There's no guarantee that the United States will be around 200 years from now.

Retain the vision for space exploration. If we turn our backs on the vision again, we're going to have to live in a secondary position in human space flight for the rest of the century.

As someone who flew two space capsules and twice landed in the ocean, I can attest from personal experience how much logistics work is needed to get you home.

Program Alarm, it's a 1202.

We could have human intelligence in orbit around Mars, building things there.

I'm not in favor of just taking short-term isolated situations and depleting our resources to keep our climate just the way it is today.

I believe that space travel will one day become as common as airline travel is today. I'm convinced, however, that the true future of space travel does not lie with government agencies -- NASA is still obsessed with the idea that the primary purpose of the space program is science -- but real progress will come from private companies competing to provide the ultimate adventure ride, and NASA will receive the trickle-down benefits.