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NASA's Coming Crack-Up<br /><br />By HOLMAN W. JENKINS JR.<br />October 5, 2005; Page A21<br /><br />President Bush has his hands full with critics of his Iraq policy and his hurricane cleanup policy. So let's give him a hard time about NASA.<br /><br />It may not be important in the grand scheme of things, a $16 billion a year agency. But one thing has changed: There's now a popular constituency for space policy that does more than just tune in for the blast-off extravaganzas. Blame the Web: We told you last year how seething space fans had kept Congress's feet to the fire and ended up saving a bill designed to speed development of private space tourism.<br /><br />The same folks are also a source of critique of NASA's Exploration Systems Architecture Study, issued last month, mostly in consultation with the usual suspects -- the giant aerospace contractors, who've been NASA's primary iron triangle sounding board since Gemini. Now there's an effective peanut gallery, their voices magnified by the Web, which has sprouted numerous sites devoted to criticizing and kibitzing about NASA.<br /><br />The critics won't be flyswatted away for one big reason. NASA's "return to the moon" efforts over the coming decade, as budgets bloat and deadlines are missed, will take place against a background of much faster progress in private spaceflight endeavors.<br /><br />Last year, Burt Rutan won the X Prize for the first private space flight. Next year, his new backer Richard Branson, billionaire chief of the Virgin conglomerate, hopes to fly test passengers to the edge of space in a Virgin Galactic ship based on Mr. Rutan's design. Paying cargo will soon fly aboard a rocket built by Elon Musk, owner of an eBay fortune. In all, at least a dozen entrepreneurial companies have serious space projects in the works.<br /><br />These companies have tight, pained little smiles on their faces right now. Many hope to benefit from contracts, and thus don't publicly criticize NASA's plans. But they're doin