The US Senate Demands NASA: "Go to Mars"

“Fifty-five years after President Kennedy challenged the nation to put a man on the moon, the Senate is challenging NASA to put humans on Mars. The priorities that we’ve laid out for NASA in this bill mark the beginning of a new era of American spaceflight,” said an optimistic Florida Sen. Bill Nelson, senior Democrat on the Commerce panel.

Senator Bill Nelson was also a NASA  Payload Specialist on Space Shuttle Columbia's STS-61-C mission from January 12 to 18, 1986.

The Senate is not giving NASA money just for the sake of exploration. It is also a challenge, a mandate, actually. The bill requires that NASA make it an official goal to send crewed missions to Mars in the next 25 years.

NASA's budget vs. federal budget

The Senate is not giving more money. The NASA' budget will stay about the same as before, about 0.5 % of the United States federal budget. They are just giving more orders at this time. The NASA funding reached its peak during the Apollo era 1966, almost 4.5 % of the federal budget.


RESOURCES

/1/ "It’s Official: We’re Going to Mars" - http://futurism.com

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