Ah, The Revolving Door in Washington
Key Senate NASA Staffer Moving on to Lockheed Martin, SpacePolicyOnline
“Ann Zulkosky, the top Senate Democratic staffer dealing with NASA issues on the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, is leaving to join Lockheed Martin. Zulkosky is a member of the Democratic professional staff of the committee, which is chaired by Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV). Rockefeller is retiring at the end of this Congress and committee staff changes are common when the chairperson retires. Zulkosky has been handling a variety of science issues, but is best known in space policy circles for her work on NASA issues with Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL), who chairs the committee’s Science and Space Subcommittee.”
She seems fairly knowlegable. Unfortunately nothing can shake Senator Nelson’s fascination with “the big rocket”. But with rare exceptions astronauts have not made the best agency or center managers.
Ah Ann, CASIS and the ISS will miss you. 🙂 I enjoyed all of those fun meetings with you.
Keith,
This is not really an example of the “revolving” door. Ann is not going back into industry after a brief tour in government. She’s making one transition to industry. Furthermore, she’s not going to Lockheed to lobby the Congress… she’s going to work in the Washington office, interfacing between NASA headquarters and the Orion (and perhaps other key spaceflight) projects inside Lockheed.
I’m certainly going to miss her razor-sharp questions and humor when visiting the Senate. Lockheed is lucky to get her.
– Jim
What a bunch of baloney. She might not officially be lobbying, but I know this woman and know how much of a people person she is. Anyone who says she isn’t going to user her DC connections is lying through their teeth.
The bottom line is that she is a people person. She makes the baby boomers in congress happy and keeps the cash flowing. If Lockheed is hiring her for technical skill, they are making a mistake.
She is not dishonest. Not at all. She works hard, is very smart, and will do a good job wherever she works. I have no suspicions whatsoever about her.
I never said she was dishonest. I do have concerns about her role and background though.
Taxpayers continually get ripped off with these types of employment relationships. Granted if congress wasn’t so corrupt, this wouldn’t matter.
Not everyone in America has an inside the beltway perspective and attitude on how this all works, Jim. In fact 99.999 of the people affected do not. All they see is that people move from Congress and government to the private sector – one way and two way – far too easily – far too swiftly.
This wouldn’t apply to her, but there is (or was) a law against civil servants leaving government work and taking a job with a government-funded company. I believe a few years had to pass before they could do so. They didn’t want government employees being influenced by the prospects of a future job.
So what’s the alternative? Have her stay on the Hill til retirement? Or have industry unable to hire people who actually know how Congress works? This isn’t a revolving door – its simply a smart person getting out of a disfunctional work environment that is soon likely to get worse!