Obama Steps Ahead for NASA
Barack Obama is beginning to more than show his “true grit” lately, eliminating any worry in my mind and hopefully everyone else’s that he is lacking in responsibility to lead our country. This “leading” so far involves some excellent ideas for solving the financial crisis our country has been unknowingly led to, while also backing the NASA waiver that may save our shuttle fleet from being unable to access the International Space Station.
Calling on Congress to take some form of action before next Friday in order to protect our access to the ISS, Obama has condemned Bush’s administration in how they have handled NASA. With the Iran, North Korea, Syria Nonproliferation Agreement expiring between now and 2011, a key aide to NASA’s Administrator Mike Griffen has told the media, ““if we do not get the exemption on this, we are going to have to abandon the station, and that if we do this it will hurt the U.S. space program not the Russians.”
With this in mind, Obama has sent a strong-toned letter to Nancy Pelosi-House Speaker, Harry Reid-Senate Majority Leader, and listed it on his Senate September 22 web site, urging Congress to fund an additional Shuttle flight that is already authorized. He also demanded that “no further actions be taken by NASA to preclude extending the Shuttle program beyond 2010.” His letter was supported by Griffin’s internal email that had been leaked earlier in September to the media, criticizing our government leaders with Shuttle retirement and underfunding of our return to the moon.
Nominee for Democratic Vice-President Joe Biden is also the head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and is the sponsor of the waiver legislation introduced last June. The waver recently passed this committee, and now must pass the Senate vote before the adjournment of Congress when NASA’s situation must compete with other “major financial crisis legislation” on the floor.
A highly critical time for NASA, Obama’s letter is a ray of hope for the space industry before it leaves for recess. When the existing waiver becomes renewed, NASA can continue purchasing the Russian Soyuz vehicles it needs—transporting U.S., Canadian, European, and Japanese astronauts to and from the ISS.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 17th, 2008 at 4:30 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
