Proud Europa: Science!
And here is a microcosm of Europe's space problem: £link. The European Union, taken all together, has a significantly larger economy than the United States, but the budget spent on the E.S.A. and the various national space agencies (an expensive and irrational redundancy in my view) is an eighth of what we spend on N.A.S.A., and N.A.S.A. operates on a damn shoestring compared to what it needs. I would love nothing better than to get into a friendly space race with our European friends, but as things now stand it is no wonder we regard them, in the field of space exploration, as our funny neighbors across the way, not as true and equal partners.

Zounds, I hope they get their act together in time to make ExoMars a rousing success. (Also, I have been neglecting our own magnificent Phoenix lander and the plucky Mars rovers. I shall have to remedy that.)

Science!

Proud Europa: The Stars My Destination
An intriguing proposal: manned spaceflightlink. The only part of this article that doesn't really add up is under the "Two steps" heading. One of the proposed uses of the "A.T.V. Evolution" would be to return research and astronauts/cosmonauts. Fine and good, as the current A.T.V.s have no return capability. The ability to return a non-human load could be up and running by 2013. Again, fine and good. Here's the odd bit, human return capability is not envisioned until 2017... three years after we fully except to have the Orion spacecraft up and running, meaning the A.T.V. Evolution will fill no operational void. Make no mistake, I am all for Europe having an independent manned spaceflight ability, but let's not justify such a vehicle on the basis of false claims. The A.T.V. Evolution would be a supplement to the American Orion and Russian Soyuz (or eventual successor) vehicles, not a fill-in until the Orion is up and running.