NASA COVID-19 Inventions Go To The White House
President Trump and NASA Administrator Bridenstine on Coronavirus Technology Video
Trump: “NASA was dead as a doornail and then we reinvigorated it.”
CSPAN Transcript: “YOU KNOW ALL ABOUT NASA AND WE’VE REALLY DONE A JOB WITH NASA. IT’S BEEN REINVIGORATED. IT WAS DEAD AS A DOORNAIL AND NOW IT’S VERY MUCH ALIVE.”
At the White House sharing @NASA efforts to respond to COVID-19 https://t.co/YuJLTvN9OO
— Bettina Inclán (@BettinaInclan) April 24, 2020
Keith’s note: Yesterday NASA PAO denied access to some media covering the COVID-19 invention press event and sent screwy, broken links to others such that the only way to know what was going on was to listen to a black screen Youtube video with narration as objects where shown to a camera. For today’s White House visit there was no advance notice that this was going to happen. We all learned about this event officially from NASA after the fact when the NASA PAO chief retweeted someone else’s tweet – after news media had retweeted it. It is as if PAO just makes this all up as they go.
NASA can’t even be bothered to post this on their home page (screen grab at 5:33 pm EDT) or on @NASA – but I can post news about it sitting in my basement. Update 25 April 4:30 pm EDT – still no mention at NASA.gov
The device pictured (AMBUstat) was also featured on the local news in Cleveland tonight. It is a shame they are blowing the media relations ( which seems to be more common with non- spaceflight items). They may need the good will in the austere budget environment post- COVID.
There is so much braggadocio surrounding the President that one has difficulty with assessment.
“Dead as a doornail”? The planetary science team might have a different view.
Very often we hear certain claims that the nobody has ever done what the Administration has done. This statement is often made, I believe, with an honesty. It’s simple ignorance. In this context, if the President has no knowledge of NASA’s successes, a statement of previous failure to perform would be accurate. He just doesn’t know.
And why would he know? Didn’t we send to Washington an outsider? Don’t we want the ‘swamp’ drained? How would we expect an outsider to be familiar with the realities of government? Indeed the ignorance of the President was demonstrated over and over during the campaign, interpreted as qualifications. He’s bragged about denying subscriptions to the NYTimes and Washington Post.
Should he know? Different question.