Back in July, I posted about the upcoming moon landing anniversary.
Well, the 40th for this historic event has come and gone, but I did run across some additional information courtesy of the ABC Science show, from Australia. They were rebroadcasting an interview with the astronauts at the 20th anniversary of the moon landing, and what was really funny was the interchange between John Getter, KHOU in Houston and Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins.
Buzz Aldrin had answered the reporter's question on what's different between 1969 and 1989 with some kind of bland stuff like in the 60's we were ripe for commitment, that now so much more technology was available, that we could do a lot, things are changing Alvin Toffler style, but it was expensive. He left off and I certainly had the impression that the commitment in the 80's was somewhat lacking but he did say that he had hope that things would continue on (from the original missions).
Michael Collins must have been the straightman for the Space Program, because he replied: "President Kennedy said that we were going to land a man on the Moon and return him safely to Earth, that was his goal. President Bush (George H Bush), whom I consider to be a president as dynamic as Kennedy, I think, in today's climate would have to say, 'I think we ought to dedicate ourselves to the goal of perhaps considering appointing a commission, after due deliberation with the Congress of investigating the feasibility of certain long-range goals for the space program, perhaps even including a mission to Mars.'
I laughed myself silly... Maybe he had lots of time in the Command Module to think up this stuff.
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