when someone asks the question: "Name one thing that government can do better than private business."

...so right now SpaceX is certainly doing better than NASA has. They've achieved controlled descent under power. That's a biggie. They'll get there if they keep working on it.

not this one specific thing. Let me know when private enterprise lands a man or woman on the moon and returns them safely. I do think private enterprise has a role to play in the space program, though.

...using the military budget mainly to siphon money off from taxes under the guise of ''protecting'' us, and then using it for high tech research. Later, the business sector who've been largely contracted to do the legwork, comes in and takes advantage of the discoveries. And then we get to buy cell phones we paid for the research to invent.

- And that's capitalism for ya, all of the up and none of the down. Unless you're shorting stocks.......

This is an amazing success. SpaceX has been far more successful than NASA in getting new tech out the door, tested, and into actual use. OMG, a mere 2 partial successes out of 2 attempts? NASA would have killed to have that kind of a batting average.

I'm tired of hearing how this is a failure, already. It came down in a controlled fashion and right on target. Ok, it was a harder landing than they wanted. That's what happens when you are working on a completely new concept. Just how many failures do you think NASA had when working out the tech on the moon lander? You just can't recite them because unlike SpaceX, NASA didn't put their attempts on social media where all the world could see them (and play armchair quarterback).

NASA did not have the computational power available today when developing the Apollo program.

I'm not saying that this was a failure, but comparing development now with development in the 1960's is a failure.

NASA has no plans to do anything like this with its new launch vehicles.

Much of the engineering work at NASA isn't (or at least wasn't) done by government engineers, but by contractors. I have personal experience with this.

It's interesting to note that the new Orion system is essentially a retread of Apollo in concept. It is surely more advanced in many ways, but they are going back to an Apollo-type capsule with an ablative heat shield and "splash-down" recovery. I think it's a step backwards.

One unrelated point deserves another.

Link please.

You need more information. He's doing what has never been attempted, and i know he'll pull it off FIRST.