[Biggirl]

Did you read post number 159 by any chance?

[jboot]

Yes. I've been following SpaceX, SpaceDev and Scaled Composites for years. I'm impressed and I'd be thrilled to see NASA use Dragon or one of the others as a COTS vendor for the Shuttle replacement (sorry LockMart!)

Here's the sticker: SpaceX (or whoever) is going to make a profit by selling hardware to the government, not by going into space themselves. It's a fine distinction, but the key difference is that the second the government closes their purse the space "market" collapses. In truth it's still a government program run (at a massive loss) with taxpayer bucks.