More Washington shenanigans over who will be NASA’s next administrator
Two news outlets in the past day (Politico and Ars Technica) have posted stories about a 62-page plan — supposedly written by Jared Isaacman while he was still the nominee to become NASA administrator — that was recently leaked to them as well as others inside and outside NASA.
The plan itself, dubbed “Project Athena”, has not been made available, though the descriptions at both sources suggest it matches closely with the overall Trump effort to cancel SLS and Orion and shift space operations out of NASA and more into the private sector.
The nature of this plan of course threatens NASA’s established work force and the big space contractors who have worked hand-in-glove with NASA for decades, producing little but distributing a lot of money and jobs to these groups. Not surprisingly, both news sources quote extensively from anonymous sources within that NASA work force and those big space contractors, lambasting the plan and blasting Isaacman for proposing it. From the Politic article:
Sean Duffy: “Pick me! Pick me!”
Putting all of these plans into writing is a “rookie move,” and “presumptuous,” said an industry insider who has seen the document and thought it would stoke congressional skepticism around his nomination. Many of these ideas would need congressional approval to enact, and Congress could always block them.
The Ars Techica article speculates that interim NASA administrator Sean Duffy was the source of the leak, in his effort to become NASA’s official administrator. If the plan is Isaacman’s, it generates opposition to renewing Isaacman’s nomination as NASA administrator while garnering support for Duffy from NASA’s workforce and those big space contractors.
All of this is pure Washington swamp, however, which really matters little in the long run. First of all, none of this is real. We are talking about an unreleased plan that no one has seen publicly, and the reactions of anonymous sources criticizing that unseen plan. It is all the stuff of ghosts and fantasy. For we know, it is all made up, just like the Russian collusion hoax was manufactured against Trump.
Second, and more important, who runs NASA next is becoming increasingly unimportant. The real American space program is being run by SpaceX, using its own revenue to produce the only spacecraft and rockets truly capable of exploring and colonizing the solar system. What NASA plans to use for its manned program — SLS, Orion, and the proposed Lunar Gateway station — are badly conceived, over-priced, and incapable of accomplishing much.
And NASA’s space station, ISS, is on its final legs, due to be retired in only a few years. By that time the rumored proposal by Duffy to fold NASA into the Department of Transportation might make sense. NASA itself won’t be doing much by then.
Thus, this is all a Washington game about dividing up taxpayer loot. Essentially, Duffy and Isaacman appear to be fighting like dogs over the scraps left over from the main meal, cooked by SpaceX.
From the Polaris webpage
I’ll tell you what I would do if I was Jared Isaacman. I’d stop wasting my time trying to get to run NASA and instead renew my focus on my own presently-suspended Polaris manned space program. Isaacman had already flown twice on Dragon, and had planned another Dragon mission followed by one on Starship. He should now team up with Elon Musk and SpaceX to start detailed planning of that Starship manned mission to the Moon, flying it completely independent of NASA, with the goal to do it before either NASA or China manage their own manned Moon landers.
That would be a much better use of Jared Isaacman’s skills and money. Becoming NASA administrator will get him nothing but heartache and an empty legacy inside that Washington swamp that has little to do with exploring the solar system. Let Sean Duffy have it. He wants it, and it better matches his far more limited capabilities.
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The U.S. Federal Government will not allow SpaceX to go to the Moon without its consent and it will not give that consent without SpaceX prostituting itself to the Government. And Elon is not willing to do the latter at the level that would be demanded.
Can’t argue with a bit of that.
At this point, both NASA and its legacy contractor-verse appear to be more cosplaying or LARPing at being a space program than doing it for real. Once that becomes apparent to the general public – about the time we return to the Moon and ISS is winding down – the politics of space will shift. As the great mass of voters don’t have space very high up on their list of political concerns, the shift won’t be much, but it doesn’t have to be. Right now, the uninvolved public tends to see NASA as the default for space. Once that perception changes, “inertial” support for NASA will greatly diminish. NASA and its legacy contractors will find themselves just another parochial special interest with mostly only their own employees strongly motivated to influence Congress. As the cost-plus programs end and the legacies fail to be competitive with newer entrants, there will be both fewer employees at NASA and the legacies and less money coming their way. The attention of politicians will shift accordingly.
Just to make things clear, what I was not arguing with in my previous comment was our host’s post, not BillB’s pessimistic take on statist interference with SpaceX.
BillB,
You seem to badly misunderstand both the distribution of power in the US government and the politics of returning to the Moon. There is no defensible basis for any element of the US government to flatly forbid Musk and SpaceX from going to the Moon – especially in a Trump administration. Elon and SpaceX certainly have enemies in the current government – though a lot fewer than in the previous one. But those enemies are now attacking Musk and SpaceX for being too slow to Beat the Chinese[tm] to the Moon. Once it becomes apparent that SpaceX can Beat the Chinese[tm] there, the political coalition opposing SpaceX will have no choice but to let Musk do that. Absent SpaceX’s involvement, the US government simply lacks the wherewithal to go to the Moon in time to Beat the Chinese[tm].
Isaacman addresses in a tweet.
https://x.com/rookisaacman/status/1985796145017471442?s=46
Gary: Isaacman essentially confirms my analysis. This whole kerfuffle is Washington stupidity, designed not to accomplish anything except feather some nests that don’t need feathering.
I should add that Isaacman by this long response is allowing himself to be dragged into this stupidity. He should do as I suggest, get out of DC and restart his Polaris space program. He doesn’t need NASA any longer.
Trump just put out a statement on his Truth Social account announcing that he is renominating Jared Isaacman as NASA administrator. ““This evening, I am pleased to nominate Jared Isaacman, an accomplished business leader, philanthropist, pilot and astronaut as Administrator of NASA. Jared’s passion for Space, astronaut experience and dedication to pushing the boundaries of exploration, unlocking the mysteries of the universe and advancing the new space economy, make him ideally suited to lead NASA into a bold new era.”
Isaacman already has a post up on X accepting the nomination: https://x.com/rookisaacman/status/1985846020283265319
Done deal. Nominated. Wonder if he will have to go through the hearings again, or if Cruz can just schedule a vote.
Dick Eagleson,
I think the Statist in the agencies particularly the FAA and FCC will be the first to push back against SpaceX. If this is during the remainder of Trumps administration or maybe a following Conservative administration, I think the President will cut that short. The unknown is Congress; they tend to be swayed by the big corporations and those big corporations are willing to expend a great deal of political capital if they are threatened. I have seen the dissipation of political capital by a big corporation to get a goal; I will not be more specific because I would reveal too much. I think that Old Space might influence enough of Congress to bypass a Presidential Veto to shut down SpaceX doing an independent flight to the Moon. And if #48 is a Democrat I am almost sure SpaceX will be prevented from an independent flight as Elon Musk must be punished/persecuted for what he has done that upset the Democrat’s apple cart.
Robert and I actually agree on something…I hear Trumpets
The Donald will just fire Isaacman again after a few months over something else…some other e-mail over DEI.
NASA needs a Chief Administrator used to not having any money
“Slippin” Gary Hudson?
He’s used to not having any funding.
Maybe Tumlinson, who likes the sound of his own voice almost as much as I do.
Hmm…Zubrin know how to golf?
BillB,
The worst actors in the Biden-era FAA and FCC are already long-gone. The FCC was never much of a problem for SpaceX anyway. There will be no gratuitous interference from either agency anent SpaceX during the remainder of Trump’s term or during that of any Republican Presidents who follow him in office – and, the way things are going, there could easily be several of those.
The typical Congresscritter is worried that the US won’t Beat the Chinese[tm] back to the Moon. So, if, as I fully expect, SpaceX is ready to do that – either in harness with NASA or on its own – in 2028, the prospect of any Congressional bill to prevent that is zero.
As there will be no such bill, the matter of a Presidential veto is moot. But overriding a Presidential veto requires super-majorities in both houses of Congress. Given the political divisions in Congress, even if a bill endorsing motherhood and apple pie somehow got passed through both houses, but was vetoed by President Trump, there is no possibility of an override.
The legacy aerospace primes are large employers. In aggregate, they employ about 20 times as many people as SpaceX. But that employment is concentrated in a few states. So is SpaceX’s employment. But two of those states are TX and FL. And Musk’s other companies, particularly Tesla, have large payrolls in TX as well. The legacy primes have sizable footprints in CA, CO, UT, LA and AL. That’s 74 House districts. If one adds Nevada, based on Tesla’s footprint there, to TX and FL, that’s 70 House districts. That’s a pretty even fight without even considering party totals or likely defections. Anyone at one or all of the legacy primes looking to gin up any sort of legislative monkey wrench anent SpaceX is going to have a seriously uphill fight. And that, of course, is without even considering the Constituional prohibition on bills of attainder.
I don’t think the average congress-critter ever thinks of anything past re-election…
Despite the alliteration of Schumer’s shutdown (up there with the Gingrich that stole Christmas)….Red Staters may take a hit.
Chamber of Commerce Republicans like Reagan gave us the amnesty–with manufacturing going overseas….COVID hurt the service economy that was left. The only good paying jobs left were in often in government—and now A.I. is threatening Achmed’s call centers –but White Collar types as well–who might just change their long opposition to living wages when they get handed a broom and told they actually have to WORK like the rest of us.
Robert wrote: “The real American space program is being run by SpaceX, using its own revenue to produce the only spacecraft and rockets truly capable of exploring and colonizing the solar system.”
The commercial free-market enterprises should be the ones to run the space program. It is how the American west was settled. The government’s involvement was to grant homestead rights to those who were able to establish farms in the west.*
“[Jared Isaacman] should now team up with Elon Musk and SpaceX to start detailed planning of that Starship manned mission to the Moon, flying it completely independent of NASA, with the goal to do it before either NASA or China manage their own manned Moon landers.”
Isaacman would be a good asset to the SpaceX space program. The best part could be that instead of being an employee doing this mission or even a contractor hired to do the mission, he would be a customer paying SpaceX to perform this task in the objective of colonizing the solar system.
The American space program may now be largely operated by SpaceX, but there are so many other companies getting into the business that our space program will soon only be dominated by SpaceX, and later SpaceX will only be a part of the commercial-space space-program. Instead of nations with their own ineffectual space programs, commercial companies will run one large program that seems disorganized and conflicting, but will actually be driven by the needs and desires of We the People, competing with each other to improve each aspect of the worldwide commercial space program.
This is also how the American west was settled. Farmers, towns, and territories competed with each other, finding the efficiencies and optimizations that worked for them.**
From the Politico article linked in Robert’s essay:
That’s funny, in the ha-ha sense. Up until WWII, most of science was privately funded, often from people or companies who sought general knowledge of the world around us or sought something specific, such as the telephone, the electric light, or the phonograph.
From Eric Berger’s analysis in Ars Technica:
“
”
This tells us a lot. It tells us that Isaacman has opposition in the heritage contractors, who are willing to violate the integrity of those who shared the document with them. It tells us that the leak came with mischaracterizations of the document, and it tells us that Berger is not willing to just pass along those mischaracterizations but will clarify the situation for his reading audience.
From Gary’s linked Isaacman tweet:
This is definitely the right thing to do. If we don’t get more out of space than we put in, what is the point? So far, we have not been doing that, but it is mandatory in order for profitable companies who do business in space.
______________
* One of my great-great aunts tried this in the Dakotas, but upon her failure she went back to the family farm in Wisconsin.
** Richard M, in another thread, pointed out that NASA’s Artemis program, and by implication (or am I only inferring?) NASA itself, were optimized for distributing money to the heritage contractors ( https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/essays-and-commentaries/spacex-starship-will-be-going-to-the-moon-with-or-without-nasa/#comment-1624491 ). This also seems to have been Congress’s intention with Artemis and maybe the rest of NASA, too. This would explain why the skills, talents, and knowledge of NASA employees has been so poorly utilized these past two decades and why Congress hasn’t minded that NASA management has been so lousy at managing its projects.
Edward: Please note that the quote of mine that you cite at the start of your comment is another example of me being ahead of the curve. I doubt seriously anyone else has made this point about SpaceX in the manner I have. But in about two years a lot of people will be saying it.
Robert,
I do not recall hearing or reading such a bold statement anywhere else, but then most people may think that NASA holds the title because it still has a wider variety of operating missions than SpaceX has. NASA has space telescopes and is planning a flyer for a Saturnian moon, but SpaceX is planning a colony on Mars and soon will have the flight hardware that can sustain a base, settlement, or colony on the Moon, too. When it comes to a manned space program, it is SpaceX that has America’s.
Then there are the many companies that are currently operating many different missions in Earth orbit, so SpaceX may outnumber the commercial space program, but these other companies, including Rocket Lab, are making their own contributions to America’s space program. As time passes, they are adding more and more to this program, also using their own revenues (at this point it is often investments) to produce their contributions.
This is why I embrace rather than argue against your point. It is about time that the right people be in charge of America’s space program.
Edward: Most of my readers (such as you) are here because they “embrace” my perspective, sometimes even better than I.
Nonetheless, I will say it again: What I have written now about SpaceX will be something others will discover with great fanfare in about two years. It is too bad that so many news sources (good and bad) won’t read or take what I write seriously.
But then, that has been the story of my life. :)