The launch this week of a new Boeing Delta rocket (picture from the BBC story) , without a real payload, demonstrates everything that's wrong with the current U.S. space program.

The real problem in space is not addressed by this rocket. The real problem is the cost of spacelift per kilogram of mass. Until that goes down substantially space pays for no one.

If the taxpayer money being spent on this program were invested instead in a space elevator, we would all be a lot closer to getting off this rock than we are.

The likely motives for this, are truly frightening:

• First, this is a political pay-off. Boeing has been transformed from a civilian aircraft builder into a defense contractor, and the Bushies are giving it a reward.
• Second, the only possible use of this rocket is to control geosynchronous orbit. The Mercury and Gemini astronauts reached space in re-fitted ICBMs. This is a move toward militarizing space.