From: Dehede011@aol.com
Date: Sat Jan 05 2002 - 04:39:49 MST
In a message dated 1/4/02 9:44:28 PM Pacific Standard Time,
Spudboy100@aol.com cites Mlorry: What Heinlein and his contemporaries failed
to forecast was the enormous economic drain that both the Cold War AND the
'War on Poverty' would have, how this negatively impacted the level of
investment in space exploration following the Apollo era, and how the loss in
Vietnam would impact the national self-confidence for so long, and he did
not, in 1946, forecast the sort of market manipulation the OPEC cartel could
use to cripple the world economy for years.>>
In Expanded Universes Heinlein gave his own analysis of where he had
gone wrong. He had grown up in a time when govenrnent had been organized to
accomplish one or more really large projects and had been sucessful in doing
so. I don't recall his specific list but Oak Ridge, TVA, WW2 come easily to
mind. He believed that we as a society and a government would understand the
wisdom of space exploration and had the organizational ability to
accomplishment the goals he set out. It didn't happen.
However, I don't disagree with Mlorry -- I think we are talking about
two different facets of the same diamond and that our viewpoints are
complimentary not antagonistic.
Ron h.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Fri Nov 01 2002 - 13:37:32 MST