To Infiniti and Beyond?

So I just found out that, in the next year, the government will be cutting off funding for the space shuttle, and retiring it for good. Which, considering the amount of money in this country currently bleeding out in all directions, makes sense. The shuttle is impractical, uses billions of dollars, and really only just sends us into outer space. Let me say that again. It SIMPLY takes our fragile human forms and hurls them through the atmosphere, into a void that we sort of understand, to a piece of rock trapped in the gravitational pull of our blue planet, and lets us walk (well, float) around up there. On something that ancient civilizations once worshiped. That inspired Galileo. Something that gives us front row seats to the Milky Way Galaxy in all her bizarre glory. You're right, let's get rid of it. And give the money to billionaires on Wallstreet. I mean, let's keep our priorities in order here.
I find it so incredibly tragic that, when it comes time to make budget cuts, the arts and sciences are always the first to go. And I find it so incredibly ironic that, in a thousand years, no one is going to remember what sort of healthcare we had, or if we raised taxes. No, they'll look back and admire the intensity of the Space Race, the brilliance of our medicinal advancement, watch the movies and read the books.The smothering of creativity and curiosity, the cutting of the programs and classes that promote thinking outside the box ,or hell, just thinking at all: these go before anything else. Sure, sacrifice a young child's musical program. It doesn't really matter. Who plays the violen anyway? My university just cut the entire Anthropology department. Because, I mean, we don't need to understand other cultures and people, ancient civilizations and their connections to us. No, it's much more important we fund a college of business based on failed models in an economy that is making us rethink and reevaluate everything in that category.
Why not retire one of America's greatest achievements? We don't really need to be up there all the time. Let China and Russia do it. We have other, more important things to do down here.
I guess my point is that, in a time of economic trouble, we allow ourselves to let go of the things that really matter, we WILL lose the America we know and love. Because that America was going to the moon in the middle of a war. That America never stops thinking and innovating, rocking the boat and changing the world. I don't want to see us lose that passion, and I don't want to have to catch a ride to the moon with Russia. I want to stay that America.


MWAH,

Moi.


*I was greatly inspired by this article; I think he hits the nail on the head. Take a look.*