i blame the us dept 100% on the “war on terrorism”

The Iraqis can survive without industrial ACs, Americans must be inferior.

Here is a crazy idea. How about we bring the troops home end the wars and spend the A/C money at home. Because the government has ended heating fuel assistance and I think those people would like not to freeze this winter.

Spending on research is not just a cost it’s an investment. The Apollo missions paid for themselves 14 times over with the money it injected back into our economy. http://www.ted.com/talks/brian_cox_why_we_need_the_explorers.html

My God! The US spends less than 20 rabbits on NASA? #IHateBadCharts

NASA is a big waste of money too, calm down.

Amount of US sales of all air conditioning, forced air heat, and refrigeration equipment in the US for FY 2007 (the last year available: $28 billion+. Now assume air conditioners accounted for 1/3 of that figure (and I think this would be generous, since I believe heating and refrigeration would have the lion’s share):$9 billion+, now adjust for 4 years of inflation: almost $11 billion. For 330 million Americans:about $33 per person. $21 billion for 200k Americans in those 2 countries(soldiers and govt employees): $105,000 PER PERSON. Are these, like, solid gold air conditioners?

Look, as much as I am for space exploration and enriching human knowledge, it is undisputed that the troops in the desert need the air conditioning, not only to be physically fit to fight, but to survive the extreme weather conditions there. It is expensive but it is not unjustified.

What does the y-axis dictate exactly? A.C. in the Middle East gets 20+ priority? What?

Find a way for someone to get rich in space & we’ll be there in 10yrs.

You’re missing the big picture…Yeah, air conditioning in a desert, especially during the summer, is expensive. It’s not fair to get upset at a necessity caused by the geographic location of the war; it’s similar to getting angry about the cost of food for the soldiers. It’s part of the trillion or so dollars we’re spending on the wars as a whole, concentrate your anger on that, not the cooling. If you end the wars, that cooling bill, as well as everything else, drops to practically zero. Stop paying for cooling, and our soldiers will just suffer from heat strokes.

I don’t have much sympathy for NASA. But $20bn is more than the US government spends on research for heart disease, diabetes, mental health, cancer, genome research, aging, drug abuse, infectious disease, neurological disorders, and the entire Center for Disease Control. Combined. The point isn’t how much we spend on a/c.
The point is how little we spend on other stuff that is potentially life saving and useful.

This is a complicated issue. Whether or not one supports the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, we should all support our troops regardless. And like Jacob H. said, the men and women in military service are subject to harsh conditions, and I’m all for letting these soldiers have air conditioning when it’s a viable option. That being said, it’s totally obscene that our elected officials continue to give tax breaks and exemptions to corporations, refuse to close corporate tax loopholes, and continue to pass legislation that only increases the gap between the extremely wealthy and the extremely impoverished. The top 0.1% of earners in the US take in more than 10% of the country’s total personal income, according to a recent Washington Post article. Since the 1970’s, the income of corporate executives has increased 400%, while for most of the people working for those corporations, wages have stalled. Yes, we should give more funding to NASA. Yes, we should continue to provide air conditioning and body armor and other equipment to our military as long as we are involved in conflicts overseas. Most importantly, though, we need to overhaul the system of corporate lobbying and corporate funding of elections, and then we need to elect people who will actually re-prioritize and attempt to balance the country’s budget in a just and equitable manner. And we average Americans, as their constituents, need to hold our elected officials accountable for their (in)actions. But hey, that’s just the opinion of this one US citizen. Go ‘Merica.

Wow, it sure it awful that we’re spending money to take care of our soldier overseas instead of throwing it away into space.

Hey there folks. I’m a soldier currently serving in Iraq. I don’t really agree with the war, but meh… I’m stuck here anyway because I promised to do what the Army needed me to do. We live in metal boxes out here. METAL BOXES. Without AC we would likely die of heat exhaustion in large numbers. Just so you know. Please don’t take our AC…. this place feels like an oven…

I actually have a lot of more complicated feelings on this post. But let’s just start with this: We have US citizens fighting overseas (like it or not) and they should be taken care of on our account. And, I want to to know what we are supposed to find on other planets that will solve the myriad of intense problems we have terrestrially.

Have you ever seen how cold it is in space? BAM!, there’s you money saver right there.