The moon landing’s recent 40th anniversary sparked a flurry of retrospection, as well as considerable commentary on the future of space exploration.  Many bemoaned the decrepit status of America’s current space capabilities, then followed with grand plans for renewed government spending and a new era of exploration.  One author making this argument, much to my surprise, was Charles Krauthammer.

Krauthammer correctly observed that, “America’s manned space program is in shambles.”  This state of affairs being wholly unacceptable, he recommends we fund the Constellation program – the intended replacement to the aging Apollo shuttles, whose computing power was no more impressive than that of a common calculator – in order to “open new human possibility in ways utterly unpredictable.”

Many balk at such flowery dreaming for practical reasons.  We can’t afford it, they say.  Indeed, now does seem an awkward time to be proposing renewed government outlays for such speculative returns.

I don’t wish to make that argument, because the truth is that I share the dream.   I’m a sci-fi nerd at heart, and I want my country to be the first to place a man on Mars.  There are better places to save a buck, anyway.

Here’s where I take issue with Krauthammer. No where does he ask the critical question as to why our space program is in shambles.  Without addressing this question, it is silly to just assume that funneling more money to NASA is the best way to achieve his goal.

Believers in the power of government see NASA as a model for what government can do.  And I have to agree with them; it is a model.  It’s also one which they fail to interpret correctly.  Yes, NASA placed a man on the moon.  It’s also squandered hundreds of billions of dollars since, with little more than a half completed space station and a crumbling shuttle fleet to show for it.

NASA’s metamorphosis from an agency at the cutting edge to a bloated, inefficient bureaucracy should be considered just as instructive as the remarkable accomplishments that amazed the nation 40 years ago.  In the long run, government is simply wasteful and ineffective.  No one can hide for long from the systemic faults of centralized, top-down control.  Determination and a nation focused on a common goal can only mask systemic problems in the short-run.  Eventually, the lack of competitive pressure will result in complacency.  Innovation is slowly but surely replaced with an attitude aimed at maintaining the status quo.  “The moon? Pfft. Just get us our next yearly budget from Congress, with the customary increase, and we’re happy.”

America’s greatness is not created by visionary government leaders proposing bold public expenditures of other people’s money.  It is our freedom and prosperity that has propelled us to where we are today.  If we want to regain our unquestioned status as leader in space exploration, we need to turn to allow America’s best asset, a vibrant private sector, to work for us.

One way to do this is to offer prizes for significant achievements in space travel.  A $10 billion prize for landing the first man on Mars would attract a lot of bright Americans to the challenge.  It’s certainly better than annually pumping two or three times that much into NASA for the same purpose, which feels about as productive as giving a blood transfusion to a corpse, in the dim hope that a government bureaucracy can match the creative innovation of the private sector.