I understand that Detroit was a pretty rough place to grow up in the '70s and '80s.

For every winner, there's a loser. And that person didn't really need to lose. They just didn't understand the game plan.

I think the American Dream used to be achieving one's goals in your field of choice-and from that all other things would follow. Now, I think the dream has morphed into the pursuit of money: Accumulate enough of it, and the rest will follow. We've become more materialistic. For balance, I think we need to get back to idealism and patriotism, but also be realistic with our monetary goals.

Trips to Mars, the Moon, even orbit, will require that we provide astrotourists with as many comforts from home as possible, including paying each other.

The much-hyped Ares 1-X was much ado about nothing.

When you're in a spacecraft, you need to know what things you can touch and what things you shouldn't touch!

In Mars, we've been given a wonderful set of moons where we can send continuous numbers of people.