Just as NASA was about to solve the mystery of whether or not there is life on Mars, the world went broke and both NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) had to back off on their plans to send astronauts and rovers there to find out. Two NASA missions to Mars–one in 2016 and another in 2018–have been canceled.

In the March 13 edition of the New York Times, Kenneth Chang quotes Planetary Society director Bill Nye as saying, "The pipeline is being shut off, and that’s not what anyone wants. We are closer than anyone has ever been to discovering life on another world."

While the sad state of the economy seems obvious, the reasons for cutting Mars explorations aren’t clear to all scientists. Change quotes astronomer Raymond E. Arvidson as saying, "We seem to have gotten the drastic cuts relative to other parts of NASA. Why?" Could it be that discovering life on another world is "bad politics" that would alienate fundamentalist religious voters?

While European economies are hurting as well, the ESA might turn to Russia as a new partner for the Mars missions that NASA will no longer pursue, which is a shame, since NASA spent 15 years laying the groundwork for future Mars explorations. Chang quotes NASA’s John M. Grunsfeld as saying, "We still have very exciting things to do in science."

In 1998, a mysterious man that Whitley Strieber calls the Master of the Key burst into his hotel room in Toronto and told him all kinds of things he didn’t know–but when he checked them out later, he found out they were TRUE.. One of the few things that Whitley could NOT check out was MOTKE’s provocative statement that we are stuck on this planet because the parents of the child who would have given us the ability to travel into space was killed in the holocaust! You can get a copy of The Key that comes with a special bookplate signed by Whitley from our Whitley Strieber Collection.

This means you’ll have to take a more conventional method of travel to the Dreamland Festival in May, but once you’re there, we GUARANTEE that you’ll be glad you came, and if you subscribe today, you’ll save 10% on ticket prices! You’ll also get a coupon for a copy of Whitley’s wonderful novel Hybrids for only $1.99 to read on the rocket ship.

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