Congress, NASA, White House

Announcement today?

According to the Orlando Sentinel, “the buzz around the White House today is that the NASA press corps should expect a late-in-the-day announcement” that would presumably be the president’s nomination for NASA administrator. If so, the timing would be a bit odd: late in the afternoon before a three-day holiday weekend, with much of official Washington either already on vacation or about to leave to beat the rush. It would not seem to correspond with President Obama’s stated desire to have some “hoopla” about the announcement.

Update 6:45 pm: No announcement today (unless they’re really going to wait until late today, which seems highly unlikely).

In the meantime, though, you can amuse yourself with these items of news or speculation, also from the Sentinel:

13 comments to Announcement today?

  • Major Tom

    Does the Orlando Sentinel even have anyone positioned “around the White House” to pick up “buzz”?

    Now the Sentinel blog states, apparently in reaction to Mr. Foust’s post above, that the announcement won’t be today because of the positioning right before a three-day weekend.

    On the topic of Bolden’s nomination, the Sentinel blog seems like a self-referential do-loop without any real access to White House decisionmakers or staff.

    FWIW…

  • Doug Lassiter

    This comment may be rendered irrelevant by an announcement from the WH, but one might wonder if the “hoopla” that Obama promised with the announcement of an Administrator nominee might depend on the shuttle being safely back on the ground, as it was supposed to be by now. It would go over like a (very, very heavy) lead balloon if the nominee were introduced to the public, followed almost immediately by a shuttle tragedy. So it might be old buzz that the Sentinel was picking up. The safe way would be to make the announcement after STS-125 rolls to a stop, and a complete success.

  • Norm Hartnett

    Yup, that’s my take, the administration is waiting for STS-125. What I’m wondering about is if this tie in is indicative of a possible policy announcement. E.G. is there a possibility that in addition to the appointment of an Administrator will there be an announcement of a Shuttle extension or, conversely, an announcement of final confirmation that the remaining eight missions are all she wrote?

  • Major Tom

    “an announcement of final confirmation that the remaining eight missions are all she wrote?”

    It’s already been confirmed that the remaining ISS assembly manifest plus AMS is all she wrote.

    See the President’s FY 2010 Budget summary for NASA here:

    http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/assets/fy2010_new_era/National_Aeronautics_and_Space_Administration.pdf

    Or NASA’s own FY 2010 budget summary here:

    http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/344612main_Agency_Summary_Final_updates_5_6_09_R2.pdf

    Or Scolese’s testimony here:

    http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/338547main_Oral_Statement.pdf

    FWIW…

  • Norm Hartnett

    I won’t accept the gap, I won’t accept the likely shortfall of logistics to the ISS reducing the crew size, I won’t accept a likely termination of the ISS in 2016, if not sooner, caused by such a shortfall, I won’t accept the gutting of science on the ISS due to the lack of down mass capability, I won’t accept the loss of one of the most capable spacecraft ever built by mankind. I don’t think America will either.

    The OMB does not set national policy.
    The budget summary is just that, a summary without details
    As for Scolese, he is chanting the HQ mantra, I doubt many outside HQ buy into that anymore.

  • Doug Lassiter

    Well, they did it before landing. A bit surprising, but it’s nice to see that the administration isn’t intimidated by how events could unfold.

  • I won’t accept the gap, I won’t accept the likely shortfall of logistics to the ISS reducing the crew size, I won’t accept a likely termination of the ISS in 2016, if not sooner, caused by such a shortfall, I won’t accept the gutting of science on the ISS due to the lack of down mass capability, I won’t accept the loss of one of the most capable spacecraft ever built by mankind. I don’t think America will either.

    What does that mean, you “won’t accept” it? What are you going to do about it?

  • Major Tom

    “The OMB does not set national policy.”

    The budget request to Congress is an articulation of White House/Executive Branch policy. It’s not OMB’s policy — it’s the Obama Administration’s policy.

    “The budget summary is just that, a summary without details”

    Here’s the NASA details in the President’s FY 2010 Budget:

    http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2010/assets/nsa.pdf

    And here’s the detailed NASA FY 2010 Budget:

    http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/345225main_FY_2010_UPDATED_final_5-11-09_with_cover.pdf

    Not surprisingly, the details are consistent with the summaries.

    “As for Scolese, he is chanting the HQ mantra,”

    It’s not the “HQ mantra”. It’s the Obama Administration policy to shut down the Shuttle program after ISS assembly is complete (plus or minus AMS).

    “I doubt many outside HQ buy into that anymore.”

    It doesn’t matter whether the field centers “buy into” shutting down the Shuttle program in 2010. The funds to keep Shuttle flying flow from HQ, not from the field centers.

    “I won’t accept the gap, I won’t accept the likely shortfall of logistics to the ISS reducing the crew size,”

    Barring a miracle from Saint Augustine, there’s little can be done about it now. Such objections should have been raised two to three years ago when ESAS/Constellation started auguring in.

    “I won’t accept a likely termination of the ISS in 2016, if not sooner, caused by such a shortfall,”

    The former has little to do with the latter. Going back to a three-person crew doesn’t force ISS to shut down in 2016.

    “I won’t accept the gutting of science on the ISS due to the lack of down mass capability,”

    ISS science was gutted years ago to fund Ares I/Orion. Dollars, not downmass, are the issue.

    “I won’t accept the loss of one of the most capable spacecraft ever built by mankind.”

    She may be capable in LEO, but she’s horrifically expensive, arguably dangerous, and incapable of supporting exploration beyond LEO.

    FWIW…

  • Chance

    “I won’t accept the loss of one of the most capable spacecraft ever built by mankind.”

    You mean the Soyuz?

  • Norm Hartnett

    @ Rand – Write my Congressmen, write Congressmen on the appropriate committees, write the President, write MG Bolden, write Augustine, write… well you get the idea.

    @ Chance – LOL – I didn’t say most dependable, most flown, most inexpensive, or safest.

    @ Major Tom

    I am not really competent to comment on the internal politics of OMB and the current administration, those who are suggest that things may not be as clear cut as that.

    Tom, as to the relationship between Shuttle operations and the ISS I’d like to point out what happened when SSP was shutdown for three years not so long ago, crew size was reduced to two. There is very little that has changed since then. ATV is hardly going to make up the shortfall in logistics, nor is it likely that Progress will be able to increase it’s flight rate to such an extent. HTV and COTS have not flown and hoping is not a great way to support a $100 billion program. There is reason to believe that even should HTV and COTS meet their goals we would still have a logistics shortfall and reduced crew size. This disregards the complete lack of ability to get large ORUs to the station that none of the existing or proposed vehicles can address except the Shuttle. Loss of the shuttle means loss of the station as soon as something big breaks, no matter the level of logistical support.

  • An orbital tug based at the station could pick up ORUs delivered by EELV.

  • Norm Hartnett

    Yup and a $50 billion dollar budget could buy us the moon, we don’t have that either.

    As Mr. Augustine said we have to work with what we have.

  • Kris Ringwood

    “we have to work with what we have”. Do we? One cursory look at Constellation/ARES proves NASA has not done that! Hopefully Augustine’s “review” will change that. BUT with a Industry hack(Bolden) at the helm @ NASA, I think not. Marking time again…cancellation row…
    In the end :”we’ don’t count.Look what happened to Von Braun once his usefulness reached an end; out to grass…and THERE was a SPACE ADVOCATE! Not much use when the powers-that-be aren’t listening though…

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