Author Topic: Griffin, The Obama Transition Team, and "sources" at the Orlando Sentinel  (Read 75927 times)

Offline MarkWhittington

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Time Magazine has a piece that might illustrate why Griffin is unhappy:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1866045,00.html?xid=rss-topstories

Griffin may have concluded that Garver and her team are simply rooting around to find excuses to cancel the entire exploration program are is not disposed to make it easy for them.

Offline MarkWhittington

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Other papers rehashing the same thing, mixing it up with examples of 50 attendees into "50 witnesses of the argument".

Chris is right.  I was there, 20 feet away.  I heard and saw no "argument."  And other stuff in the article about the party is exaggerated.

Don't believe everything you read, even if it satisfies your pre-conceived notions.

Unfortunately, once a meme-set has escaped into the noosphere, it doesn't matter what insiders and witnesses know or say, but rather how many are hearing the story, for whom its meme-set content constitutes the sum total of their knowledge of the subject.

As Mark Twain once famously said, a lie can go half way around the world in the time it takes the truth to put on its golashes. That is especially true in the era of the Internet.

Offline elmarko

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While it's just a news aggregator for geeks of sorts and not an actual news outlet, Slashdot has a story up about Griffin's supposed unhappiness. They haven't updated it with his response to the Sentinel, though.

Offline Martin FL

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Other papers rehashing the same thing, mixing it up with examples of 50 attendees into "50 witnesses of the argument".

Chris is right.  I was there, 20 feet away.  I heard and saw no "argument."  And other stuff in the article about the party is exaggerated.

Don't believe everything you read, even if it satisfies your pre-conceived notions.

Thanks for posting that. Just goes to show this is another Sentinel article that has stretched the truth to fufil their own anti-Ares, anti-Griffin agenda.

Couple of interesting things to add, however. Firstly, the Sentinel page now has a pop up ad for loans at 5000 percent, making the most out of all the attention, and the comment section is nothing more than a political fight, mized in with idiots saying NASA should be scrapped, some very distasteful comments too. You'd think they'd moderate that comment section? Some of it is totally racist.

Online wannamoonbase

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Other papers rehashing the same thing, mixing it up with examples of 50 attendees into "50 witnesses of the argument".

Chris is right.  I was there, 20 feet away.  I heard and saw no "argument."  And other stuff in the article about the party is exaggerated.

Don't believe everything you read, even if it satisfies your pre-conceived notions.

Thanks Blackstar.  It's good to know that civility is alive in the leadership ranks.

Even if the underlying disagreement is still there its nice to know they can be professional about it.
Wildly optimistic prediction, Superheavy recovery on IFT-4 or IFT-5

Offline robertross

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And another follow-up from the Sentinel...


And like clockwork, there's the second effort based on the denial of the original rumor article, as pre-empted.

Other papers rehashing the same thing, mixing it up with examples of 50 attendees into "50 witnesses of the argument".

Come on guys, isn't it obvious how the game is played yet?

Meanwhile, Griffin's going to lose his job over this, you can see it coming, because the media will keep rehashing this over and over again, in a cyclonic wave of falling over each other to make this as big a scandal as possible, negating any facts, until the pressure claims its victim.

The main problem being that Joe Public will once again see NASA as a waste of money, and the year will once again end with a negative, despite four successful shuttle missions, Pheonix, etc.

To me, this plays out like other tabloid scandals. Sensationalism.
Furthermore, I see it as no different than how we all jump on the bandwagon when there's some juicy details, with comments coming from people in the general public who have no background information other than what's presented to them on the front page. Most don't even bother getting all the facts. I'm guilty of that, even on here, for just basic vehicle info and not taking the time to research it myself.

It's no wonder we get this knee-jerk reaction from this type of reporting. That's why I like NSF, and your reporting Chris. I'm fairly confident about what I'm reading, and read a little further on in posts to make sure something hasn't been updated/discredited/proven wrong.

Take a deep breath everyone, it's going to be a ride (good and bad).

I'd be more worried about what I don't hear, actually, and not just in spaceflight or NASA, but all departments & agencies. 

Offline khallow

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There's strong pressure on NASA to deliver a viable Ares I project by Obama's inauguration. I gather the Ares I-X was supposed to be that proof, but it's been delayed till Fall 2009.

Huh? Ares I-X was on the "books" for April '09 for a LONG time, then was moved back. I never heard any talk of moving it up to mid-January, what do you have to back that up?

Odds are good that a new administrator won't cancel a launch that is three months away. Odds are not as good for a launch more than half a year away.
Karl Hallowell

Offline jeff.findley

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Rush mentioned it too, though in contex of Obama team malfeasence.

Yea, well, Rush has nothing good to say about Obama, so a lot of what he has to say will be completely irrelevant for at least the next four years.

Offline jeff.findley

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It is worth remembering that the Orlando Sentinel has published several anti-Ares (and pro-Direct) articles in recent months, hyping the Thrust Oscillation Hysteria (now debunked), and so forth.  It stands to reason that the Sentinel's space editor has no love for Mr. Griffin, for whatever reason.

Sure, it's debunked to the point where the current design won't see TO killing astronauts.  It will only shake them bad enough that they won't be able to throw switches... (rolls eyes).

Sure the Orlando Sentinel has been doing its best to point out the failings of Ares I.  The failings are glaring, even when you remove the media hype.

Offline Stowbridge

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The Sentinel should issue an apology.
Veteran space reporter.

Offline iamlucky13

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The Sentinel should issue an apology.

Unfortunately, it's far too late for that. While it was still in the circle of the Sentinel's readership, that could have accomplished something.

I think Chris is right. The media smelled blood, they started a chase, and now they've got the prey pinned down.
« Last Edit: 12/12/2008 06:02 pm by Chris Bergin »

Offline A_M_Swallow

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Huh? Ares I-X was on the "books" for April '09 for a LONG time, then was moved back. I never heard any talk of moving it up to mid-January, what do you have to back that up?

Odds are good that a new administrator won't cancel a launch that is three months away. Odds are not as good for a launch more than half a year away.

The danger increases when the launch is delayed past the start of the new financial year in September because the Administrator has to apply to Congress for extra money.

The big cancellation risk is Ares-I-Y, since that is not protected by the need for a firework display in 2009.

Offline HIP2BSQRE

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I've said this before and I'll say it again. Griffin made one enormous mistake when he came on board, and that was to assume his solution to the VSE mandate could survive multiple election cycles and presidential transitions. That was utter folly. At a minimum, he needed to make sure a manned CEV had reached orbit by Fall of 2008 (ie, before the election). If that had been put before everything else (inlcuding his own favored architecture), it could have been done, and had he done it, it would be likely whoever won the election would have kept him on as a glorious success, and that would have bought him all the years out to 2016 to get to the Moon.

History proves this out time and again. Kennedy wanted to get men to the Moon before he left office at the beginning of 1969. But for Apollo 1 (and the mistakes that led up to it), it's likely the first manned landing would have been in late 1968. Nixon wanted the Shuttle to fly by 1976. Reagan made a mistake letting the space station get out of hand. He should have made it small enough to fly by 1988. As it was, Clinton decided to "brand" it for himself, and then made sure at least a little bit of it flew before he left office. You can argue details all you want, but the fact is, the election cycle in this country, and the swing back and forth between party-in-power spoilage, determines outcomes much more than anything else. Deciding on an architecture that put men on the Moon eight election cycles down the road, and which wouldn't show a single tangible *result* for five cycles, was just plain stupid.

Obama may make any kind of decision at all, including the really bad one he suggested at the beginning of his campaign. But if he wants to make Constellation his own, he's only got one rational course. Extend Shuttle to 2011 (ie., 2 to 4 more flights), make sure Orion is aloft by 2012 (during his run for reelection!), and make sure an American crew lands on the Moon before election day 2016 (nail down that part of his legacy and boost his chosen successor's chances of victory). I can think of several ways he can achieve that (EELV+Jupiter seems a pretty good bet, if you ask me). But it's too late now for a flat budget to handle it. I guess we'llfind out in the next few months.

You would like the following:

1.  Extend shuttle till 2012--2 -4 flights
2.  Orion by 2012
3.  Moon 2016 (EELV and Direct/Jupiter).

My questions:

1.   Will/can Orion Block A be ready by 2012?  What cost involved?
2.   What will Orion fly on--EELV? 
     Projectwise--How much and what would it cost.
3.  Moon by 2016.  Can Direct be ready even if only a flyby like Apollo 8.  How much will this cost, since NASA already impacted by time and  money to get Orion and EELV ready for 2012. 

Bottomline--budget may stay the same or just adjust for inflation/deflation. 

It looks to me--1 and 2 are very near term items.  Direct gets $05-2b a year till 2012 to start process, etc.  But as you said--President needs to see something fly in first term. 

Offline iamlucky13

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If he succeeds in making the continuation of the Constellation program a Mike Griffin vs. Barack Obama pissing contest, he should expect to see the program cancelled as a means of establishing just who is in charge.  You can do some element of this maneuvering and politicking subtly and behind the scenes, but once it comes out into the open you've left your boss with no choice but to come down hard.

This would be the worst thing he could do, and is in contradiction with the article:

"The e-mail followed two teleconferences set up by Shank and another NASA official, Gale Allen. According to documents produced from the teleconferences, the point was to 'to develop a strategy for promoting the continuation of Constellation in the next administration.'

Among the ideas agreed on: tell the team that an Obama White House 'could take ownership of the [Constellation] program and ‘re-brand’ it as their own with minor tweaks.'"


Pissing off Obama and getting his baby cancelled isn't going to build Griffin's legacy.

Offline DaveJSC

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You're forgetting the story isn't true!

Offline Chris Bergin

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Offline jurgen

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It's a shame that one person with an Agenda can do so much harm to an Agency.

Offline Lab Lemming

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Transition rumors aside, an article in Nature says that NASA HQ basically took over science operations of Phoenix from the science team...
http://www.nature.com/news/2008/081210/full/456690a.html


It's a shame that one person with an Agenda can do so much harm to an Agency.

Online Blackstar

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Note that I'm not saying that nothing happened, only that I was 20 feet away and saw and heard nothing, so no "shouting match."  And I know a dozen other people who could say the same.

Offline edkyle99

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It is worth remembering that the Orlando Sentinel has published several anti-Ares (and pro-Direct) articles in recent months, hyping the Thrust Oscillation Hysteria (now debunked), and so forth.  It stands to reason that the Sentinel's space editor has no love for Mr. Griffin, for whatever reason.

Sure, it's debunked to the point where the current design won't see TO killing astronauts.  It will only shake them bad enough that they won't be able to throw switches... (rolls eyes).

Sure the Orlando Sentinel has been doing its best to point out the failings of Ares I.  The failings are glaring, even when you remove the media hype.

The reported analysis said that astronauts might have trouble *seeing* displays, not throwing switches, for a 4-5 second period during worst-case conditions that might occur only once every three flights - keeping in mind that astronauts won't have to "throw switches" during this part of the flight unless (1) an abort is needed and (2) the automatic abort system fails, requiring the crew to perform a manual abort.  This becomes a crew training issue and a crew interface design issue.  Something like a giant red mushroom switch might solve the problem. 

The problem isn't "glaring" - it is manageable.  The media hype distorts reality to a point that deceives the general public.  This is a disservice to the public, not public service.

 - Ed Kyle
« Last Edit: 12/12/2008 09:59 pm by edkyle99 »

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