U.S. mustn't give up on space, Opinion, Gerry Griffin, USA Today

"Going forward, commercial space companies and NASA must be considered partners, not competitors, in the U.S. human spaceflight enterprise. NASA's plan to support commercial spaceflight would significantly strengthen the agency's chances to have humans explore beyond Earth orbit once again. Human spaceflight to and from Earth orbit provided by commercial companies would enable NASA to focus more of its energies and very constrained budget on exploration beyond Earth's orbit. Today, it will be better, even necessary, to have NASA focus its tight resources on preparing to send astronauts ultimately to destinations such as Mars."