On the contrary, by definition, blue-ribbon panels are established to make recommendations _independent_ of political influence and authority. White Houses create blue ribbon panels to get honest answers to difficult questions, not to rubber stamp solutions that an Administration has already selected for a given issue.

If an Administration already has a decision in hand, there’s no reason to pursue a blue-ribbon panel. In fact, creating an blue-ribbon panel just risks getting that decision overturned or brought into question by an independent group over which the Administration has little control.

“When they do validate policy commission members are publicly praised, given press conferences and sent to the Hill to support admin policy. When they don’t do justice to USG policy, all is forgotten.”

Although they have published budgets setting a retirement date for Shuttle, this White House has not released any other formal policy document with respect to NASA’s human space flight programs. There’s no existing “USG policy”, that the Obama White House endorses, for Augustine’s review panel to support (or disagree with).

“In this case does anyone really believe Obama plans on supporting the VSE, either in the moon or Mars direction, and will provide the needed funds?”

On the campaign trail, Obama endorsed the lunar goal. The Obama White House has since inherited a Constellation program with a schedule that is slipping year-for-year, has almost doubled in cost by NASA’s own estimates, is riddled with technical issues, and cannot support a full ISS crew complement until at least 2016. With the Augustine review, the Obama Administration is arguably providing the agency, with some serious adult supervision added to the mix, one last chance to salvage something from the Constellation budget wedge and the VSE. The question of whether that involves civil human space flight goals beyond Earth orbit remains to be seen, and for now, it’s up to the Augustine panel, not the White House.

“Does anyone really believe Nasa gets some new manned mission…”

No one has promised a new civil human space flight program on the campaign trail or since the inauguration. NASA is struggling to finish ISS, doesn’t have a clear path to supporting six ISS crew between 2010 and at least 2016, and can’t put together a coherent post-Shuttle architecture to support the ISS and lunar missions. Another program on top of those was simply never in the cards.

“…requiring more money?

My vote is the Obama administration has a new mission for Nasa requiring less money and its Augustine’s job to see if his Commission can justify it.”

In the FY09 stimulus bill and in its FY10 budget submission to Congress, the Obama Administration already met its campaign commitment to provide an additional $2 billion to NASA. Part of the Augustine panel’s charge is to develop one or more solutions within the budget runout that starts from those increased funding levels.

“IMHO ISS will be the focus of manned missions and the only question in my mind will Augustine recommend Nasa owning a manned launcher. Augustine will be tasked to kill VSE, HLV and in essence return to the 1990’s policy of forbidding Nasa to mention Mars manned missions.”

Given NASA’s repeated fumbling of human exploration initiatives over the past couple decades — first with SEI and now with the VSE and Constellation — could we really blame the Augustine panel if they came to that conclusion? I don’t like it myself, but when tens of billions of taxpayer dollars are at stake, it’s a sensible argument that the agency’s human space flight activities must finish what’s on their plates, and demonstrate a modicum of competence in development programs, before moving on to the next course.

FWIW…

“There are plenty of articles, blog posts, and papers that point out problems with the ESAS-derived approach. However, these are scattered all over the place, as far as I know. Is there any consolidated, organized, quality 1-stop shop for this kind of thing that could be a useful resource? If not, is anyone going to step up to the plate and do it? It would be good if it covered all of the bases – technical, budget, policy, management, distance from VSE letter and intent, etc.”

Does anyone really believe Nasa gets some new manned mission requiring more money?
I personally think that they’ll get the same mission, different plan.

In this case does anyone really believe Obama plans on supporting the VSE, either in the moon or Mars direction, and will provide the needed funds?

Does anyone really believe Nasa gets some new manned mission requiring more money?

My vote is the Obama administration has a new mission for Nasa requiring less money and its Augustine’s job to see if his Commission can justify it. IMHO ISS will be the focus of manned missions and the only question in my mind will Augustine recommend Nasa owning a manned launcher. Augustine will be tasked to kill VSE, HLV and in essence return to the 1990’s policy of forbidding Nasa to mention Mars manned missions.

Edward Crawley:

web.mit.edu/aeroastro/www/people/crawley/bio.html

“Dr. Crawley’s earlier research interests centered on structural dynamics, aeroelasticity and the development of actively controlled and intelligent structures. … Recently, his research has focused on the domain of architecture, design and decision support in complex technical systems that involve economic and stakeholder issues. … In his outreach and public service, Dr. Crawley has served as chairman of the NASA Technology and Commercialization Advisory Committee, and was a member of the NASA Advisory Committee. … In 1993 he was a member of the Presidential Advisory Committee on the Space Station Redesign. He has served on numerous committees of the National Research Council, and recently co-chaired the committee reviewing the NASA Exploration Technology Development Program. … In addition, he has served on the boards and advisory boards of numerous other entrepreneurial ventures. In 2003 he was elected to the Board of Directors of Orbital Sciences Corporation (ORB) …”

esd.mit.edu/symposium/pdfs/monograph/architecture-b.pdf

“The Influence of Architecture in Engineering Systems”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/30/science/30spac.html?_r=3&emc=tnt&tntemail0=y

“The Fight Over NASA’s Future”

“Edward F. Crawley, a senior professor of aeronautics and astronautics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said that the Ares I was not perfect, but that when seen in the context of its use of components from the shuttle program, military systems and the coming Ares V, it was the product of sensible choices. “I don’t have any reason to believe there are major technical issues to block its success,” he said.

Building a new rocket “is a hard thing,” Dr. Crawley said, and initial test flights often end in embarrassment or even disaster because everything in a very complex system has to go right. “It’s one strike and you’re out,” he said. “If you put every day of its development under a microscope, you’ll find plenty of things to write about.”

…

“Dr. Crawley of M.I.T. said he would like to see a panel of “unbiased and wise people” under the new administration weigh NASA’s plans against the alternatives while keeping in mind the broad range of budgetary, workforce and technical issues. “I don’t frankly know what the answer is,” he said, “but I know it’s a lot closer and a lot more complicated answer than the one playing out in the media and the blogs.”

And then, Dr. Crawley said, get on with it. The space program’s $17 billion annual budget is small in comparison with other elements of the nation’s spending. But its payoff, he noted, can be big. If the new president seeks to stimulate the economy with “domestic high-technology jobs that provide stable and rewarding employment,” he said, “space would be a well-placed investment.”

Leroy Chiao is quoted in the same article:

“Leroy Chiao, a retired astronaut who flew three shuttle missions and served aboard the space station, said that the 2004 announcement by Mr. Bush of NASA’s new direction “was a time of great optimism.” Mr. Chiao is not involved with the Constellation project today, but he said it was clear from some of the leaked discussions that “the program has not panned out as I, and the vast majority of people, had hoped.”