Topic: Is the Moon Really a 'Been There Done That' World?

[sam]

If there's only one thing we've learned from all the highly successful recent Moon missions – the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, LCROSS, Chandrayaan-1 and Kaguya — it's that the Moon is perplexingly different from our perceptions of the past 40 years. The discovery of water and volatiles across the surface and in the permanently shadowed regions at the poles changes so many of the notions we've had about Earth's constant companion. Basically, just within the past year we've realized the Moon is not a dry, barren, boring place, but a wetter, richer and more interesting destination than we ever imagined. And so, the proposal for NASA to effectively turn away from any human missions to the Moon, as well as Administrator Charlie Bolden's 'been there, done that' comments is quite perplexing – especially for the lunar scientists who have been making these discoveries.

http://www.universetoday.com/2010/07/26/is-the-moon-really-a-been-there-done-that-world/

[Clive]

To me, it's complete madness that the Americans are going to allow the Chinese, Indians and Iranians to get to the Moon before them.  Have they given up on national security? 

[sam]

its caused they are becoming mexican.