Why do so many people think that if there isn't a NASA plan to put a couple NASA astronauts on a NASA rocket and launch them to a specific NASA-picked destination by a specific time that we've somehow abandoned human spaceflight? How short-sighted can people be? We already did that 40 years ago, and where did it get us? The huge expense caused the cancellation of any real followup missions and damaged human spaceflight aspirations to this day. We're still seeing the effects, since apparently no one in congress (or much of the public, apparently) can imagine anyone except NASA putting people into space.

It just pisses me off to no end. We need a space program that opens access to space for EVERYONE. Not just the few lucky NASA picked government employees. Do you want to go into space at some point? I certainly do, and constellation had zero chance of ever letting me do that. Maybe you think constellation would have opened access to space and expanded the possibilities for the rest of us, but I think you are wrong. So, so wrong. The current plan for NASA has the best chance of anything NASA has done since its creation of truly opening access to space. New technologies, reducing cost, encouraging multiple options for access to orbit. That's what NASA's goal should be and needs to be. Not a repeat of Apollo. Not another huge expense for flags, footprints, and some neat video that ends up getting 5 minutes on the evening news. So there's my rant. Take it or leave it.

Constellation was just "Apollo on steroids", as described by Griffin. How does sending a few government employees to the moon help open access to space for everyone? That should be the point, not just going to the moon for the sake of planting flags and making footprints (or "boldly going").

And perhaps the private sector would have gone to the moon, had they been given 150 billion dollars (apollo cost) and a mandate to go there ASAP. But it was NASA that was given the money and the mandate, so they went. And where did it get us, ultimately? There hasn't been a single person past LEO since. Sounds to me like a different approach is needed. Perhaps one that builds and refines basic technologies, opening access to space and making it cheaper and easier to operate there. That way, when we do go back, we go back to stay.

This new program is far better than the old one. It is so very heartening to see in a NASA program a stated goal to reduce the cost of human spaceflight, along with R&D of enabling technologies (orbital refueling, etc). NASA is finally shifting its human spaceflight focus in the right direction. As I've heard said before, it's not NASA's job to put a man on Mars (or the moon). It's NASA's job to make it possible for National Geographic to put a man on Mars.

Now congress just has to not be a bunch of idiots and ruin it (possibly the greatest challenge to human spaceflight yet).

Here's to hoping that this kind of drastic cutting will finally spark some national debate (and perhaps a decision) on what we want our space program (specifically, the human spaceflight program) to do. There are a number of options as I see it:
1) Support earth activities (science/climate/earth observation/etc)
2) Jobs program and political/economic tool
3) Brief exploration for national pride (Apollo moon shots)
4) Enabling permanent, sustained human presence in space (colonization)

Right now, our space program is pretty much just a combination of options 1 and 2. My personal belief is that it should be 4. If humanity is to ultimately survive, or even just take full advantage of the resources and opportunities that space offers, then a permanent human presence in space will be required. Constellation, as it stands now, would likely only lead to options 2 and 3.

The most encouraging part of that article was:

This has been NASA's biggest problem. Congress doesn't want to do anything with NASA that might upset the status quo of job distribution in their districts (along with those stupid cost plus contracts). It's high time that NASA get a cleaning and reorganization around a defined goal that will accomplish something in space. (And there's a whole other side rant about how going to the moon/mars as a goal is useless. Those are destinations/places to operate in fulfillment of the goal of colonization or resource utilization or just "exploration")

I think it's also worth pointing out Elon Musk's rebuttal to the findings of this NASA safety panel. I'm glad to see someone in the private spaceflight industry has the cajones to call BS when he sees it.

You may not be a rocket scientist, but I am, so let me clarify a few things here.

You seem to be confusing ULA and NASA launch efforts here. The Atlas V and Delta IV EELVs are commercial designs. Titan is retired, never to be launched again, and the future (and ultimate feasibility) of Ares I or V remains uncertain. Also, under point 6, Atlas and Atlas-Centaur are the same thing. Atlas refers to the first stage booster and Centaur is the second stage.

Drastically increasing the launch schedule of EELVs would be a tall order, necessitating a great deal of infrastructure development. Where all the money for this, and all these extra payloads you'd like to launch, will come from I have no idea. Right now the gov't is up to its eyeballs in debt, and is rapidly increasing that debt bailing out automakers, banks, and lining congressional districts with cash for votes. I'd love you see the increase in launches just as much as you would (it'd keep me employed), but it's certainly not realistic.

But I have to take issue with the basic premise that seemingly underlies your post here, which is that NASA (or the gov't in general) needs to be the one designing, building, and launching these rockets. Why? Why limit the launch industry to one or two designs with the NASA-approved stamp on them? (Which may or may not be the best vehicles for putting things and/or people into orbit.) Why not promote competition and increase the demand for vehicles in the launch industry by getting NASA out of the launch business altogether. Make NASA a purchaser of rides, not a supplier. The launch industry can then build and fly the designs it wants and let a multitude of designs compete. My dream would be to see another few Space-Xs pop up in the next few years. Thankfully we're actually starting to see a little bit of what I want with the ISS resupply contracts to Space-X and Orbital. I would be even happier, though, if NASA were out of the launch business altogether.

Here's what it would take to capture Apophis:

I'm assuming that the capture will take place on the 2029 encounter and that the perigee of any capture orbit is equal to the closest approach distance (this makes the calculations simple enough that I felt like doing them to post on slashdot).

So to capture into a circular orbit would take an instantaneous delta-v of: 4.18455 km/s. (Capturing into a highly elliptic orbit (e=0.9) doesn't reduce the delta-v by all that much (4.13677 km/s instead of 4.18).

Assuming the mass on Wikipedia is right (2.7e10 kg), and using space shuttle main engines (Isp_vacuum = 450 sec), it would take 1.65e10 kg of propellant to achieve the 4.18 km/s delta-v. So, a lot. (More than 1 million Delta IV heavies worth of payload capacity to orbit).

Going to a higher specific impulse form of propulsion, like Ion thrusters with Isp from 3000 to 30000 would take between 3.58e9 kg and 3.81e8 kg of propellant, respectively. Though Ion thrusters are about as far away from applying an instantaneous delta-v as you can get (except maybe solar sails or other neat little things like that).

In conclusion, it would take a hell of a lot of effort to capture Apophis.