Sean O'Keefe's New Job, New Portrait

As a journalist, I covered Sean O'Keefe during his entire tenure as NASA Administrator. A gagy and wiley pol, O'Keefe always struck me as a honest decent guy who understood the way government is run in Washington, better than some of his fellow Bush era appointees. His steady hand during the Columbia accident was crucial to NASA's recovery from that tragedy. From my vantage point, I can attest that the accident deeply affected him and the trauma of that experience accounted for much of his decision, based on the data of the period, not to persue a final Hubble servicing mission.
I wish him well in his new assignment.
His biggest fault, IMHO? Those damn cigarettes!

A wise man, that. Was brought in to get NASA's budgeting mess under control. Guided NASA through after the tragedy. Understood the respect he needed to have for the budget money, and tried to be prudent with the agency's budget.

In addition, he and the people he brought on (Steidle) had the right ideas for a modern NASA approach to human space flight. I wish he'd stayed on. Not that he'd want to.

The OSP was a chance lost for the nation's space program.

Oh, well, best of luck. It's with the multitude of space companies where it lies now anyway. Shades of OSP.

Perhaps his plans will come to fruition there.

Good job for a good man. Best of luck.

Hopefully we will see EADS step into a similar role with new.space as Boeing and Lockheed are doing.

Frank, cigarettes helped us get to the moon! The guys in MCC had to have something to go with all that coffee...

Dan is right, we should be watching the initial crewed launch of OSP today instead of this "Peak of Model Rocketry" exhibition.

Someone should have briefed Augustine Committee about VSE implementation plans of O'Keefe and Steidle.

They WERE on the "flexible path", essentially.

Ah yes, Mikey Griffin's folly....the "stick" with which we will be beaten many times over, I fear...

Ah yes .......... the good old Spiral days, thanks Sean. Nothing like a bean counter to make technical decisions. Was it just me or did anyone else have trouble understanding what O'Keefe was ever talking about? As I recall he spoke in circles, very eloquently I might add. Although he wasn't as shrewd as Goldin. Goldin managed to get the university to pay him not to work, O'Keefe on the other hand had to do the time if he wanted to get paid. Poor ole O'Keefe

Deriding one of the best managers NASA has ever had as a 'bean counter' will get you nowhere.

NASA needs Bean Counters. Now more than ever. The taxpayers demand that. The President demands that.

Eagle, a "bean counter" is NOT a bad thing for NASA. Someone should want to keep an agency's spending habits in check.

O'Keefe made "technical decisions"? News to me. He made a point to delegate professional insights to the professionals.

He is a true Manager. Perhaps he wasted his time trying to get NASA into shipshape.

I'd take a "bean counter" over a guy that's never lead a design of a system in his life, yet thinks he 'learnt all the books'

The OSP as a long term program was miles better than the current turkey NASA is working on.

The current turkey NASAS is working on was designed by not a Bean Counter but by an n-times PHD in anything, but common sense.

A bean counter, eh, with no technical cred?
What would you call Jim Webb then-and his legacy, the greatest era of space flight in American history?
It's how and who you lead, my friend, not what you learned in school. if that's all it took, then Mike Griffin would still be NASA Administrator...

Are you saying that Dr. O'Keefe is in the same league as James Webb? If so please enlighten us all. As for Mike Griffin, if a Republican had been elected he would still be administrator, but I'm sure being a Washington "journalist" and all you already new that.

Well O'Keefe the bean counter selected Steidle who led ESMD into an endless spiral that we'd still be in if he had not been fired when Griffin came in. This is not to say Griffin had all the right answers but he got us further ahead in HSF then any Admin has in 3 decades period.

Uh... Ares I? On the chopping block with the axe whistling downwards... We might expect to hear the dull *thunk* sound around maybe Friday of next week.

Ares V? Being forcibly scaled back and redesigned at best... perhaps into not existing at all.

Orion? So messed up by the screwups that were Ares I and V that it will literally take years more to recover even to the point of being the passable cislunar+ space ship that it was originally intended to be.

... or was it the just the sight of Ares I-X waving in the breeze that got you all excited? :)

Now Now zapkitty, Mr. Augustine said that there was no mismanagement of Constellation.

Its just that after 5 years and $10 billion, essentially nothing done to date can be counted on. Maybe after another 8 years and a $100 billion more we can make the decision.