The NASA tax -- a running-dog capitalist technocrat's rant

(warning: sheer, unsupported, blatantly opinionated ranting ahead)

The Huntsville Times is reporting (via Slashdot) that a Republican congressional candidate will, if elected, propose a 1% tax on all scifi-related products -- books, games, movies, novelty condoms, and so on -- the entirety of which would be the sole source of funding for NASA. The idea is to make it so that only people who give a damn about space (most, if not all, of whom tend to be fairly avid consumers of SF-related products) are the ones to actually pay for it.

I have two problems with this.

1) That means legally defining science fiction. Ha!
2) I'd be happy to give money to NASA, if NASA was worth a damn. To quote icebluenothing: "Where's my fucking moonbase?"

Where's my manned Mars mission? Where's my orbital factory, and where is my asteroid mining operation? NASA is the dotcom of government agencies -- all vaporware, no product. Sodding hell. I fail to see how sending people up in a space shuttle to run painstaking experiments to determine the quark content of cosmic rays is more interesting than trying to exploit the tremendous opportunities for immediate technological advancement that space offers us... not to mention the fact that I WANT MY SODDING MOONBASE, GODS DAMN IT! I want societies in the Belt. I want orbital habitats that don't look like tin cans and have loud air conditioners. I want big fucking spaceships. I wand grandeur. I want majesty. I want epic tales of adventure among the stars. I want a proper ground-to-orbit craft that doesn't drop bits off on the way up!

I say we just sell the NASA equipment and facilities lock, stock and barrel to Lockheed-Martin and Boeing, myself. Feh.