Mark Whittington’s Tourette’s Syndrome

Isn’t it amusingly stupid how he is unable to write the phrase “commercial crew” without using the word “subsidy”?

What’s funniest of all, of course, is that he seems to actually believe that space policy will be a significant, or even debated issue in this election.

[Afternoon update]

Awwwww, isn’t that cute? Mark still fantasizes both that I have a “chain,” and that I ever “leap the length” of it. It seems to be one of his favorite expressions. That’s the autism, rather than the Tourette’s.

[Update on Tuesday morning]

I know what metaphors are, Mark. I was simply pointing out that your attempt at it was insane, and bore no resemblance to reality.

36 thoughts on “Mark Whittington’s Tourette’s Syndrome”

  1. I wonder if Mark (when speaking to people in real like) says that subsidizes his local grocery store, or if he just calls it “buying milk”.

  2. Gak. Followed the link and just…gak. A festival of conventional wisdom wrapped in cliche.
    To comment on the economics and/or enabling technology of space ventures, it would help if one actually had *some* grasp of economics or technology.

    Anyone have a feel for how many times he’s criticized the “internet rocketeer’s club” since Dragon made it to orbit…twice?

  3. And its amazing how you keep misusing clearly defined economic terms to push your agenda forward. I guess its the only why to deal with your cognitive dissonance of being a “free marker” demanding government markets for New Space 🙂

    1. I have never demanded government markets for New Space. I have demanded, as a taxpayer and space enthusiast, that the government stop spending money on space in such a pointless and stupid manner.

      1. Rand,

        [[[I have demanded, as a taxpayer and space enthusiast, that the government stop spending money on space in such a pointless and stupid manner.]]]

        Which is creating a government market (ISS) for New Space firms… A Rose by any other name.

          1. Rand,

            Are you sure you are an engineer? You are sounding more and more like a political operative 🙂

        1. Which is creating a government market (ISS) for New Space firms… A Rose by any other name.

          No, the market would exist in any case. ISS is already in orbit and requires resupply.

          You simply prefer the resupply be controlled by a Lockheed monopoly (or a Lockheed-RusCosmos duopoly) rather than allowing SpaceX, Boeing, and Sierra Nevada to compete.

          And for all your complaining about subsidies, the billions spent on subsidies for Orion and SLS don’t seem to bother you at all.

          I can’t wait for you to explain how US government funding for an International Lunar Development Corporation would not be a subsidy.

          And I still don’t see you advocating any policy that would help suborbital companies, which you claim to support — but never seem to support.

          1. Edward,

            You are the one that seems to think subsidies are evil. Otherwise you would admit that COTS/CCCDev/CCP/CCiCap/What ever it is today is a subsidy. That is all I am asking of space advocates like you, to fess up and be honest that the program you are advocating is a subsidy instead of trying to pretend its not for ideological reasons. If a policy idea is good why to you have to lie about it?

  4. Regardless of the larger point, both COTS and CCiCAP actually do meet the dictionary definition of the word “subsidy”.
    Not that there is anything fundamentally wrong with subsidizing some industries.

    1. But Mark seems to imagine that it’s a bad thing, at least when it comes to enabling cost-effective space activities, and that he must emphasize it at every opportunity, and even those where it doesn’t exist. If one considers all subsidies equal, than there is no useful way to distinguish between propping up sugar prices, which serves no government purpose, and (for example) the Civil Reserve Air Fleet.

      1. It is a bad thing in the sense that it picks winners and losers and that there seems to be little or no effort to create private markets for these so-called “private” spaceships. I thought that free market folks were against that sort of thing.

          1. Markets require BOTH demand and supply, buyers and sellers. So no, the private HSF markets don’t exist yet, but there is evidence that there will be demand for private HSF if the providers emerge to supply it at the proper price points.

          2. Tom, what makes you think sellers don’t exist?

            How do you think astronauts get to ISS right now? You don’t think the Russians give away Soyuz rides, do you?

          3. Edward,

            I am glad you recognize that supply (sellers) does exist today. And if that is the case why is the U.S. government spending billions on COTS/CCDev/CCP/CCiCap/what ever it is called today? The only reason I hear is to have American alternatives, in which case it is a classic subsidy to create a domestic industry for political reasons.

          4. Fine, Tom. Make your case for a Russian monopoly on human access to orbit. Get Mark Whittington to write it up for you and your friend Harry Reid to pass it into law.

            Then you can ask Congress to appropriate $100 billion for your International Lunar Development Corporation.

            What are you waiting for? You keep telling us how politically savvy you are.

            Could it be that no one in Washington takes you seriously, any more than we do?

          5. Edward,

            You and the Space Frontier Foundation (SFF) advocates think Washington is the answer to building a space faring society, not me. I see Washington as the core of the problem, along with groups like the SFF whose entire financial existence is based on playing Washington politics and empowering NASA by acting like its the critical path to opening up space for development.

            So why would I waste time on Washington space advocacy and politics, or donating money to groups that waste the money on Washington politics? Why do you think I don’t waste my time and money going to space advocacy conferences anymore? But they are a complete waste of money and effort.

            As for the Russian “monopoly” on ISS. Who cares? The ISS is a White Elephant, the very symbol of what happens when “commercial space” advocates look to NASA to lead them to a space faring society. The sooner it is splashed into the Pacific the sooner real space commerce will be able to move forward without the “dual dependent monopoly” of NASA and SFF blocking its development.

            So tell me, why would anyone who truly believes in the commercial development of space advocate for promising space firms like SpaceX to be pulled into the NASA tar baby? And for them to be transformed into new space contractors instead of firms built around serving commercial markets with commercial products?

            Ten years ago I was at the Churchill Club event when Elon Musk announced SpaceX before it was pulled in by the NASA tar baby. It is sad to see how it has drifted from the clear vision he had then into what it is today. Ten years ago Elon Musk would have gone to Silicon Valley to fund Red Dragon and flown it at the next Mars opportunity, not be begging NASA for the money and waiting to fly it on NASA’s schedule. Is really sad to see SpaceX on the same downhill spiral as Orbital Science followed to its present position.

            It should also be noted that the Congressional founders of NASA recognized its limitations especially in terms of commercialization, that is why Comsat was created to develop the communication satellite industry. In the 50 years since it was formed it created a $200 billion dollar space commerce industry driven by markets, not Washington. And when it served its purpose it faded away instead of staying in the way as NASA has and will.

            Now I don’t know about your twisted thinking after decades of hanging out with space advocates, but that strikes me as a success story of how the government properly used subsidies and risk reduction to create an industry that transformed the world, and then faded out of the picture. Just as DARPA/NSF did with the Internet. But stick to your Apollo based beliefs that somehow NASA, by some miracle, will somehow use ISS to create a new industry, a approach that has failed repeatably over the last 40 years.

  5. Websters definition of a subsidy: “a grant by a government to a private person or company to assist an enterprise deemed advantageous to the public.” I fail to see why this is so hard for the Internet Rocketeer Club to understand.

      1. That’s the root of the issue. Mark sees the money given by NASA to SpaceX (in particular, but the other partners too) as a “gift” whereas you do not.

        Mark, please make the case that it is a gift.

        Rand, please make the case that it is not.

        We’ll decide who won.

        1. I’m sure you all saw Doug post these, but NASA will pay $80M this month to SpaceX and $50M to Boeing to hold a bunch of meetings for CCiCAP milestones.

          Call these what you will, but for a lack of a better term and my poor command of the english language, until informed otherwise i will use the word “grant”.

          I’m not sure what the big deal is about calling the spade a spade in this case. And wrt Whittington, even a broken clock is right twice a day. If its not one of these newfangled digital watches of course ..

    1. ULA is a better example of a subsidy. Boeing and Lockheed not only got money to develop their Delta IV and Atlas V boosters, they get money each year to keep producing them over and above the cost of the vehicles themselves.

      This recent NASA move was closer to a downselect than a subsidy. By way of comparison, when the Air Force wanted to purchase the Advanced Tactical Fighter back in the 1980s, it issued a set of specifications. Eventually, they downselected the various proposals to have Lockheed and Northrop-Grumman develop prototypes (YF-22 and YF-23 respectively). Eventually, Lockheed (“Overruns-R-Us”) won the production contract.

      NASA looked at the various proposals for commercial crew and downselected to three providers for additional funding. Even better than most previous procurements, they only get paid for meeting specific contract objectives. This is a vast difference from the cost-plus contracts used to such ill effect in the past. If they don’t meet the objectives, they don’t get paid. That isn’t a subsidy any more than the DoD buying petroleum products from the oil companies is a subsidy.

      1. Larry,

        Yes, ULA is a subsidy, just as COTS/CCDev/CCP/CCiCap is. Government subsidies have been key to developing many industries, so there is nothing evil about them. Which is why I find its amusing New Space advocates like Rand go to such lengths to avoid using the word.

        1. In the case of ULA, they’re getting about a billion dollars a year whether they launch anything or not. SpaceX and the other companies don’t get anything like that.

        2. Tom, you need to look up the term “progress payment.”

          When buying expensive items, it’s quite common for a buyer to provide partial payments along the way to help finance the project.

          You may consider this to be Politically Incorrect, but it is common practice for jet airliners, communication satellites, launch vehicles, etc. If you’re the first customer for a new satellite bus, for example, your payments help to finance its development.

          This is a little different, because a satellite buyer doesn’t usually demand test flights first, but it’s similar in concept.

          As a taxpayer, I would prefer that the contracts be strictly “pay on delivery,” but that isn’t practical with items as expensive as launch vehicles and a customer as undependable as the US government. No one would be willing to take the risk.

          I’m petty sure Russia gets progress payments for Soyuz and Progress flights, so I wonder why you and Mark don’t whine about those “subsidies.”

          1. Edward,

            I am not whining about the subsidy. They are a useful tool for economic development. I just want folks like you to be honest and admit that what it is instead of pretending its not. You are the one with a problem with subsidies it seems since you go to such great lengths to avoid admitting the truth.

    2. Mark,
      I work for a company (Tri-Tech USA in Liberty SC) that builds mobile kitchens for the US Army. We are paid to build those kitchens. Not a subsidy, not a grant, not corporate welfare, just payment for goods and services.

      Just like SpaceX.

      If you are too dense to understand that then there is no hope for you.

      1. Cecil,

        The difference is that SpaceX was paid to develop and demonstrate the technology needed to build its rockets. That is why COTS is a subsidy and CRS is not.

        1. Fronting research and development money to a company that is building something for you is not a subsidy. Again to use my own experience as an example, we had a large project to build for a commercial customer and we demanded 50% of the money up front, were we asking for a subsidy? No, we were not. NASA wanted a spacecraft / launch vehicle to service ISS. SpaceX was planning to build the Falcon 9 and Dragon anyway but to meet NASA’s timeline they needed more money faster, NASA fronted them the money. That isn’t a subsidy; that is payment for goods and services.

          1. Again, that is the same way communication satellites are financed. No one calls progress payments subsidies except for Tom and Mark — and, then, only when it suits their political agenda.

          2. Cecil,

            Let me provide a clearer analogy.

            When my grand kids need money I just don’t give it to them. They have to write book reports to earn it. Reports on classic books I select by authors like Jules Verne, Rudyard Kipling, Mark Twain, Robert Heinlein, etc. Now I don’t need to know what is in those books, I have read them all years ago. But its a way to make them feel they are not getting a handout but earning the money.

            COTS is the same thing, SpaceX, Orbital Sciences, RpK, all getting money for the work they needed to do anyway to be a supplier to the commercial market. Like the money I give to my grandchildren its basically a gift but with some “make work” to make it seem like something else.

            The COTS program is not an upfront payment as they are not delivering any real product, just test flights and paper work. And NASA is not getting any break on launch prices as they would if these really were up front payments. In fact, SpaceX and Orbital Sciences didn’t even have any obligation under COTS to service ISS, that is why a separate CRS contract was done by NASA. The same is true for commercial crew. SpaceX could get a billion under the program and never have any obligation to transport a single astronaut to the ISS or to give NASA a price break on doing so.

            Now I assume in your case of an upfront payment, if after developing the technology you decided not to supply them that firm would have demanded their money back, and probably damages as well. That is how most contracts for up front payments work. And I would not be surprised that in return they expected a price break on the products you produced for them over the price to competitors, and priority in the production schedule. In short, they want their up front payment paid back in some form. By contrast everything I read on commercial crew is expecting that SpaceX will be charging commercial customers less then NASA for the same service. Again, the mark of a subsidy.

            So no, the spin that its only an upfront payment doesn’t fly. The emperor is still naked. Its just a pity that his supporters, like the supporters of COTS et al are not honest enough to admit it.

  6. I’m gonna go out on a limb here, and say that I get the distinct impression that Rand doesn’t think much of Mark Whittington.

    Call me crazy, but I have a sense about these things…

    1. Sometimes I imagine them sitting at the bar during some conference giggling like school girls and talking about trolling their readers. Me thinks they doth protest too much…

      1. Whittington has readers ? Wait, he does post his inane stuff on Slashdot to a large audience alarmingly often.

  7. TM, I’m just going hit on only a couple of things here because it is obvious that arguing this with you is like beating ones head against a wall.

    “.. SpaceX, Orbital Sciences, RpK, all getting money for the work they needed to do anyway to be a supplier to the commercial market.”

    As I already stated, the money from NASA was in order to facilitate the recipients (SpaceX at least) to accomplish what they were going to do anyway but at a quicker pace. If I were planning to build a facility to start producing widgets within 5 years but there was a company in desperate need of widgets next year that company might front me the money to build my widget facility sooner, and in doing so it would not be a subsidy. It would simply be a payment for a product the consumer needed.

    “The COTS program is not an upfront payment as they are not delivering any real product, just test flights and paper work.”

    If the customer says that test flights and paper work are necessary then test flights and paper work ARE part of the product. Back to my own experience, when a customer has certain test criteria that a product must meet the cost of that testing is figured into our quotations process and that customer pays for the testing procedures. Likewise test flights and paperwork are required by NASA, SpaceX is conducting the tests and completing the paperwork and NASA is paying for it. It’s simple goods and services once again.

    The only way for this to be difficult to understand is if you willfully make it so.

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