Space Politics
Because sometimes the most important orbit is the Beltway…
Archive for April, 2008
April 29, 2008 at 7:06 am · Filed under Campaign '08, Congress, NASA
On Monday several members of Congress, including Sen. Bill Nelson and Congressmen Tom Feeney and Dave Weldon, held a “workshop” on space issues Monday in Brevard County, Florida, where people are understandably concerned about life after the space shuttle. According to Florida Today, Nelson said that his subcommittee had proposed holding a field hearing this summer to review the future of KSC but that NASA was opposed: “I’m sad to tell you, NASA has asked me not to have a meeting, because they don’t want to stir up the people.” A NASA spokesman later contacted by the paper said that the agency would support any hearing the committee held.
The Orlando Sentinel focused on another claim made by Nelson: that space could, in effect, be a key issue in the general election because of the pivotal role of Florida, and within the state, the “I-4 corridor”, including the Space Coast. “The next president is going to decide a lot [about the space program],” Nelson said. “And East-Central Florida has an opportunity to influence the next president because, at the end of the day, Florida is going to be important this November.” However, as the Republican primary this January showed, space may not nearly be as critical issue in the state or region as some supporters hope.
April 29, 2008 at 6:51 am · Filed under Campaign '08
In case you missed it, on Saturday CNN aired a brief report on space and the lack of attention it was getting on the campaign trail in this presidential election. While you’re unlikely to learn much new about the topic from the report if you’ve been reading this and other resources on the topic in recent months, the report was disappointing in another way: it focused almost entirely on building up a space race between China and the US. Among the claims made by the CNN piece: “Chinese scientists talk about mining the lunar surface for possible nuclear energy resources that are plentiful there but rare on Earth.” That’s a reference, of course, to helium-3, and such mining might indeed be useful—in that day in the far future when we actually have operational helium-3 fusion reactors.
“But there is genuine and growing fear among some scientists that if space does not become a higher priority, the Chinese program will be on par with America’s by the end of the next president’s second term,” the piece concludes. It’s not clear that CNN talked to any scientists in the article—the only experts quoted are Robert Zubrin and a military analyst—and some scientists might have very different opinions about current space policy depending on, for example, the status of their budgets. There’s no discussion in the piece about concrete, near-term issues like the impending retirement of the shuttle and the gap between it and Constellation, something that the next president will have to immediately grapple with.
It does raise an interesting question, though: should US space policy, and the candidates’ positions on the issue, be judged against the “threat” (real or perceived) of China or other nations, or should it be judged against whatever national goals we have for it, regardless of what other countries are doing?
April 26, 2008 at 8:40 am · Filed under Congress
An AP article Saturday examines the reelection challenge Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL) is facing for his House seat. Democrats have made Feeney “their top Florida target” and are playing up allegations of ethical improprieties by him. Feeney, the ranking member of the space subcommittee of the House Science and Technology Committee, is instead emphasizing his space experience for his district, which includes the Kennedy Space Center.
Feeney tells the AP that he is concerned that China is challenging US leadership in space, noting events like China’s ASAT test last January. It appears, though, he could use a refresher course on China’s space capabilities. “He warns that the Chinese are developing killer satellites that can attach themselves to other orbiting devices,” the article notes. However, claims that China was developing “parasitic microsatellites” were debunked a few years ago after people traced the source of the intelligence to a source with little credibility. (Perhaps Feeney will pick up some new intelligence on his current trip to China to participate in a global space forum in Beijing.)
Feeney’s Democratic opponent, Suzanne Kosmas, is focusing on issues other than space in the campaign, according to the article (her barebones campaign web site has a picture of a shuttle launch on it, but that’s it for space-related content.) The article indicates that at least some people in the district will factor in space into their voting decisions. “It’s going to kill this town,” one Titusville resident tells the AP, speaking of the shuttle’s impending retirement. “This town pretty much lives for the space shuttle.” It’s not clear Feeney would be able to do much about that: while he is a cosponsor of Rep. Dave Weldon’s shuttle extension legislation (HR 4837), he has talked recently about the need to shorten the post-shuttle gap by accelerating work on Constellation rather than keeping the shuttle flying after 2010.
April 25, 2008 at 7:45 am · Filed under Campaign '08, Congress
Friday’s Orlando Sentinel reports that senator and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has introduced legislation designed to support the Arecibo radio observatory in Puerto Rico. The giant radio telescope is in danger of closing because of budget pressures on the National Science Foundation’s astronomy programs, much to the consternation of astronomers who use the facility for a variety of applications, including tracking near Earth objects.
The Sentinel article plays up the timing of Clinton’s legislation, introduced last week: the commonwealth will hold a primary on June 1, one of the last of campaign. “Arecibo has been in peril for a while now,” a co-director of Barack Obama’s Puerto Rico campaign told the paper. “The timing is more than suspect.” Clinton does have a legitimate case in introducing the legislation, since the observatory is run by Cornell University in New York state, but her Senate office didn’t explain why the bill was introduced now.
One thing the Sentinel article missed, though, is that Clinton’s bill, S. 2862, is effectively word-for-word identical to HR 3737, a bill introduced last October by Luis Fortuño, the commonwealth’s non-voting representative, and Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA). (A press release issued by Clinton’s Senate office does note that a “similar” bill was introduced in the House, and includes a quote from Fortuño.) HR 3737 was assigned to the House Science and Technology Committee, which has not acted on the bill; the Senate, interestingly, sent S. 2862 to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, and not the Commerce, Science, and Transportation committee.
April 24, 2008 at 5:56 pm · Filed under Campaign '08
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has won the endorsement of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE), a union that represents scientists, engineers, and other technical professions at various companies and organizations, including NASA. Space (or even more general science) policy did not factor into the IFPTE’s decision, at least according to the statement the union released, which instead cited issues ranging from H-1B visa reform to health care.
The IFPTE release includes a statement from Sen. Obama, who did make a passing reference to NASA: “I’ll support vigorous reinvestment in our federal research and development agencies, including NASA, to maintain America’s leadership in Science and Technology and to foster economic competitiveness.”
April 24, 2008 at 6:47 am · Filed under Campaign '08
“Although the MSM [mainstream media] has largely ignored Barack Obama’s plans for NASA, the issue is likely to bubble up during the general election campaign, if he’s the Democratic nominee,” claims Lee Cary in an essay in American Thinker, a right-leaning online publication. Cary never really explains why he believes this will happen: after all, while space got more attention that some might have expected during the primary season, it never became a major topic (outside of, say, Brevard County in Florida). In a general election between Obama and John McCain, it’s hard to see space getting much attention, particularly given the increasing concern about the economy (in particular food and fuel prices), the ever-present debate about Iraq, and so on.
Cary largely rehashes what’s been previously said about Obama, including his pledge to delay Constellation for five years to help pay for his education programs. Cary then cites the campaign’s quasi-official space policy where Obama pledges to “support the development of this vital new platform [the Orion CEV] to ensure that the United States’ reliance on foreign space capabilities is limited to the minimum possible time period.” “Now is that in human or dog years?” is Cary’s rejoinder, one of a number of parenthetical, italicized comments littered throughout the document in an apparent effort to be witty. Cary doesn’t note, though, that this “reliance on foreign space capabilities” (aka “the gap”) is going to be an issue for whomever is elected president.
A more balanced analysis comes from Rand Simberg in a PopularMechanics.com article. He examines what the three campaigns (Obama, McCain, and Hillary Clinton) have said to date on space, and how the facts back up (or don’t) their rhetoric. No clear winner emerges. “For voters already behind NASA’s targeted human spaceflight, don’t get your hopes up—none of the three major candidates are likely to fund the current plan, because they’ll all face the budgetary pressures implied by an aging population and a burgeoning federal deficit,” he writes. “So perhaps the real question to ask McCain, Clinton and Obama is not what they’re going to do for NASA, but whether they’re going to come up with a more innovative federal space policy overall.”
April 24, 2008 at 6:07 am · Filed under Congress, NASA
As noted here earlier, the space subcommittee of the House Science and Technology Committee is holding a hearing on the ISS this morning. While it’s not specifically mentioned in the hearing charter, one would expect that committee members would ask NASA’s Bill Gerstenmaier some questions about the Soyuz reentry Saturday that experienced what may be significant problems, especially since NASA is now asking Congress to extend its authority to purchase Soyuz flights beyond 2011.
The Orlando Sentinel reported yesterday that at least one member of Congress is seriously concerned about the Soyuz problem. “I don’t know how to reliably interpret everything they [NASA] are telling me about things like this,” Rep. Dave Weldon (R-FL) told the paper. Weldon, of course, is pushing a bill to keep the shuttle flying after 2010.
The Sentinel article also notes that county commissioners in Brevard County, Florida (home to Cape Canaveral and KSC) “passed a resolution saying ‘resources to be spent on procuring Russian Soyuz#8230; would best be devoted to the development and procurement of domestic crew and cargo logistic capabilities.’” (The county board’s minutes aren’t available this morning.) Not that the Brevard County board has much influence on affairs in Washington…
April 22, 2008 at 11:12 pm · Filed under Other, States
The Las Cruces (NM) Sun-News reports that voters in Sierra County, New Mexico approved a spaceport sales tax by roughly a two-to-one margin, much larger than the margin of victory last year in neighboring Doña Ana County. The quarter-cent increase will provide a modest amount of funding for New Mexico’s Spaceport America but also allow the formation of a “tax district” with Doña Ana County so that the tax revenue can actually be spent.
April 22, 2008 at 7:14 am · Filed under States
While most people will be focusing their attention today on the Democratic presidential primary in Pennsylvania, the space industry, in particular the entrepreneurial NewSpace sector, will instead be paying attention a special election today in Sierra County, New Mexico. At stake: a quarter-cent increase in the sales tax in the county, with the proceeds going towards the development of Spaceport America, the commercial spaceport planned for southern New Mexico that will be used by Virgin Galactic, among others.
The tax itself will contribute only a tiny fraction of the project’s $198-million cost: about $2.3 million. Yet the election is considered key to the spaceport’s development. A similar tax was narrowly approved a year ago in neighboring, more populous Doña Ana County, which includes the city of Las Cruces. However, because of a provision of state law, the money that the tax would have collected there could not be spent until a spaceport “tax district” is created, and that can’t be done until another county or locality approves the tax. That puts pressure on Sierra County to approve the tax, or else the spaceport will face a funding shortfall of over $50 million. (Officials in a third county, Otero, have stated that they plan their own tax referendum later this year—but only if the tax passes in Sierra County.) “At this point there is not a back-up plan” if the tax fails in Sierra, Steve Landeene, executive director of the New Mexico Spaceport Authority, told the Las Cruces Sun News.
It’s not surprising, then, that spaceport advocates have been putting on a full-court press in the last couple of weeks. Spaceport officials have announced a number of agreements with potential spaceport users, from sounding rocket developer UP Aerospace to aerospace giant Lockheed Martin. New Mexico’s lieutenant governor, Diane Denish, also stumped for the tax in the county last week. The biggest incentive, though, might come from Virgin Galactic, which is offering to take one local resident to space for free each year once they begin operations at the spaceport.
Far and away the largest city in Sierra County is Truth or Consequences. For spaceport advocates, that’s a pretty apt description of what this election represents for them.
April 21, 2008 at 8:54 pm · Filed under Other
Dr. George Nield, who had been the acting associate administrator for commercial space transportation at the FAA since Patti Grace Smith retired in early February, can take “acting” off his job title. Nield was formally named as associate administrator today by (ironically) acting FAA administrator Robert Sturgell. Here’s a quote from Nield in the FAA release:
“This is a very exciting time for those of us working in commercial space transportation,” said Nield. “With the pending retirement of the Space Shuttle, NASA has pledged to use commercial space vehicles to service the International Space Station, and the FAA will license those launches. We are also looking forward to the debut of commercial human spaceflight, with hundreds of flights per year carrying paying passengers to the edge of space. Each of these endeavors will require us to think about new ways of doing business, while continuing to keep public safety as our top priority.”
[Standard disclaimers and disclosures apply. While my employer does work for FAA/AST, I actually first heard about this appointment earlier today from someone outside of that office who found out about it through his grapevine.]
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