The New Space Race

[Sheogorath]

Hello all, I'm doing a term paper for my Astronomy class on the Space Race, and including a large chunk on the 'New Space Race'.

For those who don't know, basically this term arose around the point China declared that it was going to the moon, and everybody concluded that they were going to start mining up there. At that point the US said, "Crap, we've got to get there before the Reds!" And Bush authorized the Constellation program...
I'll leave my own personal feelings about that program out for now, since I'm interested in other peoples opinions on the New Space Race and don't want to taint them with my own.
Anyway, the 'New Space Race' probably started a bit before that, but was simply 'undeclared', IE: The major news outlets hadn't tested it out for buzzword effectiveness yet.
So, feel free to voice how you feel about the US/China race, or the developing countries now entering space. I understand Iran recently launched their own satellite on a rocket they built themselves, from their own facility, and North Korea's trundling along quite nicely as well.