Great overview of the dysfunctional state of NASA and the difficulty in deciding where to direct the agency's resources. NASA critics abound, but this is generally even-handed and fair.

Interesting report on NASA's achievements over the years following the Apollo moon landing, with an overview of some of the problems that have plagued its progress in recent years. This short article points to a lack of long-term vision as a key obstacle, and provides a candid, fact-based assessment of some of the challenges and opportunities ahead, like the 15-nation partnership to build a space station.

This article could have gone into more detail about the reasons some decisions were made (for example): why the decision was made to go with a vertical launch shuttle rather then one launched from a mother ship (as Scaled Composites has done), and why it was decided to build a station in low orbit rather devoting that effort to long term lunar exploration/exploitation.

Pretty poor analysis of the reasons for NASA's apparent stagnation and the shuttle's failure to live up to expectations. The writer should have done a better job exploring the various political motives behind the shuttle's design as a "jack of all trades but master of none" and the amazing amount of political nonsense that goes on in an agency devoted to science and exploration.