Tuesday’s Washington Times has an op-ed piece by Jim Muncy on the Bush space policy. For those who weren’t able to attend the Georgetown Law School panel session on the policy that included Muncy, this commentary is very similar to his remarks there, although he spoke in much greater detail during the panel. Towards the end of the essay, Muncy quotes a George Will book that compared President Eisenhower to a quartermaster in his treatment of the nascent space program, while likening JFK to general who saw that the program “was primarily about politics, in a grand sense: it was about defining and shaping the nation’s spirit and confounding its enemies.” Muncy then concludes:
In that context, Mr. Bush has indeed found his “Kennedy moment.” By realigning our space program toward opening the space frontier to and for all humanity, Mr. Bush has thrown the space agency’s cap over the wall. NASA has no other option but to let go of its bureaucratic past and pursue this risky but rewarding future. Of course, Congress must join with the president and do its part as well.
I wonder if Mr. Muncy believes America would have followed through with JFK’s vision for Apollo had he not been shot in Dallas and instead experienced a bruising 1964 election campaign? In death, JFK achieved a mythic stature he never could have equaled in life.
“Spaceflight and the Myth of Presidential Leadership” is a must read for all space advocates, IMHO.