NASA's New Mission: Muslim Self-Esteem!?!?

[Shady]

Apparently under Obama, NASA's new mission isn't so much science related anymore. They're now basically an American public relations firm, directed to help Muslims feel good about their contributions to society.

No. I'm not making this up.

A few days ago, in Cairo, Bolden told Al Jazeera that when he became the NASA administrator, President Obama charged him with three things: "One, he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math; he wanted me to expand our international relationships; and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science and engineering -- science, math and engineering."

The White House came to Bolden's defense.

The White House and NASA today defended comments by National Aeronautic Space Administration administrator Charles Bolden about reaching out to the Muslim world

ABC News

I know this is a crazy idea. But how about leaving NASA to deal with subjects related to science, technology, and research and development? Not Obama's stupid feel-good diplomatic hugs.

PIC

[Bonam]

Obama's new direction for NASA is pretty much the death knell of American space exploration. Besides this latest statement (which really isn't a big deal), he also scrapped NASA's plans for manned space flight and the spacecraft development aimed towards that end, leaving it with no options for the near future besides relying on Russian generosity with Soyuz launches. Additionally, he has redirected substantial funds from NASA's other programs to the study of global warming, much to the detriment of NASA's other goals.

You can be sure Obama is already not popular at all with space enthusiasts, regardless of NASA's stance on Muslim self-esteem.

Edited July 6, 2010 by Bonam

[Remiel]

I know this is a crazy idea. But how about leaving NASA to deal with subjects related to science, technology, and research and development?

If you actually bothered to quote the other relevant parts of the article, you would see that that is what it is about in the end.

In response to criticism, White House spokesman Nick Shapiro said in a statement that “The President has always said that he wants NASA to engage with the world’s best scientists and engineers as we work together to push the boundaries of exploration. Meeting that mandate requires NASA to partner with countries around the world like Russia and Japan, as well as collaboration with Israel and with many Muslim-majority countries. The space race began as a global competition, but, today, it is a global collaboration.”

Of course, the best part came last:

Another response was offered by the liberal media monitoring group Media Matters, which wrote a story titled “Yet again, an Obama official says ‘Muslim,’ right-wing media freak-out follows.”

[DogOnPorch]

Obama's new direction for NASA is pretty much the death knell of American space exploration. Besides this latest statement (which really isn't a big deal), he also scrapped NASA's plans for manned space flight and the spacecraft development aimed towards that end, leaving it with no options for the near future besides relying on Russian generosity with Soyuz launches. Additionally, he has redirected substantial funds from NASA's other programs to the study of global warming, much to the detriment of NASA's other goals.

You can be sure Obama is already not popular at all with space enthusiasts, regardless of NASA's stance on Muslim self-esteem.

Especially seeing how much effort was put into this...

[Bonam]

Especially seeing how much effort was put into this...

To be fair, there were a lot of problems and potential problems with the Ares I launch vehicle and some revision to the planned program was likely in order. There were interesting proposals about simply man-rating either the Atlas V or the Delta IV instead, which likely would have been cheaper and reduced the development time as compared to Ares I. Unfortunately, the Ares I program had more to do with politics and keeping NASA jobs at existing influential NASA facilities that had worked on the shuttle than on technical merit or necessity. But Obama's action of scrapping manned spaceflight altogether was a tragic mistake.

[M.Dancer]

But Obama's action of scrapping manned spaceflight altogether was a tragic mistake.

Perhaps, Many scientists believe the effort that it takes to put a passenger on a ship is wasted effort and and wasted payload. The thought is the $$$ and payload would be better served by doing science instead...the only real benefit to putting a body on board is TV ratings.

[Bonam]

Perhaps, Many scientists believe the effort that it takes to put a passenger on a ship is wasted effort and and wasted payload. The thought is the $$$ and payload would be better served by doing science instead...the only real benefit to putting a body on board is TV ratings.

In terms of raw scientific data, robotic probes do provide more bang for the buck than humans in space. However, science is not NASA's only goal, just as important, if not more, is exploration, and development of technology for eventual utilization and colonization of space.

But that is a point that can be argued, and if the money we are losing from the human space flight (HSF) program was all going to robotic probes, that would be one thing. There would be lot's of exciting opportunities for new technology development and amazing new discoveries if that were the case. Instead, this money is being spent on things like more global warming satellites, subsidizing private companies to develop space launch capabilities that already exist (i.e. reinventing the wheel, over and over), and continued funding of things like Altair that make absolutely no sense to be developed if its launch system (Ares I) has been scrapped. Of course, some of the projected money under the previous program is not going to be given to NASA at all, and is instead gonna be a pebble in the pond of repaying the trillions of dollars of debt created to bail out failing financial companies.

The real tragedy of canceling HSF, however, is that the expertise, the knowledge, the people that could lead and develop projects in this field will retire and be lost. If NASA ever arises from the ashes to try to do HSF again, they will spend years or decades just remember and reacquiring their lost capabilities. Dusty old documentation only helps fresh new inexperienced engineers who will be working on those projects so much, without the benefit of their predecessors who already worked it all out being there in person.

[DogOnPorch]

Well, heck...don't you all want to go to Mars? If not...why not?

More bang for the buck, my ass. Obama is a tool re: NASA. Reach out to people who believe that 72 virgins await upon killing an astronaut? Yeah...that'll work.

As for NASA in general...wee problems like an Atlas blowing-up on the pad didn't stop 'em back in the good ol' days.