Yeah. The facility itself is useless. But it was no small feat of engineering to get it built. One only regrets what could have been built with the same effort.

“Small thinking is what dooms our space program to mediocrity”

Yes, but big missions/projects should not be assumed to also mean big rockets.

“Any of the SLS configurations would serve nicely to transport telescope components and the Orion spacecraft to L2.”

And face the same, if not greater, Shuttle-like criticisms of repair missions that cost about as much as completely replacing the object in question…

“The experience of building ISS has been incredibly hard won. You’d think NASA would want to apply it in a different, more beneficial area like astronomy.”

So you acknowledge that something of value, especially (ahem) in-space assembly experience, came from ISS?

And actually, you have a very good point here. But there’s still that small matter of the cost of transportation to the work site, that can negate all the good you could do, once there…

That is a point against SLS. EELVs can used to do the same thing and for cheaper. NASA can not afford any SLS launched spacecraft

Actually, an example of small thinking that dooms our space program to mediocrity is the idea that one would service JWST out at Earth-Sun L2. It is well understood that moving back and forth from Earth-Sun L2 to an Earth-Moon Lagrange point is propulsively cheap. Why send astronauts out on a several week trip to service it, or endure a ten-second time delay for telerobotics when you can just drive it into the shop close by?

In fact, the large solar shields of JWST do make it pretty challenging to service. They get in the way physically, and make one side cold and the other side warm. You’d need to service both sides — spacecraft and telescope. So take your pick which one will be accessible. Also, unlike Hubble, JWST has no contamination shielding. So anything you do there strongly risks system performance. Whatever side is cold will be especially prone to contamination. Probably the right strategy is to kick off the old solar shields and install new ones after servicing.

There are many credible plans for putting an Orion and service module at Earth-Moon Lagrange points with two ELVs. An SLS might be considered necessary for something else, but it sure isn’t necessary for this. Sure, it would “serve nicely”, but so would other, much more economical strategies.

But I agree that our hard-won expertise on ISS is that doing things in space piecewise really works. That piecewise philosophy can be a sound basis of any construction or servicing plan.

In this case the dinosaur is 100% correct. Every time NASA reports to Congress they’re further behind schedule and there are more overruns in a flagship project like JWST it cuts deep into their credibility with both Congress and the public. All Rohrabacher did was state the blatantly obvious.

“Any of the SLS configurations would serve nicely to transport telescope components and the Orion spacecraft to L2.”

Regardless if they COULD use the SLS, the can’t afford it. Using NASA’s own estimates, the SLS will cost $1.6B/launch, and that’s without averaging in the development costs. In any case the NASA Science directorate has said they have no plans to use the mega-rocket.

“The experience of building ISS has been incredibly hard won. You’d think NASA would want to apply it in a different, more beneficial area like astronomy.”

Yet you don’t want to use those same techniques for boosters, so you don’t have to rely on the same rocket to do everything (get the payload to space and then boost it on it’s way). You are always contradicting yourself.

But what the management team knows is that they have Barbara Mikulski firmly on their side. As long as she’s around, JWST will survive at least by earmarkery. The lesson here is that if you’re going to screw up badly, make sure you have an Appropriations leader on your side.

It’s not only counter-intuitive that several small missions could take the place of one huge mission in delivering most of the JWST science goals, it’s also wrong. Aside from an interferometer, which is from the perspective of technology capability a non-starter for such goals, there is no other way to get the kind of spatial resolution that JWST will offer. No way. Three smaller telescopes won’t do it. Most of the science goals are critically dependent on that spatial resolution. It is true, however, that NASA science has competently cost-managed most of its smaller missions.

Small thinking is what dooms our space program to mediocrity. Any of the SLS configurations would serve nicely to transport telescope components and the Orion spacecraft to L2. The experience of building ISS has been incredibly hard won. You’d think NASA would want to apply it in a different, more beneficial area like astronomy.

Decadal reports used to inform the divisions on the order of what flies over a decade; now it is used only to award a single winner per decade, as anyone not ranked #1 won’t fly till the next Decadal comes out. Indeed, the 2007 Earth Science Decadal highlighted 3 tiers of missions, about 4 missions per tier. By 2017 NASA will have flown SMAP and ICESat-2 from the 4 missions in Tier 1. Nothing else. Pathetic state of affairs.

Replacing the senior managers isn’t going to make a difference in JWST performance, except that it sends a chill down the spine of those remaining. Folks will now be working overtime out to kazoo, weekends, etc. w/o compensation, because everyone knows one more cost over run and JWST is dead – into this kind of environment we will see mistakes creep in – let’s hope they don’t result in failure at L2.

And the last time I checked, Jeff Hanley Cx fame, now is a senior manager on JWST.