Lights! Camera! Action!: Foam Still an Issue at NASA

SpaceBlog Alpha is officially open for business! Horray!

Now, if we could just get a million hits between now and Christmas, my dreams will come true...

And to that end, I offer this nugget of info for anyone living under a rock: NASA still has foam problems.
I understand the difficulties of engineering the most complex machine ever built by human hands, but give me a break already. After more than one BILLION dollars spent on a retro-fit to keep the insulating foam securely attached to the fuel tank instead of impacting the fragile orbiter, the foam still cracks, breaks and comes loose in large, almost boulder-size pieces.

I don't know about any of you other US taxpayers, but let's do a little comparison shopping. The Russians are flying tourists to the International Space Station for $20 million a pop. That means the entire shuttle crew, all seven astronauts, could have flown on a Soyuz half a dozen times for the same amount of money.
And the Soyuz hasn't had a fatal accident in more than 30 years!

I realize you can't change horses in mid-stream, but this is getting a little ridiculous. It seems to me NASA engineers may be losing sight of the BIG picture, too busy trying to salvage their egos to realize they are fighting a losing battle.
The shuttle, still grounded though it is, is slated to be retired in about five years anyway. If we continue to shovel money at a potentially unfixable problem, all we'll do is put our next generation of Spacecraft in jeopardy: NASA needs to show the world it still matters.

Because right now all they are doing is showing a penchant for extravagance