You're in the Paracast, the gold standard of paranormal radio.

And now, here's Gene Steinberg.

So think about, ladies and gentlemen, this week.

The last space shuttle ever has gone aloft.

It's up there as you hear this show.

And people are now setting up petitions to restore the space program.

What's your feeling about this, Chris?

Well, I'm really disappointed.

I think when Barack Obama was on the campaign trail back in 2007,

you know, he was making all the right noises in terms of manned spaceflight,

getting us back on track in space, and here we are.

Just, you know, another promise down the tubes. It's a change we can like

lament over, I guess. It's really unfortunate that our man presence in space is starting to go

the way to the dinosaurs and I think we're in a retroactive period here in, you know, in terms of spaceflight.

There's some question even NASA surviving all these budget crises that we're in,

and that would really be unfortunate.

I don't think the private sector has the money and, you know, I think the proper motivation to get us, you know, transition us from a governmental space program to a private industry space program.

I don't see any real impetus to do that.

So I'm saddened by the whole thing, Gene.

Well, I'll tell you something here. Let's forget for the moment who occupies the White House.

I don't think anybody in Washington has the stomach, has this spine, the titanium spine,

to bring back the space program. You know, they're talking about, we've got to cut this, we've got to cut that, we've got to put people out of work, whatever. Whatever you think about the politics, right or left, doesn't matter. Nobody has a vision for the space program. The last vision I heard of the space program was John F. Kennedy saying, we will land a man on the moon before 1970. And he didn't do it because he wanted to explore space.

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