Going Commercial

while the conditions are more rigorous today for the ISS than they were in the very early days of space travel, opportunities still abound, and we just need to overcome the hurdles. As Pogo put it, "By gosh, we seem to be surrounded by an insurmountable opportunity here." This really is a great time in human spaceflight. We re doing marvelous things up there from an engineering standpoint. We now have to put them to good use. We need to optimize the 30 percent of the ISS that our federal government and the international partners have available in terms of the Station s power, volume, and crew time. Despite the recent issues with cost and schedule, as Mr. Goldin has said, this Agency will find a way. This country and the partners will find a way to restore the ISS s capability. We need help from this government, from our Congress, from our partners to do that, but it will be done, and then this facility is going to be world class--nah, it will out-of-this- world class. I m pleased to be a part of not only the history of spaceflight and the history of industry s participation in spaceflight, but I m also pleased to be a part of the future, the future applications, the future benefits that our spaceflight program is going to bring to our economy, to our careers, and to those of us that are both taxpayers and participants as well, to the great joy of seeing success as part of this country, as a part of our intellect, applied to the great beyond.