The only action going on at Cape Canaveral these days are Disney Cruise ships and people getting sun tans on the beach. The United States invested millions of dollars into our space port, but we choose to let it sit idle and hire the Russians to lose our satellites for us.

and now must rely on others to launch our birds.....

After all, Boeing is involved.

Don't think that's why the engine quit. Russian rocketry is simply unreliable and old. Those two go together. Sure wouldn't want to risk my life and ride aboard a Russian spacecrap to the International Space Station or anywhere else.

Elon Musk has had some pretty spectacular successes lately.

Elon Musk's SpaceX has the launch vehicle contract at Vandenberg Air Force Base for polar orbit-bound U.S. "govt. satellites." I believe SpaceX has the same gig for equatorial orbit-bound, U.S. satellites launched out of the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Russians may be cheaper on the price, but unreliable on attaining mission objective. They completely failed the Contact! organization (Ann Druyan's organization) when they attempted to submarine launch ("SLBM&quot a solar sailing vehicle awhile back. They still have the ISS ("International Space Station&quot resupply and "progress" (docking with and then boost-pushing the ISS into a higher orbit) contract . They use their "Proton" rocket for that mission. Not sure if they'll be doing that much longer, as SpaceX et al may be taking over the ISS resupply and progress mission. NASA very likely still has capability to put satellites into Earth orbit. I know the U.S. Air Force does. So, it stands to reason that NASA still does as well. Might all be about the bottom line cost that determines who gets the launch contract.