Apparently Representative Bill Posey, from Florida does. He introduced the “REasserting American Leadership in Space Act, or “REAL Space” Act as HR1641. This follows an open challenge to the lack of manned space flight that the Obama Administration has proposed.
The bill has some pretty hefty goals, such as “The National Aeronautics and Space Administration shall plan to return to the moon by 2022 and develop a sustained human presence on the moon…” which is read to the common man as “BEING AWESOME”.
Before you go all whiny “NASA is a waste of money” on me and make me shoot you in the face with a nerf gun, the bill has a list of findings that back up the claim that we should build a moon base, like Dracula. It’s noted that Congress passed a the NASA Authorization Act of 2005 which stated that the primary goal of NASA’s manned space flight should be to “develop a sustained presence on the moon” and that NASA has been ordered to build a heavy lift shuttle, yet with no clear goal.
What does this add up to? Goals for our young ones, just like I had as a kid. Now, however, they aren’t just looking to float around Earth, but to possibly go live and colonize the moon. The bill just has to go through Congress and the Senate, then survive President Obama’s desk.
Check out the source link for the full text.
Sources: Yahoo! News, Library of Congress
Here’s my idea, if they want a build a Moon base with fricken lasers.
1) Turn the Space Station into a docking/power up station.
2) Build a ship that converts to a base/lab upon arrival to the Moon. Lift that bugger into space with rockets. Send to Moon.
3) Contract SpaceX to build a recurring light lift transport to the ISS.
4) Dock a shuttle to the ISS for round trips to and from the Moon.
5) ???
6) Fricken profit
I think that their heavy lifting shuttle is the biggest feature that they need to focus on, short term. I think that’d require an underground silo with rails for guidance up to a certain speed.