We can walk on the moon, or we can open the sky. We cannot do both.

Um, not to get into a debate about Iraq, but please see Imperial Life in the Emerald City and Fiasco. They are well-sourced books by responsible reporters. Most of the people working these issues on the ground were startled by what Bremer did after he took over. It was contrary to what they had been working toward, and they protested vigorously. Jay Garner told Rummy as much.

Well, actually before Bush, it’s the science advisor’s (Marburger’s) job to ask those questions. But since Griffin was Marburger’s handpicked choice for NASA Administrator, that’s not going to happen in this White House.

“The administration had policies regarding the Iraqi army and De-Baathification, and Paul Bremer went in did the exact opposite.”

This is simply not true, but this space forum is not the place to discuss it.

Again, I’m no fan of Bush. But to expect one person (President or otherwise) to personally oversee the detailed planning, budgeting, and execution of the hundreds of multi-billion dollar development projects and operations spread across a multi-trillion dollar federal government is a little extreme and rather ludicrous.

“And Bush is much more involved in Iraq than he is in the implementation of the VSE. It’s been Griffin, not Bush, who has been deviating from the VSE as laid out by Griffin’s predecessor (O’Keefe) and the Bush White House.”

Umm, refresh my memory here. Did Bush leave the White House at the same time O’Keefe left NASA? Are we somehow dealing with a different administration that has veered from what the previous one set out to do?

This is not a credible argument. If Griffin started doing things that were contrary to what the Administration had agreed to, then isn’t it Bush’s responsibility to say, “WTF is this? This is not what we decided upon. We talked about this and if we do it your way, it’s not going to work.”

If Bush didn’t do that, then he’s not being very responsible. The same thing happened in Iraq. The administration had policies regarding the Iraqi army and De-Baathification, and Paul Bremer went in did the exact opposite. You can blame Bremer, but it was ultimately Bush’s responsibility to make sure policy is being followed. You can’t just delegate things and walk away from any responsibility.

I disagree completely with this interpretation. Griffin chose not to hold the Shuttle program (and human space flight program at large) responsible for the budget savings they had promised to his predecessor (O’Keefe) as part of their buy-in to the VSE. Instead of holding Shuttle and human space flight managers responsible, Griffin chose to punish science and aeronautics instead. He probably did so either because he did not want to see human space flight (or other NASA civil servant) layoffs on his watch or because avoiding human space flight civil servant layoffs at all costs was the price he paid to Senators Hutchison and Nelson for his confirmation.

And from a technical and budgetary point-of-view, it makes little sense for a program that is flying fewer vehicles not to see a declining budget. It’s just lazy and timid on the part of Griffin and the Shuttle and human space flight managers not to extract savings as orbiters retire.

“He also got none of the budget increases that were promised three years ago. Add to that the fact that the Republican Congress left town without passing a budget last year.”

He (Griffin) also constructed a Constellation budget that, contrary to the VSE and based on erroneous ESAS analysis (that he also set up), sucked up all the spare dollars at NASA and provides the agency with practically no budget flexibility. Any reasonable observer of federal budgets could have predicted that NASA would run into external budget problems at some point in the 15- to 20-year lunar build-up and would have left some slack in the system to accommodate it. But Griffin chose to do the exact opposite.

“So, before you start hitting Griffin too hard, consider who has stuck him in this difficult situation.”

I don’t mean to pick unnecessarily on any NASA Administrator. It’s a tough job regardless.

But Griffin’s current situation is one almost entirely of his own making.

Unfortunately, I agree most with this assessment.

True, but Orion and Ares I are not the problem. Budget and rumored technical issues aside, Orion and Ares I will be well along in development by 2009. In the absence of a miracle in COTS or the commercial sector at large or the rumored technical debacles on Ares I, it will be difficult for the next President to cancel Orion and Ares I, especially given the poor alternatives (continued Shuttle flights and/or continued reliance on Russian Soyuz vehicles).

The problem from an exploration point-of-view is that no actual lunar hardware — heavy lift (Ares V), lunar lander (LSAM), etc. — will be under development by 2009. So even if Orion and Ares I are healthy and performing, it will be very easy for the new White House to cancel the rest of the VSE — the part that actually prepares for exploration — and redirect the remaining budget ramp-up elsewhere.

This is the true tragedy of the ESAS implementation plan, Griffin’s overarching decisions, and NASA’s cultural obsession with astronaut safety and ETO transporation ownership. If you want NASA to transform itself from a LEO trucking company to an exploration agency (as I do), then ESAS is the exactly wrong way to execute the VSE in terms of political and budgetary strategy.

Yes, Bush appointed Griffin.

But to use an Iraq analogy, both Bush and Rumsfeld share responsibility for mismanaging the Iraq war (along with Cheney, Rice, etc.).

And Bush is much more involved in Iraq than he is in the implementation of the VSE. It’s been Griffin, not Bush, who has been deviating from the VSE as laid out by Griffin’s predecessor (O’Keefe) and the Bush White House.

I’m no Bush fan, but to imply that the President (whoever he or she is) bears all or most of the responsibility for errors in setting up NASA studies, inflexible budget planning by NASA leaders, and poor technical decisions by NASA managers, is a little extreme and rather ludicrous.

I was speaking in general terms about those on the right who, if this thing implodes, will blame Congress and the Democrats instead of those who those responsible for planning and implementing the program.

Bush appointed Griffin. And O’Keefe. He approved the VSE plan. He approved the budgets that cut NASA’s science funding. The program is carried out by his administration and appointees (which now includes Michael Brown’s former deputy from FEMA).

Of course Griffin deserves blame if things go badly. But, Bush has ultimate responsibility for this. He is the president. VSE is his administration’s initiative, and if it works, he’ll be there front and center to claim credit.

Far be it from me to defend the Bush Administration, but that seems a little strong. I’ve seen little evidence that anybody deliberately lied about the cost of continuing the Shuttle program, or even about the plans for the wider NASA budget. They were wrong, but that is different from lying. There may have a little (or a lot) of wishful thinking, but that again is different from lying.

There certainly was the larger lie that we could simultaneously have tax cuts, conduct multiple major wars, not cut any politically important projects, and still end up with a balanced budget — oh, and go to Mars besides.

Mr. Bush has taken it to unprecedented extremes, but there is nothing new about this wider lie, particularly (but not exclusively) among Republicans.

— Donald