Why Space Policy Is A Disaster

Yah, he seems upset that they haven't made it a priority.

I wonder if it's crossed anyone's mind that if the president (whoever it is) did make it a priority they might come to vastly different answers about what to do than Mike Griffin has?

The implicit assumption here is that our nation's "human spaceflight program" would be just fine if we weren't having a presidential election,

More fundamentally, he thinks our nation only has one human spaceflight program.

Why do you assume MacKinnon is a Republican?

He is a "K-street lobbyist for a firm that represents (among others) Raytheon" and a "former White House and Pentagon official" but that says nothing about what Administration he served in, let alone which party he belongs to.

I suppose it's possible that he's a closet Democrat, but seems unlikely:

Prior to joining as Director of Federal Affairs and Communications, Mr. MacKinnon spent the last five years as Bob Dole’s director of communications. During that same period, he also served as director of communications for Verner Liipfert in Washington, and as one of the firm’s top Republican lobbyists. In his role with Senator Dole, Mr. MacKinnon interacted daily with the national television networks and major newspapers, negotiated commercial deals, helped write and negotiate book deals, drafted speeches and columns and worked regularly with the Bush Administration.

Mr. MacKinnon also served as a senior communications adviser to Elizabeth Dole., both for her presidential campaign and for her successful senatorial campaign. Prior to working with Bob Dole and Verner Liipfert, Mr. MacKinnon served as Vice President at Barbour, Griffith & Rogers. BGR is headed up by Haley Barbour and is considered the preeminent Republican lobbying firm in Washington.

So, what do you think?

Looks like another Kennedy Republican.

Given Obama's need to appeal to the Hispanic demographic and given Bill Richardson's recent endorsement of Obama (Carville called him "Judas" which is telling) a Vice President Richardson may now be a possibility.

Perhaps Obama gives Richardson "control" over NASA.

= = =

Bigger picture? Space businesses need revenue streams that do not first pass through Uncle Sam Sugar's digestive track.

Given Obama's need to appeal to the Hispanic demographic and given Bill Richardson's recent endorsement of Obama (Carville called him "Judas" which is telling) a Vice President Richardson may now be a possibility.

While I do think that's not an unlikely pick, Bill, and not to harsh your buzz, but what kind of pharmaceuticals have you been ingesting that causes this delusion that Obama has a chance in hell of winning the general election?

Barring him dropping dead between now and January of next year, John McCain, for better or worse, is going to be the next president.

Barring him dropping dead between now and January of next year, John McCain, for better or worse, is going to be the next president.

Which brings up the question of what McCain's space policy would be like.

Sean O'Keefe is one of McCain's campaign advisors, so I expect we'll hear some cheerleading between now and the election. However, I doubt O'Keefe wants to be NASA Administrator again, so the real policy will be made by someone else.

Regarding Richardson, the Obama thing is an interesting development. The Washington insiders who were backing Richardson kept telling me he was going to be Hillary's veep. That seems to be an impossibility now.

Not surprisingly, Mark Whittington has mistated MacKinnon's article as a partisan slap against Obama.

Also not surprisingly, the counter on Mark's website still shows he has raised zero dollars and recruited zero supporters for John McCain. You'd think Mark would at least donate ten bucks to McCain himself, just to avoid the embarrassment. :-)

As usual, Edward Wright mistates that I have somehow made a mistatement. The bulk of the piece is a slap against Obama.

Laugh.

I suppose you think it's a slap at John Kennedy (who MacKinnon compares to Obama), too?

Read the article title, Mark, then go look up the word "nonpartisan."

Can someone point me to an intelligent, relatively unbiased discussion of the NASA manned flight architechure and it's possible flaws? Since they went to the Apollo redux, I gave up following it and it's probably time I caught up.

Shittington is an uninformed, illiterate idiot who can't even count into the low single digits. Only two paragraphs in McKinnon's piece, out of 14, deal with Obama. Clinton and McCain also get mentioned. That would never constitute "a bulk of the piece" to anyone in their right mind.

Oh yeah, Shittington doesn't have a right mind...

Sure would be nice if this idiot whose only credentials are a bachelor's degree in history and sub-par writing skills would leave space commentary to individuals with an actual background or experience in the subject.

"Also not surprisingly, the counter on Mark's website still shows he has raised zero dollars and recruited zero supporters for John McCain. You'd think Mark would at least donate ten bucks to McCain himself, just to avoid the embarrassment. :-)"

It would also be nice if Shittington would stop damaging the McCain campaign with his (literally) worthless commentary and fundraising efforts.

You also have to love how practically every single one of Shittington's "editorials" has earned three or less stars from readers. What a joke of a loser.

Whether you agree with the VSE or not (Now the USSEP - United States Space Exploration Policy) or agree with the ESAS architecture, if you are a proponent of manned space flight, then by now you should be painfully aware that Obama has stated over and over his intent to cut NASAs budget. Most recently in Wyoming. He has criticized our space program everywhere he goes, including Houston, which is probably why he is trying so hard to prevent a re-vote in Florida. This man would do nothing good for our space program.

As for private industry, until one of those countries successfully launches anything, let alone something with a human in it, then we only have one manned space program.

As for all the people who keep saying Sean O'Keefe endorsing McCain could be good for the space program, obviously never paid attention to Administrator O'Keefe. He was the worst administrator ever, with no background in and no understanding of space. He was brought in to hack the budget and then left after the Columbia accident. He had no love for the space program and made it no secret that he did not see any point to goin beyond LEO. So, please keep him far away from NASA. Of course, he never said anything as bad as Obama's repeated comments about how the Shuttle program never inspired anybody and how useless manned space flight is.

The one thing I do agree with in the original article is that our manned space program is at a crossroads. For the first time since Apollo ended, we are ending a program. If we do not have a president who supports the space program, I truly fear it will destroy our manned program. We do not have the luxury of falling back onto the Shuttle as we figure out what to do because the shuttle has 9 flights left (11 if they approve the contingencies). Then it is over. We can not extend the shuttle program. Constellation may not be perfect, but it is the best vision NASA has had in awhile. The ISS cost so much money because every few years, somebody came along who wanted to redesign it. If we have somebody redesigning Constellation or the VSE every few years, what do you suppose that will do to the overall cost???

I'll take Hillary or McCain's pro-space talk at this point, without a lot of detail, over Obama's slash and burn talk any day of the week.

As for private industry, until one of those countries successfully launches anything, let alone something with a human in it, then we only have one manned space program.

Private industry has successfully launched something with a human in it -- and please don't tell me SpaceShip One doesn't count because it didn't go all the way to Alpha Centauri.

That's the same logic that led critics to declare that the microcomputer was useless (and the airplane). Progress always begins at the low end.

As for all the people who keep saying Sean O'Keefe endorsing McCain could be good for the space program, obviously never paid attention to Administrator O'Keefe.

I didn't say he would be good for the space program. Please don't misquote me, that's Mark Whittington's job. :-)

I said he would be a cheerleader for the status quo. Some people might consider that good but I don't.

> He was brought in to hack the budget and then left after the Columbia accident.

No, he actually increased the budget. He also sold the Administration on the "Vision for Space Exploration" after getting the idea from Elon Musk.

We can debate whether that was a good thing, but what you say is factually incorrect.

> Of course, he never said anything as bad as Obama's repeated comments about how the Shuttle program never inspired
> anybody and how useless manned space flight is.

No, and Obama didn't say that, either. What he said was that NASA should look at whether human spaceflight was the best way to accomplish certain missions.

I'm no fan of Obama, either, but let's get our facts straight.

Do you think manned space flight is useful? What about womanned space flight? (NASA hasn't used the term "manned" since they ended their boys club in the 1980's.)

If you think human spaceflight is useful, why do you say the "best vision" is a program that will send fewer humans into space?

> For the first time since Apollo ended, we are ending a program.

No, NASA ended the NASP program, along with Shuttle II, 2GRLV, X-33, X-34, Orbital Space Plane, and quite a few others. If Ares and Orion join the list, it won't even be notable.

> If we have somebody redesigning Constellation or the VSE every few years, what do you suppose that will do to the overall cost???

Good question. We design new airplanes not "every few years" but every year. What do you suppose that does to the overall cost?

Do you think we would be better off designing one National Aircraft, and then never developing a new aircraft for the next 25 years?

Or declaring that only the government is capable of developing human-rated aircraft and government employees can only travel on government aircraft, not commercial airlines? And only the Army can carry air mail?

Not to mention designing the national aircraft so it disintegrates after every flight, requiring a completely new aircraft to be built for the next flight? And each flight is a dangerous test flight?

Do you think that would be advantageous?

Rand, great article. But you could have stopped after this.
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NASA has bitten off an architecture that will not be financially sustainable, and may not even be developable, and for which it doesn't have sufficient budget...

Doesn't that statement define 99.9999999% of gub'ment programs? The fact that it's NASA doesn't change the fact that in the end it's just a gub'ment program, just as bloated, just as dead end, or just as non-sensical as Midnight Basketball, in NOLA, being paid for with funds from the levy repair budget. Yes NASA has it's on budget, but that same amount of funding in private hands, from private sources would go far further.

If the federal govrment was good at anything "businesswise", we'd all be eating Uncle Sam Burgers, driving Americamobiles and watching a good variety of shows on PBS1, PBS2, etc.

VSE has been a dead man walking since its inception. To believe otherwise has been to believe some combination of:

1) the spirit of 1961 would return, sustaining public & Congressional support (for twice as long this time)

2) the broader US fiscal picture would remain fair to good for 15 years -- despite big tax cuts + big new entitlements + Iraq costs + Medicare/Medicaid/SS avalanches coming

3) the transition from STS+ISS to Constellation would go more smoothly than than any comparable goring of vested interests' oxen in political history

But do go on arguing as if the NASA administrator, the party of the next Administration, or the Constellation vs. DIRECT architecture really, really matters. One more chorus of 'Nearer My God to Thee' and those deck chairs should be arranged just about perfectly.

VSE has been a dead man walking since its inception.

I think that that depends on what "VSE" is. If you accept that part of it is the programmatics that stipulated how the goal was to be accomplished (e.g., NASA will develop a new "crew exploration vehicle" and be in charge of the overall effort), then I agree. But if you have a higher-level view of it (the goal of US space policy will be to expand humanity beyond low earth orbit), then it could have (and could still) survive, but it would require a radical rethinking of overall US space policy--the biggest one since NASA was founded (and NACA essentially wiped out, or at least subsumed, though it's almost completely dead now). But in a sense, the administration had a failure of vision in not doing so.

But do go on arguing as if the NASA administrator, the party of the next Administration, or the Constellation vs. DIRECT architecture really, really matters.

Well, actually, I think that the NASA administrator could, in theory, matter, though one that really tried to straighten things out would probably get canned by the porkmeisters in Congress.

...then by now you should be painfully aware that Obama has stated over and over his intent to cut NASAs budget.

You know, I'm not a fan of Obama either, but considering the bloated existence of the NASA budget that produces nothing worthwhile other than bad ideas and no dreams...perhaps some budget cutting would be a good idea?

One other thing:

despite big tax cuts + big new entitlements + Iraq costs + Medicare/Medicaid/SS avalanches coming

There were no "big tax cuts." There were no tax cuts at all, as far as we can know with any certainty. In fact, given that the federal revenue was rising pretty healthily throughout, it could be argued there were actually tax increases. All we know for sure was that there were tax rate cuts. Which I'm all in favor of, and opposed to tax rate increases. While the spending has been a disaster, it's hard to argue that the administration's tax policy has been.

"1) the spirit of 1961 would return, sustaining public & Congressional support (for twice as long this time)"

One thing we don't have going for NASA or the space science community this time is a convergence of three very outstanding individuals who each made a significant impact on the development of human spaceflight in the 1960's:

1) John F. Kennedy - 'nuff said about him
2) Werner von Braun - In addition to his outstanding engineering and engineering management skills, he was a promoter and self-promoter second to none. How else do you think a former SS/Nazi party member was given a budget of billions of U.S. dollars from an American congress?
3) Walt Disney - Yes, I am invoking the man and the legend. And no, this isn't a mistake. Disney together with the above two people was nearly single-handedly responsible for the public opinion and support of manned spaceflight throughout the 1960s, including explicit references to manned spaceflight at his themeparks, movies, and even propaganda pieces he did jointly with both von Braun and even JFK. I'm not kidding here either.

If anything, JFK was the least important part of this triumvirate of U.S. space policy, other than JFK both gave considerable support and then had the good fortune to die while in office... at least good for von Braun and Disney.

I dare anybody to note any other similar kinds of personalities that can even be remotely compared to these individuals in their attempt to reshape public opinion regarding spaceflight. Steven Spielberg or George Lucas might possibly have the Hollywood/entertainment connections of Disney, but nobody can possibly match von Braun. There are a few trying like Elon Musk, John Carmack, Robert Bigelow, Jeff Bezos and others, but they don't have the singluar talents displayed by von Braun with decades of rocket research under their belts and the ability to deftly milk the political machines of not just one but two major governments (the other being Hitler's German government). And none of these stellar personalities are really taking the initiative to push for something like the Apollo program with single mindedness.

Now if you put Spielberg, Musk, and Obama in the same room and have them conspire to send people to Mars.... well, that could be something interesting.

Rand: OK, there are alternative ways to parse "VSE" vs. the implementation. But in the post-Columbia rethink, two elements dominated: (1) we've got to stop flying the Shuttle ASAP, and (2) if we're risking people at all, it has to be in the service of something "grander" than ISS. Your (and my) preference -- a very different NASA, no longer centered on its architectures, its missions and its astronauts -- never got much of a hearing.

I guess one could find glimmerings by reading the Aldridge Commission report with a very partial and indulgent eye, but the day I listened to the VSE announcement I heard "new mission for NASA" much louder than anything else.

Robert: The personalities did matter, but all three together mattered less than the Cold War -- which from 1952-1953 on turned on the budgetary spigot for development of multiple big rocket designs (along with exotic materials, advanced avionics, global tracking, re-entry technologies, etc.)... and from 1957 on powered the space race. Without that context, and its impulses first of anxiety and then of competition for national prestige, I don't think even that combination of engineer/manager/advocate, creative 'imagineer,' and president would have gotten very far.

and please don't tell me SpaceShip One doesn't count because it didn't go all the way to Alpha Centauri.

It doesn't count and not because it didn't go to Alpha Centauri.

Happy?

Specifically, as people have pointed out before, it would be nice to see somebody who isn't a government funded organisation put something into orbit and bring it back, then maybe something with people inside.

Of course, it would also be nice if there was an evolutionary route from SS1 to an orbital vehicle.

Of course, it would also be nice if there was an evolutionary route from SS1 to an orbital vehicle.

There is an evolutionary route from SS1 to an orbital vehicle.

Of course, it would also be nice if Apollo worshippers looked at the facts rather than relying on religious faith.

There is an evolutionary route from SS1 to an orbital vehicle.

Jolly good. Glad you've settled that then.

Of course, it would also be nice if Apollo worshippers looked at the facts rather than relying on religious faith.

Who me?

I'm not a great fan of Apollo worship, although they say that he has passed comment on the Olympic Games today.

The most GLARING example MacKinnon makes of false and downright ignorant logic is when he cites Kennedy as the reason we should be doing a “apollo on steriods” almost FIFTY YEARS after Kennedy made the first clarion call to goto the moon.

The absolute LAST THING kenndy would have thought is that America would STILL be even CONSIDERING chemical propulsion for “the moon mars and beyond” in 2008.

Kennedy gave a speech in Dec 1962 http://www.jfklink.com/speeches/jfk/publicpapers/1962/jfk546_62.html

and did a question and answer session after:

Q. Mr. President, after your trip to Los Alamos Laboratory, New Mexico, is it your intention to ask for more money to speed up Project Rover, or for nuclear propulsion in space?

THE PRESIDENT. We’re going to let these tests go on, of the reactor. These tests should be completed by July. If they are successful, then we will put more money into the program, which would involve the Nerva and Rift, both the engine and the regular machine. We will wait until July, however, to see if these tests are successful. It should be understood that the nuclear rocket, even under the most favorable circumstances, would not play a role in any first lunar landing. This will not come into play until 1970 or ‘71. It would be useful for further trips to the moon or trips to Mars. But we have a good many areas competing for our available space dollars, and we have to try to channel it into those programs which will bring us a result, first, on our moon landing, and then to consider Mars.

President Kennedy ASSUMED we would be going to the moon with NUCLEAR powered IN SPACE ships BY 1970-71 and on to a mars (flyby) in 1973 and Mars landing 1975. Apollo was mearly the in space systems checkout until the NERVA program completed the new engines.

Now MacKinnon tries to somehow suggest Kennedy was in favor of an apollo on steriods program almost 40 years AFTER kennedy thought we would ALREADY HAVE nuclear in space propulsion? Come on, Kennedy is laughing in his grave at this notion.

You say things that assume you know what people are thinking. Things you obviously don't know you bitch about as if that proves they do not exist. You'd make an excellent politician. They know more than there is to know.

You say things that assume you know what people are thinking. Things you obviously don't know you bitch about as if that proves they do not exist. You'd make an excellent politician. They know more than there is to know.

You say things that assume you know things within people's thoughts. Things you obviously don't know you bitch about as if that proves they do not exist. You'd make an excellent politician. They know more than there is to know, while proving they know almost nothing.