I was green with envy when I read Kathy's post about her visit to the Kennedy Space Center to watch the final launch of  space shuttle Atlantis. As someone who can still clearly remember Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong make man's first footstep on the Moon, I am extremely proud of our nation's achievements in space. But while I agree that NASA (and the space agency's bevy of government contractors) has accomplished remarkable things, I strongly believe that the time has come for us to turn over the task of manned spaceflight to private industry.

The government does a great job of pursuing the kinds of projects that are just too risky for commercial firms to take on. In some cases (such as the development of the Internet, the push for gallium arsenide semiconductors, and manned spaceflight), the results are truly gamechanging. However, once these government-developed-and subsidized programs gain traction and become routine, the best thing government can do is turn the reins over to the private sector. While the shuttle program was revolutionary in the '70s, today it is routine -- little more than a flying boxcar that costs up to $2 billion per flight. And, as the reaction of members of Congress with large NASA facilities clearly indicated, NASA's manned spaceflight program has morphed into just another very expensive government entitlement. When President Obama announced in February that he would end President Bush's Constellation program, which would return man to the Moon, the reaction was swift, and predictable. Said Representative Pete Olson of Texas (and home of the Johnson Space Center), "This is a crippling blow to America’s human spaceflight program." And not to be outdone by his colleague from Texas, Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama (home to the Marshall Space Flight Center) declared, "The president’s proposed NASA budget begins the death march for the future of U.S. human spaceflight."

Not so fast.

According to a recent Wall Street Journal article, the iron, magnesium silicates, cobalt, platinum, and other minerals in an average half-kilometer S-type asteroid are currently worth more than $20 trillion.That's $20 trillion. If this isn't enough money to get the private sector interested in making the march into space, I don't know what is. Already, space tourism is taking off. Richard Branson's company Virgin Galactic (that's Sir Richard in the photo above) is taking deposits for future flights into space, which will cost prospective astrotourists $200,000 each. To date, VIrgin Galactic has collected deposits of more than $45 million from 335 individuals, with regular passenger flights scheduled to commence in 2012.

NASA has led the way into space. Now it's time for the government agency (and members of Congress) to step aside and let the private sector do what it does best -- commercialize it.