By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 30 at 6:55 am ET A couple of developments last week certainly were not helpful to the image of NASA and administrator Mike Griffin. On Friday the Washington Post reported that Congressman Brad Miller claimed that NASA destroyed evidence when it reportedly destroyed a videotape of a meeting between Griffin and embattled inspector general Robert Cobb. This development came a day after a front-page story in the Post reported that officials with NASA and many other federal agencies attended “political briefings” with White House officials prior to the midterm election. One person went so far as to forward me an email from a mailing list with the subject line “Mike Griffin in trouble?”
The answer is probably not, at least not over this. As both the Post story and one Saturday in Florida Today reported, the meeting was not a one-on-one affair between Griffin and Cobb but one that involved “something approaching” 200 people that was not planned to be taped in the first place to allow a freer flow of discussion, so the general counsel advised that the tape be destroyed. As for the political briefings, the results of the November election proved just how useful they were to the White House.
The IG issue, though, won’t be going away any time soon: a hearing on the investigation into Cobb and his work is planned for next week. The danger is that it will be a distraction to members of Congress who should focus instead on appropriate levels of funding for the space agency, both overall and among its various programs, and the state of its work carrying out the Vision for Space Exploration.
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 30 at 6:39 am ET This blog uses an automated system to catch comment spam before it can be posted. It works very well, but on occasion can be a little overzealous. If you submit a comment and it doesn’t show up, send me a note and I’ll see if it got caught for some reason by the spam filter, and if so, get it posted.
On another topic: a lot of people post comments here using pseudonyms. By and large such comments are informative and engaging, and add to the discussion. Unfortunately, I’ve noticed in the last week comments from some people hiding behind screen names that involve pejorative language. That is certainly not acceptable. If it continues, I’ll look into taking additional steps to improve the level of discussion (though moderation, IP-banning, etc.) If you can’t resist taking a cheap shot against someone (versus someone’s idea), please post elsewhere. Thanks for your anticipated cooperation.
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 26 at 7:11 am ET It seems a little cottage industry is forming in the area of reviews of US military space programs. The Defense Department is planning an outside review of its military space programs, the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) reported today. The panel, the article notes, will be the third such review in five years. This panel, though, will have a broader scope than previous ones, including a review of overall space policy and the relationship between the defense and intelligence communities. The review is supposed to be complete by the end of the year although the Pentagon is still deciding who should serve on the panel.
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 26 at 7:03 am ET The Huntsville Times reports that NASA will keep the robotic lunar exploration office at MSFC open while it reevaluates its plan to close the office. A temporary victory, at the very least, for Sen. Richard Shelby and other allies of the office. However, even if the office remains open in the long term, there are still the questions of where else NASA will cut to make up the $20 million is planned on saving on keep the office open, as well as just what the office will do, since NASA isn’t planning any follow-ons for the foreseeable future to LRO/LCROSS.
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 25 at 6:50 am ET The Commerce, Justice, and Science subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee held a hearing yesterday that included some discussion of NASA funding (you can be excused if you didn’t hear about it, since there were no details about the hearing released on the subcommittee’s web site). One person who did testify was Planetary Society executive director Lou Friedman, who argued, to no one’s surprise, that NASA funding cuts had “distorted” the Vision for Space Exploration: “Its mantra, ‘go as you pay,’ has become ‘go as you cannibalize other programs.’ Its scientific underpinnings have been removed, leaving it suspended with uncertain public support and public interest.” Friedman calls for increased NASA funding to “restore the Vision’s scientific underpinnings”. “If such a realistic budget increase is impossible, then the Vision’s timetable should be stretched.”
Meanwhile, the Huntsville Times reports that one member of the subcommittee is asking for more money for NASA. Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-AL) sent a letter to the chairman and ranking member of the subcommittee “asking for serious consideration to a NASA budget shortfall of about $500 million.” Aderholt, whose district is just south of Huntsville, is concerned in particular about support for Marshall’s Ares 1 and lunar exploration programs.
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 23 at 7:48 am ET About a week and a half ago I noted here that some were concerned with NASA’s decision earlier this month to sign a contract with Roskosmos for ISS resupply through 2011, including both Progress cargo and Soyuz crew missions. Their concern was with mixed messages or a lack of confidence that NASA appeared to be showing in the two companies with COTS demonstration contracts, Rocketplane and SpaceX.
Now there’s word that those concerns may have adverse consequences for the industry. An an email sent out very late last night (or very early this morning, depending on your point of view) by space consultant Charles Lurio warns that the NASA-Roskosmos contract could deal a fatal blow to one company by reducing the market for resupply services, and thus the potential revenue available to the company. “My primary informant stated that within weeks (or at best a few months) this will likely directly lead to the collapse of one of the COTS winners due to the loss of ability to close the business case for needed private capital,” he writes. Lurio doesn’t say which company is at risk, but Rocketplane had been working for months to line up private funding to supplement its COTS award, while SpaceX appears to relying for now on founder Elon Musk’s pocketbook. (Lurio adds that “the other winner may not be as immanently [sic] vulnerable, but still has limits to how far it can go without a firm initial market.) Such a failure, Lurio warns, would be “a body blow to a big part of the ‘New Space’ enterprise,” an assessment that’s hard to disagree with, regardless of the exact nature of the current situation facing one or both of the COTS companies.
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 21 at 11:16 am ET The Huntsville Times reports that Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) and NASA administrator are still at odds over plans to close the robotic lunar exploration office at MSFC, a dispute that had Shelby saying earlier in the week that he was counting down the days until Griffin left office. Shelby told the newspaper Thursday, regarding Griffin:
He had some sharp words for me… I just responded to what he said. I can work with Mike Griffin. I’ve worked with people in the past, and will in the future. don’t think Mike Griffin wants to work with me, though. (Rep. Bud) Cramer and (Sen. Jeff) Sessions and I will be here long after Mike Griffin is gone, and we will work with the next person to support NASA and Marshall.
As for the office itself? It remains open, but NASA is proceeding with plans to close it, according to a spokesman.
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 20 at 7:15 am ET Last month Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) announced that it was “time for space summit with the President” to discuss the future of the exploration effort and NASA in general. There has been little overt signs of progress on such an effort, but yesterday House Science and Technology Committee chairman Bart Gordon and space subcommittee chairman Mark Udall sent a letter to the president calling for a meeting between him and members of Congress regarding NASA. The letter argues that the rhetoric coming out of the White House on competitiveness, aeronautics, and exploration don’t match the funding that has been requested by the administration. While Gordon and Udall don’t specifically use Mikulski’s word, “summit”, they do write, “We echo the views of other members of Congress who have expressed their interest in meeting with you on this important matter, and we hope that there will be the opportunity for all of us to meet with you in the near future to discuss how best to realize our common goals.”
While Gordon and Udall were the only signatories on that letter, Rep. Dave Weldon (R-FL) announced Thursday that he had joined a “bipartisan group of lawmakers” calling for a meeting with the president on NASA budget. However, Weldon’s press release had more of an edge, criticizing members of Congress who called for the summit while, a couple months ago, voting for a budget resolution “that raided NASA’s budget and gutted the manned-space initiative.” Weldon: “[I]t seems a little disingenuous to write a letter expressing concern about NASA’s lack of resources, when you’re voting for budgets that cut NASA funding.” (Nitpickers may note that the budget didn’t strictly cut NASA’s budget, but instead failed to provide the agency with the increase it expected for FY07.) Weldon said that without a commitment by “Democratic leaders” in Congress to increase NASA’s budget, the letter “will be nothing more than a PR stunt to distract voters’ attention from their vote to cut NASA.” That assumes, of course, that voters have been paying any attention at all on this subject…
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 18 at 12:58 pm ET Another Alabama newspaper, the Birmingham News, reported today that NASA was backing off on plans to close the robotic lunar exploration program office at MSFC. This came after Sen. Richard Shelby
(R-AL) had some less-than-complimentary things to say about NASA administrator Mike Griffin Tuesday morning: “We have been working together up until now. We’re not doing so well at the moment… I’m counting the days, one year and eight-and-a-half months and we’ll have a new administrator.” Ouch…
By Jeff Foust on 2007 April 18 at 12:23 pm ET Today’s Huntsville Times reports on a speech given by Sen. Barbara Mikulski yesterday to a delegation of business leaders from north Alabama. Mikulski talks first about supporting the robotic lunar program office at NASA MSFC, which she and others have asked NASA not to close, as well as the other exploration-related work going on at the center. “We know if it’s made in Huntsville, we can count on it. We want to make sure we keep (space travel plans) on time and on schedule.”
Harmless stuff, so far. Then, however, she says the exploration program is essential to national security: “China also wants to go to the moon, and they want the moon to become a military base in space… We’ve got to get back to the moon first and be able to stay there. The nation’s investment in space should be one of our top national security priorities.” It’s one thing to say that China is “racing” the US to the Moon: while debatable, one can find some evidence to support such a claim. However, to assert that China want to turn the Moon into “a military base in space” goes a bit beyond the pale: not only is there no evidence (that I’m aware of) for such plans, it wouldn’t make much sense in the first place, unless your military thinking is stuck in the 1950s.
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