Skylab II?

My occasional rants against NASA notwithstanding, I am all in favor of space exploration. I firmly believe it is humanity's future. My problem with NASA, aside from the fact it is a typical government bureaucratic boondoggle, is that they've lost focus on their primary mission: expand the boundaries of human exploration. The Space Shuttle and the International Space Habitrail go directly against that mission. They are both low-Earth-orbit vehicles purposed for little more than planetary navel gazing. The Space Bus is gone now, and good riddance. The ISS, however, continues to suck up taxpayer money at a rate comparable to the worst entitlement excesses of The Great Society. Not a good omen for going Above and Beyond, to say the least. There may be some hope on the horizon, however.

Some people at NASA are now discussing the idea of placing a cheap and easily deployed permanent station, dubbed Skylab II, at Lagrange point 2 of the Earth-Moon system. They refer to it as "deep space." That's a bit disingenuous, however, as the classical definition of deep space is extra solar -- i.e., beyond the Oort Cloud.

Semantic quibbling aside, this is a promising first step towards getting NASA back on track to doing something useful in extra-orbital space. A permanent station at EM-L2 would make a good base of operations for moon exploration and exploitation, as well as a jumping-off point for interplanetary missions. Mind you, I still think private industry can and eventually will do it better. But baby steps are better than lying on your back in a puddle of your own pee and crying, which is what NASA has been doing for the last 25 years. Maybe there's some life left in JFK's anti-Commie tool, after all. We'll see.