🚀 go-pugleaf

->Well, from orbit, the United States is clearly the most advanced nation on 
->Earth.  More roads, dams, and bridges are in the U.S. than anywhere else on
->Earth.  Compared to the U.S., the Soviet Union is third-rate, at best.  
-
-And don't forget that the US probably puts out more RF energy than any
-other nation on the earth, which is a sure sign of a scientifically
-advanced culture (even if most of it is soap operas and cartoons!).


Or we're the only ones still backward enough to require large-scale ground
transport, and unsophisticated enough to broadcast RF signals instead of
cold-fusion-powered, phase-modulating lasers for communication?

Anyone who can get here over multi-lightyear distances may have verrry
different expectations for what "advanced" cultures look like on a planet.


SINCE I've got the bandwidth now, remember that the Apollo crews had to
go into isolation on their return just in case they had encounters with
alien viruses, germs, or cooties.  Inability to quarantine the Shuttle
crews is one way they aren't "equipped for alien contact".  They also
aren't equipped to destroy any important/secret materials if such
becomes necessary.  (Maybe the Aliens are plague-ridden Cubans intent
on hijacking the Shuttle, transferring all the neat hardware to Mir,
and crashing it into the Pentagon...)