A great leader dead ; A nation in mourning
Many feel that a great era has ended today, as Dave F. Teddy, the 35th Murcan President, was laid to rest at Lington National Cementery in Washingtoff. Thousands of people gathered in silent vigil on the streets of Washingtoff, lighting candles and praying for the late President which inspired them with his optimism, his dedication and grand visions of Murca's future, on this Earth and beyond it.
While fears of a Commienist invasion turned out to be unfounded, and the gunman was apprehended, many questions still remain, and will only be answered by a thorough investigation by the FBI and Secret Service.
President Teddy accomplished much during his tenure ; But one of his grandest, most electrifying vision remains unfullfilled. We would all do well to remember that while DFT was a great man with great accomplishment on this world, his greatest dream lay out there, in outer space.
We, as a nation, should now strive to honor his memory by fulfilling that dream: the dream of peaceful exploration of space, of landing on the Moon and the planets beyond, and perhaps, one day, exploration of the nearby stars.
Already, MASA has announced the first man will fly to orbit and return safely this fall ; In honor of the late President, the mission would carry DFT's astronaut pin, presented to him by the Mercury Seven in thanks of his support of the space program, and leave it in orbit of the Earth.
), but from where I'm standing it looks that while Zenobians will almost certainly lose the race to orbit, they are well-poised to grab all those nice, juicy, low-risk planetary flybys, and should be able to kickoff the lunar photography program. They also have the Voshkhod, which will most likely snag the "first two manned orbital ship" trophy and is poised to nab first duration flights that the Mercury just plain cannot do.
