Cliff Stearns: “heaven is not reached by a single bound. But we build the ladder by which we rise. Mr. Chairman, the international space…”

“heaven is not reached by a single bound. But we build the ladder by which we rise. Mr. Chairman, the international space station has, and will continue, to provide Americans with substantial benefits in areas including medicine, the environment, transportation, and even communications. And the benefits don't just stop there. Since the inception of the U.S. space program, the secondary applications of space technology have yielded $9 to the economy for every tax dollar spent. The returns are clearly well worth the investment. The partnerships created through the space station serve as an exceptional model for future international ventures. The partners of this program have already contributed billions of dollars to the space station, demonstrating their commitment to completing the largest cooperative science program in history. The international space station will be a world-class orbiting laboratory, which will serve as a test-bed for hundreds of science and technology experiments that could not be conducted on this planet. We will learn new research techniques for growing tissue samples outside of the human body, for use in cancer research and bone injuries. There will be new understandings of the aging process, with subsequent developments in counteracting the effects of aging. Imagine the possibilities of academic involvement in the space station's activities.…”