Category Archives: Political Commentary

Business, Political Commentary, Space

COTS Panel

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Here are the notes I took an hour or so again, when I had power and could see the show, but no Internet.

Alan Lindenmoyer of NASA speaks first. Established program three years ago: Invest to get safe reliable access to LEO and to create a market environment in which the providers were available for both government and commercial customers. SpaceX has achieved 14 of 22 objectives and NASA has paid out $234M, next milestone is to demonstrate rendezvous with a system to be launched on a Shuttle mission. Looking to first Falcon 9 demo launch later this year (Elon said at lunch that the launch had been delayed from August to late 2009).

Orbital is valued up to $170, they’ve completed eight milestones to date, and a hundred million has been paid out. Next milestone is CDR for pressurized cargo module in July. Important transition year for administration (White House) and NASA. Showing video of progress on COTS program. NASA not dictating design solutions, just program objectives. “Have need, seed money, technical expertise, and put together with capable providers, have the basis for a successful program.” Includes a PR segment from Orbital (“98% success rate in space missions over the last seven years” — I wonder what happened before that…?). Using components from existing vehicles to build COTS system. Now another one from SpaceX.

Do not confuse current COTS and additional funding from stimulus with COTS D. That will require much more money. Initial goals are just to ensure safety of ISS and of crew members. Working to best communicate crew safety requirements from NASA to new players.

OSC speaker: Head of COTS demonstration and follow-on phase for cargo resupply, and working both in parallel. Orbiter not stranger to development of commercial space systems, build satellites but also uses data buying approaches. Developing Taurus II with their own funds and leveraging money from COTS to provide end-to-end system, from ground through ISS delivery. Giving an overview of Taurus launch vehicle, and now discussing the Cygnus “visiting vehicle.” Has to have high reliability avionics, and essentially as reliable as an airliner to come into proximity of the station. It berths using the ISS arm. Describing standardized cargo bags that NASA has developed for ISS logistics. They have hired Carl Walz, ISS veteran, to help them with the program. Need for cargo supplies expanding with crew of six. They hope to help to support that need.

Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX: Praising NASA program office for ease of working with them. Proposed three demo flight: Dragon into orbit and back, Dragon approach ISS, Dragon dock with ISS. Showing pictures of new Hawthorne CA facility, current manifest. Describing Falcon 9, with its propulsion redundancy. First vehicle with this capability since Saturn, and it was used on Saturn to save crew. Think that it’s a valuable feature. They expect to be building more engines than any other entity in history shortly. Showing “tic tack toe” back end of the Falcon 9. NASA saw these multiple engines as the biggest risk. They have snuck up on engine testing incrementally, and did a full nine-engine test in November 2008. Using Launch Complex 40, former Titan IV pad at the Cape. They have tested ground support by erecting and taking down the vehicle on the pad. Still working range integration issues. Dragon undergoing structural qualification (pushed and pulled on it). Hadn’t anticipated building their own heat shield but that’s how it ended up. Developed material with NASA Ames. Propulsion uses “Draco” thrusters, using MMH/N204. Designed, built and qualified thrusters in less than two years.

They’re designing Dragon to be reusable and recoverable, but NASA wants new ones each time, so they’re looking for customers for used ones, called “Dragonlab.” Useful for orbital research.

Question: Why does NASA not turn on COTS D. Lindenmoyer: no funding appropriated. Option negotiated with SpaceX for $380M, but don’t have the money.

Question: Once COTS D is operational, is there a need for Orion and Ares 1 to support ISS? Lindenmoyer: They are complementary capabilities, and Ares and Orion are designed for lunar missions. It is designed for ISS capability, but they’d prefer to divert resources needed for LEO system to the moon.

Business, Political Commentary, Space

Kosmas And ITAR

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“Bob-1” asked in comments whether I talked to Congresswoman Kosmas yesterday about ITAR. In fact I did. She seemed aware of the issue, or at least the word. I pointed out (in light of her praise of entrepreneurship) that it was actually a much bigger problem for the smaller companies and startups, because the big ones have staff dedicated to deal with it, and can factor it into their costs for government reimbursement, but for those small companies without such in-house expertise and not on the government cost-plus dole, it represents a formidable barrier to entry, and one that the big players don’t necessarily mind. I don’t think that she had heard this argument before, and seemed interested. She told me to talk to her staffer (who was with her) next time I was in DC. Of course, I don’t know when that will be, but if anyone else out there wants to talk to the staffer, the Congresswoman seemed supportive.

Political Commentary, Space

Suzanne Kosmas

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OK, I said I was signing off, but in a surprise, the local congresswoman is giving a brief talk.

Excited to be the newly elected congressperson from Florida 20th (the Cape), lives in New Smyrna Beach, and has watched Shuttles for years. Wants to bring other congress members down to share the enthusiasm. On the science committee not because she knows about science but because of her passion for space. Entrepreneurship demonstrated here is an important component to keeping America the premiere nation for space, and there is great synergism with the Florida entertainment industry. As a long-time business owner, thinks thatus her two-year-old son will be a customer. Bought an astronaut suit at the Dulles museum, and he fell in love with it, and now says “My shuttle, my shuttle,” since seeing the launch live. Sees partnership with private enterprise and entrepreneurship as being key. Says that commercial space is important to Senator Nelson as well, and wants to be partners with the people at this summit at the federal level, helping with regulatory issues, and looks forward to working with us.

It was a quick speech, and it looked like it was without notes and she made no news, but it was encouraging. We’re about to go to a reception with her and everyone else, where I may ask her a question or two. I’m curious to know if she’s aware of the ITAR problem.

Later.

Political Commentary

H. G. Wells

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Here’s an interesting piece on him, as one of the fathers of modern American liberalism:

Wells’s “Samurai,” an updated version of the New Republicans, would keep track of their charges through a centralized thumbprint index of all the earth’s inhabitants. Latter-day Puritans in everything except sex, the Samurai would lead lives of irreproachable rectitude, abjuring tobacco, alcohol, trade, and games, which they could neither join nor watch. These elect, “the clean and straight” men and women capable “of self-devotion, of intentional courage, of honest thought, and steady endeavour,” would rule in the name of the new godhead: Progress through Science. As Wells would later put it, science was to be “king of the world.”

“Everything except sex.” Gee, there’s sort of a pattern here.

He, of course, coined the phrase “liberal fascism.” He knew the score, even if modern “liberals” are ignorant of their own intellectual history.

History, Political Commentary, War Commentary

Is Obama Another Jimmy Carter?

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If we’re lucky:

After Obama assumed office in January, whatever hesitation that existed in North Korea’s policy-making circles regarding the likely response of U.S. administration has disappeared, and its leadership now feels it can defy the U.S. and the international community with impunity.

A series of actions taken by the Obama administration have created an impression in Iran, the “Af-Pak” region, China and North Korea that Obama does not have the political will to retaliate decisively to acts that are detrimental to U.S. interests, and to international peace and security.

Among such actions, one could cite: the soft policy toward Iran: the reluctance to articulate strongly U.S. determination to support the security interests of Israel; the ambivalent attitude toward Pakistan despite its continued support to anti-India terrorist groups and its ineffective action against the sanctuaries of Al-Qaida and the Taliban in Pakistani territory; its silence on the question of the violation of the human rights of the Burmese people and the continued illegal detention of Aung San Suu Kyi by the military regime in Myanmar; and its silence on the Tibetan issue.

I’m afraid it could be a lot worse.

[Early evening update]

More thoughts from Victor Davis Hanson:

Fate, chance, luck, and more will contribute to the outcome of any presidential action — unpredictable, of course, but in the cruel game of assessing presidential decision-making, no grounds for excuse.

Moreover, both these problems not only antedated Obama, but antedated Bush as well, yet they cannot be massaged with “reset” button and a “Bush did it,” nor by soaring “hope and change” rhetoric. Neither Ahmadinejad nor Kim Jong-il care a whit about Obama’s landmark advance to the presidency, or his sober and judicious efforts to show rational concern for their own predicaments; instead, they calibrate only the degree to which Obama poses an obstacle to their regional ambitions, whether they be rational or not.

As David Pryce-Jones notes, the more sincere he is, the more naive he seems.

Media Criticism, Political Commentary, War Commentary

Debunking Durbin

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I didn’t watch, but reportedly Newt dismantled Dick Durbin on Meet the Press yesterday on the subject of the disingenuity (if not outright mendacity) of the Obama administration claims to be breaking from the Bush administration on military commissions and Guantanamo. Andy McCarthy makes him into rubble today.

2. Durbin’s “right of counsel” claim is a joke — and one you’d think Democrats would be too embarrassed to keep repeating given the number of Obama administration lawyers who, along with their former firms, spent the last eight years volunteering their services to America’s enemies. Under the Bush commission system, the terrorists already had U.S. taxpayer-funded military lawyers and were, in addition, permitted to retain private counsel — and there was no shortage of American private lawyers (such as several at Attorney General Eric Holder’s firm) who have taken up these cases. If there’s anything these terrorists have gotten plenty of, it’s top-flight legal representation.

3. The claim that “in seven years in Guantanamo there were exactly three [detainees] who were convicted by military commissions” is another screamer. The main reason for delay in the commissions process has been the aforementioned legion of volunteer American defense attorneys who ground the system to a halt by various court challenges. At the end of this legal barrage, the only real change in the commissions was a formal one — they are now authorized by Congress rather than by presidential directive (as Bush, like FDR, had used). As a practical matter (and Obama is all about being practical, right?), they operate exactly the same way. Moreover, the current delay — now in its fifth month, with several more months to go — is because President Obama himself stopped the pending commissions against 21 terrorists (when trial was imminent in several of them) so he could first “study” them and, now, propose these illusory “changes.

There’s a lot more. These people must think that we’re as stupid as they are.

Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space

More Bolden Commentary

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There’s a story at the LA Times. Not much new, but I thought that this was worth a comment:

Logsdon said he believed the skepticism about Obama’s support for manned flight was “misguided” from the first. The comment about taking money from NASA was made by a junior campaign aide, he said.

I’m disappointed in Professor Logsdon. His own comment is more than “misguided.” It’s disingenuous, and in fact false, though I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and just assume that he’s unfamiliar with what actually happened, and was told this by someone else (though he should be following it closely, being a premier expert on space policy and all…).

It wasn’t merely a “comment” from a “junior campaign aide.” He says this as though it was just an aside on background. No. It was the official position in a white paper at the campaign web site. Jeff Foust described the history of the Obama space-policy shifts, and their ongoing nebulosity, back in August.

If Senator Obama didn’t pay any attention to it at the time (we know how much trouble he has getting good help) and he’s since reversed it (and he seems to have) that’s great, but I see no point in whitewashing the history of what happened. It was an area of legitimate concern for space (or at least NASA) enthusiasts at the time, and it does provide legitimate cause to question how deep his enthusiasm is now. His supporters might claim that he had a road-to-Damascus moment, and now talks about how excited he was by Apollo growing up in Hawaii, but he was talking about that prior to the “funding education by delaying Constellation” time period as well.

I remain an agnostic on the degree of support of this president for either space, or NASA. Only the future will tell.