Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the manager's amendment. This amendment would extend the moratorium on safety regulations for human spaceflight launches for 8 years after the first licensed human spaceflight launch. With these types of flights likely not to begin until 2013, we are talking about delaying safety regulations for a decade or more. Let me first say that I hope that commercial spaceflight, both manned and unmanned, eventually will become a robust sector of our economy. We are not quite there yet. But certainly some of these companies in this emerging industry openly talk about a business model of flying hundreds of paying passengers to space every year. These are ambitious goals, and I wish them well. I hope I am one of them. But if these companies are successful and start carrying paying passengers like me, then what we are talking about with this amendment is allowing an entire human transportation system to operate for almost a decade without any meaningful safety regulation. I find that to be unconscionable. I would point out that by rejecting the amendment, Congress is not dictating that any safety regulations have to be promulgated. On the contrary, under current law, an absolute prohibition exists until the end of 2012. Even after that point, the agency would not be required to move forward with the rulemaking process but would only do so if it saw a need.…”