I Miss the USSR

Do you remember 50 years ago today when the Russians (the USSR) launched the first space object called Sputnik? Do you remember the panic that swept the streets when America (gasp!) realized that someone else had more brains than we did? Do you remember the great race to put America into space -- to do it better, faster, and sooner than those godless commie bastards?

Neither do I. I wasn't born yet.

And, as if that weren't enough, four years later (1961) those ignorant peasants put a human into space. A HUMAN INTO SPACE!

Yeh, I miss those days.

I miss the days when another country beat America, was first into something that would wipe the complacent smile off our collective faces. I miss that. I mean, look what happened:

Slightly less than 12 years after Sputnik, America and Americans put a human being onto the surface of the moon (1969). Yeh, we beat the stinking beet eaters there, didn't we? Nineteen years after (1976), we put a probe on Mars; and then 24 years after (1981), we launched the first space shuttle.

Then, the Berlin Wall came down (1989), and the Soviets and their country began to unravel.

So, what have we done since then?

Um, cut back NASA funding.

Ah, sent a couple more probes to Mars.

Let's see, we've done a lot of talking about a new space shuttle, and more talk about humans on the moon (by 2020) and on Mars (by 2030).

Hold on! In that time we perfected the cellular telephone, and made better microwave ovens, and cheaper flat screen televisions, and bigger SUV's.

Well, that's just great.

I want to go back to living in a country where people actually want to achieve something worth doing. Do we really need flat panel televisions? Perhaps, but think of what we as human beings could achieve by finding a way to put human colonies on another planet.

Of course, that's not going to happen until we Americans once again have a superior foe that will piss us off and force us to get off our lazy butts and actually start WORKING toward achieving something other than finding more sources of oil or cheaper digital cameras.

Competition is indeed the driving force behind innovation and creativity, and just look what's happened since we lost ours.