Prepare to make the jump to lightspeed

A couple of headlines from the fellas at NASA this week. One amazing, they other very unfortunate.

Lets start with amazing. An earthlike planet has been found about 20 lightyears away. It's got water, and an atmosphere, making it likely to support some form of life. Pretty awesome. If only we could get there.

This is an incredibly exciting discovery, which ought to light the fires of exploration under us earthlings. Someplace truly exciting to Boldly Go! 20 Lightyears - that's like a 2 hour trip at warp factor 6.

Oh, wait. We haven't figured out lightspeed (which would make it a 20 year trip) let alone Hyperspace. Hyperspace - or subspace for the trekkers out there - is that 'dimension' if you will, where the physical rules of our universe are tweaked. This allows for MUCH faster than light speed travel, without the nasty side effects of a temporal imbalance between you and the folks at home.

Anyhow, the issue is less that we haven't figured it out yet. It's that we're not trying so hard. We're not going anywhere. We need to be.

We should be branching out further and further into the galaxy. Had we kept exploring after the Apollo program, surely we'd be ready to travel beyond Mars, perhaps beyond the reaches of our own Solar system.

We'd have been past Pluto to give it a closer look, and maybe not demoted him into whatever he is now.

Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda. But we didn't.

We stayed in low planetary orbit, putting up satellites, conducting experiments, and building a space station. Good stuff, but it's not getting us anywhere.

And the newest headline. 1,200 NASA employees, part of the soon to be defunct space shuttle program, are losing their jobs.

Thanks Obama. Stimulus money well spent. We've got a few new roads. Harry Reid is getting his train from LA to Vegas (oooh).

Unemployment continues to skyrocket here at home. The terrorists are making threats against Europe. We're sending jobs overseas like crazy. And there's a war brewing on our southern border.

Maybe I'm leaning too far to the political right. But I'm no Glenn Beck. All those things, are true. No spin. Just turn on the news, and both CNN and FOX can confirm it for you.

Its a tough time to be an American.

It doesn't have to be. It shouldn't be.

After 9/11 we bound together with a common purpose. It lasted a few years, until the politicians spoiled it. You see when there's a common purpose for our nation, theres no 'other side' to the issue. It's all or nothing. Like Health-care reform and the Bush tax cuts. It's one way or not at all.

Asinine. Outright bullcrap. It's why we get nowhere, and live with constant government gridlock.

I give you a common purpose. Boldly Go.

Rally around it. Make it happen. It WILL stimulate our economy. It WILL create jobs. It will bring us new technology. It will change our world in ways we can only begin to imagine.

Boldly Go!

To the Moon, then Mars, then beyond. To that amazing world 20 light-years away.

If I had the means, I'd fund it myself at the expense of all else. It's that important.

Boldly Go!!!