What It Was Like When Rome Was Burning
Jeff Bezos getting the href=”https://twitter.com/HeinleinPrize”>@HeinleinPrize award tonight donating $award to @sedsusa ! pic.twitter.com/MIA8gGrntU
— Sirisha Bandla (@SirishaBandla) September 15, 2016
Keith’s note: Rich people giving each other awards. I rented the National Air & Space Museum – twice – for NASA In the late 80s as a NASA contractor employee. I have been to a bunch of them over the years. I know what these receptions cost. This one was easily $50K – and most of the money went to caterers. To his credit, Jeff Bezos gave his $250,000 award to SEDS (Students for the Exploration and Development of Space) – an organization that Bezos once belonged to as a student. If only these rich people could skip the overhead that goes with these dress-up events and write checks to organizations that matter. The cost of this reception alone could have put someone through college. I get invited to this thing every year and refuse to attend.
The space community has convinced itself that it needs to have parties like this to make themselves feel good about whatever it is they do. Instead of receptions in fancy museums in DC why not write the checks that would pay for that party to fund students, small start-ups, and other “little” things that will have an actual difference. 99.999% of americans have no idea who the space elite are or what they do. Regular folks worry about their jobs and their kids’ future. The space community needs to pivot away from this self-indulgence and focus on the taxpayers who pay for all of their toys. As long as the populace sees no clear value to space exploration and has no personnel connection to it they are not going to rise up to save it when budgets start to get thin.
One candidate for the presidency has wondered aloud whether potholes and crumbling infrastructure should be given priority over more funds for NASA. To be honest, in the minds of the vast majority rational folks who work hard every day to feed their families, better roads to cut their commuting times are far more likely to be seen as having an effect on their lives than some rocket to another planet. And yet the space people have big parties that they invite one another to.
This must have been what it was like when Rome was burning.
Hi Keith,
I am just speaking as a devil’s advocate, because I understand your feelings. However, I think these monstrosities (is there a better word?) are put on because the rich attendees will give more than the program costs. If it costs $50k and it leads to $250k of donations, then it is a win. Without the gala, I assume the award is basically announced in a press conference. The last time I checked, no one wrote a donation check at a press conference.
Basically, I guess this is a spend money to make money type of thing.
On the other hand, I could be completely wrong and this is all an ego trip by the richer patrons……
I tend to agree with you, I see these as fund raisers in a way. Seeing how the Presidential campaigns have “Fund Raisers”, where they could just have press conferences validates and justifies to a degree the need for these things, cause at the end of the day egos need to be stroked.
Or it could be both a spend money to make money thing and a rich patron celebration. But if you’re going to go all Robin Hood, why stop here? OSIRIS Rex is going to do amazing science – yet millions in India lack clean water; why not spend the money there? There will still be primordial asteroid material to study once that shortage is solved.
I’m not really advocating this – just dumping money doesn’t solve problems as our Afghanistan “rebuilding” projects demonstrate. But being overly parsimonious about galas and similar events versus scholarships is equally penny wise and pound foolish – who knows if that OSIRIS Rex mission will inspire a student to become an engineer who solves water shortages forever. So don’t go if you don’t like that kind of thing but don’t dump on Bezos – his passion is changing the world.
Whoa….I was not dumping on anyone. Merely postulating a possible reason. First sentence…devil’s advocate…..
I have no intention or desire to Robin Hood anything.
Actually, I was reacting to Keith’s posting – sorry for any confusion!
No worries….
Here is the invitation I got on 24 August 2016. No one has been asked to donate. “The Trustees of the Robert A. and Virginia Heinlein Prize Trust cordially invite you to attend the third awarding of the Heinlein Prize for Accomplishments in Commercial Space Activities to Jeff Bezos on Wednesday, September 14 at 7:00 pm at the National Air and Space Museum at Independence Ave. and 6th St. SW. The event will feature the awarding of the $250,000 Heinlein Prize to Jeff Bezos for his development of liquid rocket engines and associated space infrastructure through his commercial spaceflight company, Blue Origin. The evening will include a conversation with Mr. Bezos, as well as a wine reception, dinner, museum tours, and dancing. Please RSVP by September 7 to [email protected]. For inquiries, please contact Diane Smiroldo at [email protected] or (703) 819-1963. Black tie optional. This event is intended to comply with applicable Congressional and Executive Branch gift rules.”
Well, there you go. I told you I was probably completely wrong…..
And I am okay with that.
It’s partly that; it’s also partly an opportunity for donors to rub shoulders with policy makers, and I suppose that’s what bugs people.
Of course, it helped pay for college for the caterers’ kids…
Then give the caterer’s kids the money directly and not have their employer, the Smithsonian, and Heinlein Foundation take overhead costs out.
I’m having trouble understanding your position on this, Keith.
I understand your point about event costs better spent more directly. Fine.
On the other hand, these events, glitz and all, represent opportunities for actual human interaction among people somewhat disparate in daily life. This is good.
But follow me here: The dysfunction we see at the Federal level is due in large part by the failure of the President/Congressional leaders to find a way to actually know each other, for instance; and the tendency of congresscriters to leave Washington rather than actually talking/playing/living together during off hours, a salubrious standard recognized before the modern era and with benefit to all.
It’s worth the cost.
These people already see each other several times a week here in DC. They also have telephones. Trust me, they interact just fine without the parties. My opinion is based on 30 years living and working in the DC culture. Yours is not.
Even caterers need to make a living.
Then give the caterer employees the money directly and not have their employer, the Smithsonian, and Heinlein Foundation take overhead costs out.
but that’s no fun. Even stiff shirts like to have an evening out. Socializing with your colleagues is a nice way to build camaraderie. I don’t particularly enjoy it, but forming relationships outside of official business is important.
Keith,
I understand you’re angry and frustrated… God knows I get that way too. But last night was NOT one of those aerospace industry soirees where marketing types gather to celebrate their collective bilking of the American taxpayer in the name of having a civil space program, with a donated scholarship as “charity perfume”.
This was a celebration of Jeff Bezos and the Blue Origin Team’s development of a family of rocket engines with private dollars, engines which they are selling to other companies as well as using themselves to help build an entire industry. And the discussion with Bezos continued to illuminate his philanthrocapitalist goals for investing his own money in building a space company.
It is important for those of us struggling to get off this rock to create opportunities to rest, swap war stories, and bind each other’s wounds so we can go back to our respective battles renewed with the fellowship and inspiration of our comrades in arms. After all, we need to ensure that we keep fighting, and have the spirit to win, if only in the name of those dear friends who didn’t make it to the final victory. God knows there’s been enough death in our lives this year… we need to take time to celebrate real victories when we can.
Besides, where else would you see a billionaire holding his shiny new sword — a real metal saber instead of a “light” one — asking the audience if anyone knew where to get a scabbard… and some wag in the audience suggests his own website, Amazon.com?!
Ad astra,
– Jim
The space community has convinced itself that it needs to have parties like this to make themselves feel good about whatever it is they do. Instead of receptions in fancy museums in DC why not write the checks that would pay for that party to fund students, small start-ups, and other “little” things that will have an actual difference. 99.999% of americans have no idea who the space elite are or what they do. Regular folks worry about their jobs and their kids’ future. The space community needs to pivot away from this self indulgence and focus on the taxpayers who pay for all of their toys.
I hate to say it, but I’m not sure it’s the “space community” that has “convinced itself that it needs to have parties like this to make themselves feel good about whatever it is they do” and “needs to pivot away from this self indulgence.” How many other aspects of American culture could be described with those words? The Academy Awards, for example? There is a confusion between “big, visible and expensive” and “important”, and it isn’t just the space community who are confused about that.
So you are saying .. for the VERY tiny amount, in relative terms, of 50k I can assemble in one room a bunch of billionaires for networking, ptiching ideas, etc?
Sounds like a bargain to me.
I usually enjoy reading your insight but over the past couple of months some of the rants are nonsense.
I guess its time for you to find another website to read. Have a nice day.
You still have my clicks. I enjoy they articles you highlight and link to.
If most of the money in the space community comes from the taxpayers. Then in some sense these parties are financed by tax payers.
Maybe the Heinlein Prize is different but certainly the AIAA or IAC or the space prom or … would not happen if the tax payers were not footing the bill. I find this disturbing.
Follow the money
The taxpayers are paying. So what? I’m distressed that somehow every federal/state/local employee is accountable personally to every citizen. It doesn’t work that way, nor should it.
If the phrase ‘taxpayers…lotting the bill’ is some sort of a stand-in for judicious use of public money, then fine.
It is not the civil servants that are perverting the system they are just trying to follow the twisted and arcane rules.
The system is broken when these types of excesses are paid for with taxes. Which happens when a company who earns most of its money from the government sponsors these events. Strangely I am OK with it when Amazons takes its profits and spends on such things but not when a Lockheed or a Raytheon or Boeing. Maybe it is a blind spot I have
Thanks for the reminder about the richest man ever in the Roman Empire, a name I knew well some decades ago studying classics but doesn’t really roll off the tongue.
And you are so right- the lack of knowledge generally in our shared history is appalling- if that’s your point. There’s a sensibility that Romans and Greeks and Minoans were somehow not as capable or as ‘modern’ as we are. Nothing could be further from the truth; they were just like us, exactly like us, wanting to have a good life and a better life for their kids.
And that is why it is important to know something about history. Which is why we are so screwed today in so many ways when there is much to learn from the experience of our ancestors who were in many ways far more civilized than we are today.