Loose Lips Sink Spaceships

November 10, 2008

The prospect of a new president taking office gives NASA one more thing to be wary about -- posers.

“We have also been cautioned by the White House to only deal with those people who have been officially designated as Transition Team members,” writes NASA’s deputy administrator Shana Dale in her blog. “During this time many folks working unique agendas may present themselves as ‘working transition.’ We must be sure that any agency information that is given to transition personnel is given only to those on the official team.”

I'm mostly curious about what NASA thinks it has that is worth stealing: Three, horrendously expensive and not very safe orbiters, circa 1980? A $250 million water-recycling system that will enable astronauts to drink their urine? Perhaps that secret messed up FAA pilots survey NASA did to gauge airline safety.

Heck, even if I knew, rest assured I'd never tell ....

The President of Free Space, Part 3: Hope or Fear

September 24, 2008

Silly me. When I embarked on this project to chase down strings of rationality in the race for the U.S. presidency, using the space program as my fishing reel, I made a bad assumption. I thought rationality MATTERED to all people. You know?  Fact-gathering, logical reasoning, analysis, verification … the processes of science? Please stop chuckling. I know I should have known better.

So forget about the LOGICAL thing to do for NASA, let alone the country. I've realized what counts most in our society is a good story. We love drama. If it was our gross domestic product, we'd have so much money Sarah Palin would be writing us checks from the Treasury, just like they do with oil revenue in Alaska.

Now I know that (supposedly) the most important thing in the universe right now is our national financial situation. The question is what we are going to do about it? What will solve it?

I've learned from NASA that there is really only one way to go about solving a problem. It's called the scientific method, but I'm not really sure if it's being taught in school anymore. It's what got this country to the moon FORTY YEARS before our sisters, Japan, India, China (and I'm sorry if I'm forgetting anyone) had a clue how to do it, much less a program. Our only peer was the Soviet Union and we were scared to death they'd get there first. (They shouldn't have worried. Apparently, all they needed to do was wait until we became diverted, and in exchange for losing the moon race we'd build them a castle in the sky; for I'm told that Russia will be left sole occupant of the $100 billion International Space station unless our elected officials take a break from handling the NATIONAL FINANCIAL EMERGENCY and approve an exemption for NASA to buy rides to the station on Russian Soyuz rockets.  Perhaps that's why NASA's very erudite leader, Michael Griffin, used a most unscientific word in his officially acknowledged leaked email alerting the world to our IMPENDING NATIONAL SPACE CRISIS. He termed its handling a "jihad.")

I don't know if the proposed  $700 billion GREAT GOVERNMENT GIVEAWAY of 2008 is the right thing to do or not. I don't know if time is of the essence. I don't even know how you decide that, but I hope and pray that it is made with some degree of rationality. My Libertarian friends are even kind of exited by the stir, hoping it will rouse the good but sleepy citizens of this land we love to stop watching American Idol and reruns of Gilligan's Island (but by all means, please keep tuning in to Discovery Channel).

In a Democracy, APATHY is a cancer.

No offense intended, but we might want to question the sanity and motivations of John McCain and Barack Obama for wanting to take on this mess. (You too, Bob Barr!) There's no question they have balls: We've seen the pictures, watched the grainy films of handsome, young McCain in the POW camp and we can only imagine. And as far as Obama, well would YOU want to be a black man in America, much less one running for PRESIDENT??

Though I personally haven't given up that rationality will prevail when it comes time to vote, I've realized that that's a pretty high standard. As a steppingstone, I've designed a little quiz to help choose the next president, who as the leader of what we like to call The Free World, will be the President of Free Space, with the potential to galvanize what our space policy -- and our country -- will become.  Open or closed? Driven by fear or hope? Logical or emotional? Privately pioneered or not? Breaking ground or following footsteps? Creative or reactive?

Since I realize this cannot be objective (and frankly I find it a little exhausting trying to figure out which administration would be better for the country, the Big Government Republicans or the Big Government Democrats) I'm basing this quiz on things that matter to me. Ready? Here goes:

Who has the better sense of humor?

Who is smarter?

Who is more tolerant of dissenting views?

Who solicits and loves feedback?

Who can better control his behavior?

Got your candidate?  Good. Oh, one last question, if you don't mind. Does this change your vote?

Carnival of Space - Universe from A to Z

September 04, 2008

Welcome to Carnival of Space No. 69, the Universe from to A-Z. Seatbelts on? Visors down? 3-2-1 blastoff. Have fun!

A is for Aliens and their apparent British invasion,

B is for Breakdown of political persuasion.

C is for Commercial, the new way to space,

D is for Dark Matter, an admittedly acquired taste.

E is for Energy that comes from deep within,

F is for Federation, an alliance of future space kin.

G is for Green, which apparently does exist in space,

H is for History and how to preserve the human race.

I is for Inspirational space art,

J is for Jupiter, where astronomers often start.

K is for Knowledge and some tips to find your way,

L is for Library, which can save a teacher's day.

M is for Mother Star, a collection of solar views,

N is for Next-Generation, a telescope NASA has yet to choose.

O is for Observe and some suggestions to blow your mind,

P is for Party, of the star-watching kind.

Q is for Quantum, though I didn't find anyone writing on this,

R is for Rocky Worlds, as in Earth and her three sis.

S is for Star Trek, and the space show in Las Vegas,

T is for Travels, the Mars probes latest.

U is for Unspotted, which describes our sun in August,

V is for Volcanoes and what that means for Mars rust.

W is for Watch as Cygnus flies above,

X is for eXpedition, a Lewis and Clark tale you'll love.

Y is for Youngsters, their space toys all a'clutter,

and Z is for Zettaflops, carbontubes and exotica I can only mutter.

Happy travels, my friends.

(Did I miss anyone? Please leave comment below. Thanks!)

The President of Free Space, Part 2: Legacy of George Bush

September 02, 2008

The inertia that defines the George Bush presidency may be a blessing for the space program. I’m not saying that facetiously. For all I know, Bush’s passivity (some may say willful blindness) may be a skill he
has honed throughout his life, like a parent practicing patience. The Iraq flak at least should have taught him the dangers of going off half-cocked.

I refer to presidential candidate John McCain’s request for Bush to suspend the shutdown of the space shuttle program, pending further study (post election.) McCain is listening to folks who are 1) scared of losing their jobs; and/or 2) outraged that America, the leader of the free world, the king of off-planet pursuits, will soon be in the unseemly position of depending on foreigners for rides to space.

Personally, if McCain is such a maverick and really concerned that riding in Russian spaceships is poor form, especially with Russia thumping its neighbors, I think he should look into using Chinese spaceships to taxi crews to the space station. I’d bet that would get the Russians attention.

The fact is that unless the military has a secret space plane, or someone in the commercial sector lets loose a fly-pod, there will be five or more years when this country will have no means to launch people into orbit. That’s the price we pay for choices already made. It may be of some consolation to know that the people who FLY the shuttle for a living believe it is in the country’s best interests to let it die. It’s become a Terri Schiavo.

Chances are, the Bush space legacy will be a boon for whoever wins the presidency. All Bush has to do is do nothing and the shuttle shutdown will continue undisturbed. If it gets too uncomfortable in the gap -- the years between the shuttle’s retirement in 2010 and the debut of a replacement ship in 2015 or so -- the new prez can honestly claim it’s not his fault, though the last thing we need in this country is another poster child for victim mentality.

Finally, rather than mooning over the past and trying to delay the inevitable, McCain could rally around space workers who have taken the plunge into new careers and explain how their big brains and disciplined behaviors are now helping businesses create new economic engines to drive this country out of recession. It happened once before after the Apollo program. Obama has been making good use of its progeny to wind McCain’s clock. It’s called the digital revolution.

The President of Free Space, Part 1

(George Bush waves good-bye to a television picture of astronauts in orbit after a congratulatory phone call. White House photo by Paul Morse.)

The President of Free Space, Part 1

August 29, 2008

I’m not a gambling lady, but if I had to pick right now, I’d say the Democrats just lost the election. Now, don’t get me wrong -- I’m a registered Democrat, which I’m assuming is OK for you to know even though (especially?) because I’m a reporter and have had it drilled into my head by the hard-core teachers at the Medill School of Journalism (a sort of Hogwarts for reporters-in-training) who implored their protégés to live an objective, detached life, particularly in the political arena, for professional integrity.

Thirty years have passed since I set foot in the door and I’ve decided it’s OK to shed the cloak for a higher calling. I’ll tell you straight up what happened: While my son plowed through Tess of the d’Urbervilles for his high school IB English Class, I entered the world of Ayn Rand with my first reading of Atlas Shrugged.

If you haven’t read the book, it’s not going to help you much to read the Cliffs Notes , or Wiki report. Like sex, or watching rockets launch , you just have to experience it. I’d be happy to give you a book report on it another time, but suffice it to say it’s a POWERFUL portrayal of what happens when rationality and scientific processes break down.

Now back to the story of the day -- John McCain’s selection of 44-year-old Sarah Palin of Alaska to be his running mate.

First off, if the Republicans want to absolutely STOMP the Democrats, they would cancel the upcoming convention in Minnesota, or at least scale it way back and donate the money to any one of a billion worthwhile causes. That will show they have a heart, which is mostly what folks hold against the party. The Democrats, on the other hand, have always won my vote, though the candidates sometimes seem to lack a brain, because they positively ooze with compassion, empathy and those highly valued Judeo-Christian attributes of caring for those who can’t care for themselves. Besides, what’s the convention going to accomplish that hasn’t already happened?

Rational thought, the foundation of science, the reason why there are rovers scratching the sand on Mars today, has been largely absent from the American political scene, and perhaps the American way of life for a long time now. Institutions created to solve specific problems, became incarnated (think FDR’s New Deal and LBJ’s Great Society) and never went away. That’s what NASA is fighting now. Its leaders know the agency needs to dematerialize, shed its expensive and deadly shuttle program, and return to its core roots of space exploration. (You can read here what administrator Michael Griffin and others have to say on this subject.) Will they be successful? Who knows.

McCain’s selection of Palin brought the Republicans to the Democrats’ dinner table. She diversifies the ticket; she’s easy on the eye; she’s even a former reporter. What’s not to like? The only team that would have been more attractive would have been if Barack Obama had picked her.

So now that the beauty and ethnic portions of the presidential contest are over, let’s move on to a discussion of substance: Free Space will explore in the coming two months the single issue of space exploration as a window into how the candidates view the world. It's not about what they say or what they promise, but about their processes (or lack thereof) and whether they are rational, i.e. scientific, or based on emotions.

You could take any topic -- education, business, foreign policy -- and do the same, but I happen to know a lot about space and I happen to believe it’s cool and important. Plus, for you (us) nationalists, it's just about the only major enterprise where America still reigns supreme.

We talk a lot about freedom in this country, criticize its absence abroad, but do we really practice it? As a Democrat who has taken a sharp turn to the right, I’m often as confused as anyone about the road ahead. We often cannot pick our path, but we can choose our travel partners. I pick my old J-school buddies, Morality and Integrity, and invite you to journey with us on a scientific quest to illuminate the meaning of free space. I'd prefer to not do this in a vacuum (pardon the pun) so please use your hands or whatever tools you use to communicate these days, and be generous with feedback.

McCain, Obama Weigh in on Space

August 18, 2008

The highway to space cuts across dozens of districts but few are more vested in America’s off-planet endeavors than central Florida, home to the Kennedy Space Center, the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station and blueprints for a state-run commercial space zone.

Perhaps that’s why after visits to the area last week both John McCain and Barack Obama released statements clarifying their visions for space exploration. If you’re looking for an issue that delineates some of the differences between the presidential candidates, keep looking: Both McCain and Obama advocate a strong civilian space program and agree with the current administration’s plan to retire the space shuttles and develop a new family of boosters and capsules under a program NASA calls Constellation.

Obama gets into a bit more detail than his Republican rival, calling for at least one more space shuttle flight beyond the 10 already on the books. This presumably would be used to fly an internationally developed physics instrument called the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, which has been spearheaded by a Nobel Prize-winning physicist from MIT named Samuel Ting.

Both candidates talk about closing the five-year gap between the shuttles’ retirement and the debut flights of the new ship when the United States will be without means to launch people into orbit. Neither, however, detail how to pay for keeping the shuttle flying beyond 2010 while still maintaining or even increasing funding for its replacement.

Obama also mentions a new role for NASA -- leading efforts to break the country’s dependence on foreign energy sources. He also plans to revive a top-level space advisory group to “oversee a comprehensive and integrated strategy and policy dealing with all aspects of the government’s space-related programs, including those being managed by NASA, the Department of Defense, the National Reconnaissance Office, the Commerce Department, the Transportation Department, and other federal agencies.”

McCain may be fleshing out his plans after a pow-wow on Monday at Brevard Community College in Cocoa, Fla., with aerospace executives and regional economic development advisors trying to find ways to offset the thousands of job cuts expected as the shuttle program winds down.

Here’s hoping someone has some ideas besides asking our broke Uncle Sam if he can spare another few hundred million or so.

Click here to read Obama’s plan and here for McCain’s.