To the editor:

President Bush has hit upon a winning strategy for selling expensive ventures to the American public: Lie about the cost. A Moon-Mars expedition proposed by Bush’s father in 1989 died in Congress because the price tag was $400 billion. When President Reagan proposed the international space station in 1984, its cost was estimated at $8 billion. However, the cost has already hit $32 billion, and the station is still far from completed.

Cost overruns on the space shuttle are legendary. Roger Launius, a NASA historian, is quoted as saying, “The belief is that if you really tell people what your honest estimates are, they’re not going to approve it.” Does this sound like the Iraq war?

The space program is like compulsive gambling. Small payoffs encourage reckless bets. The price tag on the current Mars rover mission, so far a success, was “only” $260 million. However, individual shuttle missions (including the Challenger and Columbia) cost about $400 million each. The space station may well run to $40 billion or more. If we compare Bush Sr.’s 1989 estimate to space station overruns, the actual price of a Moon-Mars mission may be at least 2 TRILLION dollars!

Bush’s request for a space exploration budget is like lending someone money for a trip to Vegas when they lie, “I’m only going to drop $20 in the slots.” After giving away a budget surplus, can we afford to support a reckless spending spree? It isn’t very wise to reward lies.

John W. Hoopes,

Lawrence