]

Most of the discontent I see aimed in NASA’s direction has little to do with their autonomous missions (which have been consistently excellent) and more to do with how Congress has misused NASA’s crewed efforts as yet another cash pipeline for traditional aerospace companies, which has for decades prevented crewed spaceflight from becoming progressively cheaper, more sustainable, and more common, instead keeping it artificially suspended in its mid-late 70s state.

I think it’s a massive error for Congress to have anything to do with any remotely technical decision. That should be at the sole discretion of NASA. Congress’ involvement should go no further than deciding what slice of the taxpayer funded pie they get yearly, and should not include the ability to attach strings of any kind to the funding.