It's up to you Mr. Martin. Say something.

As Mr. Rohrabacher pointed out today in his committee meeting (his nutty scientific beliefs and positions aside) we are truly at a rather historic moment here.

Does America solve it's post shuttle problem? Does NASA abandon it's nutty beliefs and position that they somehow inhabit a central and special place in the universe? Does humanity become a space faring species?

Any way you look at it, watching NASA flail around with this transportation problem for the last decade or so has been entertaining, especially since we are now in the second decade of the twenty first century.

Uh oh, look out folks, Keith's getting tough on teh intartoobs!

"To underscore that point, NASA Watch will lie dormant until Friday." Holy cow, dormant! Take that Paul Martin!

Of course, if I had to put my own money on it, I'd bet that Paul Martin doesn't frequent this site, and thus would have no idea that Keith's calling him out. Because of this, Paul will likely not make any statements to address Keith's claims, and Keith will put up a "told-you-so" post on Friday claiming some sort of moral victory over the Inspector General.

You won't get a response because he (the OIG) is accountable to no one. If this unfortunate incident occured to any other law enforcement agency there would be a flock of oversight agencies and media attention. But who is the IG for the IG? Why does NASA have so much law enforcement to trace grains of moonrocks?

By my quick count, articles on NASAwatch that are critical or sarcastic outnumber articles that are neutral or positive about NASA by roughly two to one. So when your write "To underscore that point, NASA Watch will lie dormant until Friday," it seems like you're saying "in order to emphasize our criticism, we're going to stop criticizing you for a couple of days."

This is such a shameful deal all around... Grandma breaks the law after being warned what she wanted to do was illegal, which I suspect was out of desperation for medical costs. Then OIG agents likely break the law with the use of excessive force (we'll see how that turns out) in manhandling this woman.

The key point in all of this is that NASA should have flooded the market with moon rocks by now and this should have never happened.

Man, I had such different expectations when I was 10 and I could look up and know that guys were actually traipsing around on the moon's surface.

I figured that by now, we'd all be bringing moon rocks back as souvenirs from weekend field trips.

First of all, grandma or not, she broke the law. NASA referred this to law enforcement and they took action. If you want to complain about someone, complain about them.

Secondly, it's unfortunate that Keith is turning into Don Quixote. All this fuss and bother over non-stories means the real stories end up lost in the noise.

Editor's note: Then why not read another website where the format is more to your liking?

First of all, grandma or not, she broke the law.

Please tell us which law she broke.

I've read the opinions of several lawyers on this who can't find any federal law that makes it illegal to sell a "moon rock".

The law she broke was trying to sell stolen goods. NASA obviously owned all the rocks brought back from the moon. Unless she can provide a clear paper trail that the agency gave someone the rock and she later got it legally then it can be considered stolen. The fact that no legal charges has been filed is not uncommon in such cases. NASA got what they believe to be stolen property back and might not think it worth the while to pursue the case further. Now if she feels that the rock belongs to her legally, she can take the case to the courts to have them rule on the dispute. As for the brutality of the case it seems excessive, but again she can go to the courts to challenge the police conduct.

Editor's note: Where has she been accused of "stealing" the Moon rocks?

She has not been accused of theft as she might not have stolen it. It is still
illegal to be in possession of stolen goods. Talk to any pawn shop. If the
police identify stolen property in their possession they will confiscate it
and the pawn shop will loose whatever money they spent on the item. In this caseI would guess that she got arrested so that the rock could be recovered and that NASA has credible evidence that the rock belongs to them and was given to
someone (maybe her husband) without the agencies blessing (i.e. stolen).
No charges is file and probably will not be filed since the rock has been recovered and the case is not worth pursuing in the eyes of the owner (after all she didn't steal it, she just refused to return it when asked).

When NASA and NASA OIG determined that she was in possession of a moon rock they must have approached the appropriate agency (police, local prosecutor, judge) and presented a case to get a warrant. The police will not arrest someone like this without such a warrant. And a warrant for an arrest has to be backed up be credible evidence that the complainer is in the right. So for her to be arrested NASA had to have accused and successfully argues and presented evidence to someone with the right authority that she was selling stolen goods. Note that nowhere in the story it is challenged whether they had the warrant to arrest her, they claim that it was excessive force and should not have been done in public.

Editor's note: she has not been accused of stealing anything or selling anything that she knew or thought was stolen. She claims that the rock was given to her husband. Her husband is now dead so we can't ask him about this. When she contacted NASA and asked about selling the rock NASA did not tell her that it was illegal to do so or claim ownership of the rock - they had a perfect opportunity to do so and they did not tell her. Not every American knows all of the laws pertaining to NASA and moon rocks. NASA failed to inform someone when they inquired.

Look at the story http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/24/joann-davis-74-nasa-moon-rock-sting_n_1028160.html

In paragraph 8 it uses the words "search warrant affidavit" is used. That means that the inspector generals staff went in front of a judge to obtain a warrant, and clearly in the course of that accused her of being in possession of stolen goods and convinced a judge that they had enough evidence to get the warrant. This was not done on some whim.

Further down, she lady says that the rock was given to her husband by Armstrong, but he denies that. Again that to me is evidence that some investigation happened. She later acknowledged that the rock was not sellable on the open market, so that probably led the agency to fear that she might sell the rock before they could get her, thus initiating the sting operations.

Now, like I said before there seems like the police arresting her might have used excessive force. But as far as I can tell NASA and the OIG went by the book on this one. They did nothing different than most law enforcement agencies would do. Should they have told her that it was illegal? Maybe, but there might have been fear that she would drop of the radar and sell the rock before they could get to her and recover it.

"NASA and the OIG went by the book on this one." Really? Why didn't they report the rock encased in lucite stolen. Why didn't they just ask the old lady to give the rock back and/or make a civil claim? Why insist on "criminalizing" this by choosing a "sting" and making her such aging monetary offer that few would/could refuse. What Book?