> We're the largest backers of the ISS, have the largest civil and military launch industries, have the largest concentration of private launch and satellite companies and are one of a handful of countries in the world with a civil space agency.

And while we're #1 in overall spending we're second to Russia in terms of percentage of GDP. Considering our military budget is more than the next 10x countries combined and considering we pay into that budget regardless of our GDP I'd say we're putting in minimal effort. You're also giving credit to the US government for research, engineering, and labor that was done by private industry. That's where this problem becomes a problem.

Our government can't keep up with private innovation. We've got a car company who can make a car that gets 120 MPG but the DOT won't let it through the red tape because their required emissions testing equipment isn't sensitive enough to read it's emissions. So you deny the car and tell the company to come back with a shittier one they can read.

So instead of letting innovation happen, we're going to stifle it because we, ourselves, don't want to do our part to regulate it properly and in a timely fashion.

> A U.S. regulator regulating an American satellite, made in America by American engineers working for an American company, whose orbital damages are the liability of the American taxpayer, is being too internationally ambitious?

So when your private sector tech outpaces your public sector's ability to regulate it you just disallow advanced technology and keep regulating the same way you've always done? That sounds exceedingly bureaucratic.