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Advice for Giuliani on Space Policy and Politics

My father the presidential election historian thinks that 9/11 is your best head-to-head issue against Clinton. Play this up. In general, hit the main themes of your campaign. View space policy as a highly scrutinized metaphor for the other 99% of your domestic and international policies. Here are some 9/11 talking points.

• Focus on space for visual and signals intelligence to prevent the next 9/11


• GPS as a force multiplier


• Condemn Chinese use of anti-satellite weaponry by China


• Note that the Taiwan straits and the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea are quiet now, but it's possible they will flare up in the next 8 years so we need to build on our military space strengths


• Resurrect Reagan's flair for demonizing the Russians as part of your space platform. As Machiavelli says, "[A freed animal that was] brought up in prison and servitude ... becomes prey to the first one who seeks to enchain it again."


• Advocate awareness about a space 9/11 (don't speak purple prose here--your security firm can brief you) and the ability to cope and quickly recover from such a crisis

Frontier spirit is a traditional Republican (and Democratic) value; sticking to science, technology, the environment and international cooperation when talking about space is a mistake

• Note that space is the new frontier and its inevitable (far) future for expanding the sphere of freedom


• Visit Williamsburg and talk about how Jamestown was settled and how the frontier spirit is alive and well in America and how 400 years from now the Moon and Mars will be settled

Fiscal conservatism is a winning electoral issue (despite it being very bad public policy)

• Endorse some of the Aldridge Commission recommendations, but disclaim those that will implicitly hurt jobs in the states you are intending to win


• Tell NASA that you want them to undertake hard problems (quote Kennedy's Rice speech) and trust the private sector to deliver cargo and people to Earth orbit; note that sometimes the Russians have good ideas we should copy like harnessing capitalism for orbital spaceflight; perhaps do this standing next to Elon Musk and Gov. Arnold on a fund raising trip to LA after you've captured the primaries, but before the general gets into full swing. Musk's factory is next to LAX. Don't put on bunny shoes.


• Talk about working smarter and shrinking NASA through attrition--don't create enemies by firing people

New space gets tons of media coverage and is a feel-good entrepreneurism story

• Make fun of the new race for the next humans to set foot on the Moon and suggest that you'd like to see Google offer a prize to the winner of that race, too (on top of their rover prize). Hinting at privatizing their private billion dollar NASA airstrip and campus boondoggle is unwise. The campaign website might become harder to find on a Google search. Compromise by meeting them in a swing state.


• Praise Bob Bigelow and express interest in the next US space station being leased. Arrange to shake hands with him in Nevada. Don't put on booties.


• Before the general election arrange to shake hands with Burt Rutan in New Mexico


• Envision a time when the President will make 45-minute flights to Tokyo in a later-generation suborbital spacecraft that is as safe as Marine One, the first presidential helicopter in 1957 perhaps with Rutan


• Arrange to shake hands with Peter Diamandis of ZEROG and Space Adventures in Florida at the Cape--don't put on a bunny suit or fly in ZERO G; hard to get only good photos


• Visit Air Force Space Command


• Visit Space Explorers headquarters in Wisconsin, shake hands with George French and talk about the importance of space to motivate kids to learn about science, technology, engineering and math

But don't overdo it.

• Don't spend more than 1-3% of your words or appearances on space issues

Posted by Sam Dinkin at November 14, 2007 12:08 AM

Comments

Mark has a few more comments over at Curmudgeon's Corner: http://curmudgeons.blog spot.com

Posted by Sam Dinkin at November 14, 2007 10:37 AM

Sam: >>Visit Williamsburg and talk about how Jamestown was settled and how the frontier spirit is alive and well in America and how 400 years from now the Moon and Mars will be settled.

Mark: >I'm not sure that people can be made to be very excited about something 400 years from now. I suspect the emphasis should be on things that can happen now and in the near future.

Sam: Seeing the inevitability of settlement changes the issue from an issue of 'whether' to an issue of 'when'. It's also a dig at the Democratic partisans' predictions of the end of humanity. Of course, there are also near term applications that will be thoroughly overemphasized by all campaigns without my advice.

Sam: >>Make fun of the new race for the next humans to set foot on the Moon and suggest that you'd like to see Google offer a prize to the winner of that race, too (on top of their rover prize).

Mark: >Does anyone see a contradiction here? I suggest playing up the race, hinting that the prize is who gets to expand their political and economic system not only to the Moon, but beyond. I'm not sure, also, that tell Google that it should offer a humans to the Moon prize would be very useful. Touting more realistic prizes would be, however.

Sam: I don't expect Mayor Giuliani to publicly back expanded Centennial Challenges. I don't expect Mayor Giuliani to stake political capital on accelerating the return to the Moon. Therefore taking a cheap shot at the media that says there's an Asian space race is a cheap way to score nativist political points (The Space Review talks about this further). It's also in his interest to encourage the private sector to go sooner and completely upstage any prestige value that would result from a foreign landing. This stance is more nuanced than saying it's no big whoop to go back. It's saying it's useful to go sooner than our budget will allow, but only in the realm of private entertainment and private national accomplishment. Like Turner's gift to the UN or Gates's vaccination push. This is especially something to more sincerely and heartily encourage if Musk mounts a private Mars mission or Bigelow a space station constellation.

If Google will be the primary beneficiary of the next Moon landing through increased web traffic, then it makes sense for Google to post the prize to accelerate it.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at November 14, 2007 10:59 AM

Resurrect Reagan's flair for demonizing the Russians

Sam, Ronald Reagan never demonized Russians (or any other ethnic group). In fact, one of the few times he overrode the Secret Service's security advice was to shake hands and meet people in a Russian marketplace.

Had Reagan still been President at the end of Soviet Union, I suspect he would have been one of the very first to come to the aid of the Russian people (and we would likely not have to deal with Putin today).

Posted by Edward Wright at November 14, 2007 12:40 PM

Mark: >I'm not sure that people can be made to be very excited about something 400 years from now. I suspect the emphasis should be on things that can happen now and in the near future.

I guess you're right, Mark. Ronald Reagan used to say stuff like that all the time, and no one was ever excited by him. :-)

Sam: I don't expect Mayor Giuliani to publicly back expanded Centennial Challenges.

Why not? John Kerry did. Prizes don't seem to be an issue that either side of the political spectrum has a problem with.

I doubt it matters, in the end. No one is likely to take Giuliani seriously as a fiscal conservative. If he's the candidate, the conservatives and libertarians will stay home or vote for Ron Paul and the RINOs will see most of their support go to Hillary.

Posted by Edward Wright at November 14, 2007 12:57 PM

Ed,

My mistake. Reagan demonized The Soviets. So Giuliani should not ape Reagan.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at November 14, 2007 01:34 PM

Endorsing Centennial Challenges is not bad policy, just bad use of Giuliani's time. $10 million out of a $2.6 trillion Federal Budget is 4 parts per million.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at November 15, 2007 12:03 AM

Sam has some good points, though I suspect that it all depends on what one thinks the "race" is all about.

Ed, Reagan advocated the destruction of the Soviet Empire in our lifetimes, not 400 years from now. By the way, he succeeded.

Posted by Mark R. Whittington at November 15, 2007 08:57 AM

Ed, Reagan advocated the destruction of the Soviet Empire in our lifetimes, not 400 years from now. By the way, he succeeded.

Mark, are you trolling again?

I did not say Ronald Reagan advocated the destruction of the Soviet Union take place 400 years from now (and I suspect you know that).

Ronald Reagan spoke about many things besides the end of the Soviet Union.

Reagan frequently looked to the future and presented a longterm vision.

Yet, he built the Republican Party into the dominant force in American politics.

There's a lesson there, which of course you will ignore.

Posted by Edward Wright at November 15, 2007 05:37 PM


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