Still Waiting For Bridenstine (Update)
Keith’s update: Sources report that Bridenstine’s confirmation hearing will be on 1 November.
Keith’s update: Still no word as to when the confirmation hearing for NASA Administrator nominee Rep. James Bridenstine will be held. There has been no change to this nomination status page for Bridenstine – nor is there any update to this matrix of pending nominations or on the hearings calendar for the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.
A date in the last week of September had been penciled in but this was pushed back 2 weeks so that Sen. Nelson and others could deal with a backlog of hurricane-related issues. Since then things have been delayed further. Sen. Rubio still has issues that seem to point back to the 2016 primary season. Meanwhile Sen. Nelson is digging his feet in in terms of opposing Bridenstine and now wants to delay the confirmation hearing indefinitely on the whole climate change issue.
Meanwhile, Bridenstine has been at NASA Headquarters to start the confirmation preparation process. Headquarters veteran Tom Cremins and newcomer Brandon Eden (both with extensive Capitol Hill experience) are in charge of those confirmation hearing preparations.
It is unlikely that Bridenstine will face any significant push back with the exception of prior statements he made with regard to climate issues – with the exception of those Senators who focus on these issues. It is important to note that it is one thing to make public stands that resonate with the conservative district in Oklahoma who sent you to Congress. It is quite another to represent the planetary scope of the research conducted by NASA along with NOAA and other agencies. Already a pivot is in evidence wherein Bridenstine has made blunt statements about seeing climate change with his own eyes in the arctic and trying (perhaps not successfully) to link climatological studies on Earth with those done on other planets. I expect that his discussion of this topic will settle at a point that balances Administration policy and the compelling body of scientific work resident at NASA and elsewhere.
It is all but a certainty that Bridenstine will pass through the committee’s confirmation hearings on (at least) a party line vote and that full Senate confirmation presents few if any obstacles. I have yet to encounter a single person who does not personally like Bridenstine – indeed everyone he’s interacted with seems to think that he’s just the sort of young energetic, space supporter that the agency needs right now. Those who think that someone else should be picked due to a lack of an over scientific background on Bridenstine’s part should look back at recent history and ask themselves what happened the last time we have a rocket scientist at the helm and what happened when a professional government manager was in charge.
Right now NASA has all the science and technology smarts that it needs. All that Bridenstine has to do is walk out his door on the 9th floor and he can find it within a few minutes. What NASA does lack right now is someone at the top with the support of both the President and Vice President – someone with a vision, the energy, and hands-on political experience in Congress so as to maneuver NASA through this historically chaotic time. Bridenstine has been the heir apparent since last Fall. Contrary to the usual process where names come and go Bridenstine’s name sat steadfastly at the top of the list for 9 months. This suggests both confidence on the part of the Administration – and lack of a viable candidate from Congress and the space community.
Bridenstine is going to have to do some heavy lifting from the onset. Luckily (it seems) Robert Lightfoot will return to his prior job at NASA HQ where he has been de facto COO of NASA for a number of years making sure all of the trains run exactly on time. Lightfoot did this while the agency’s most recent deputy administrator was on perpetual travel with no known responsibilities and the administrator was similarly doing his victory lap. Lightfoot kept the lights on.
The National Space Council will eventually issue forth something with the word “policy” on it – but this will take a year or more if past experience is a guide – especially with all of the agencies involved. Bridenstine can’t wait for that. He is going to have to take what is sitting on his plate and cobble it together into a cohesive plan. He has to find a path that balances commercial space with SLS/Orion development, planetary- space- and earth science, aeronautics and technology, and education such that all of NASA’s chartered responsibilities get the support that they need. And all of this needs to be in synch with both White House pronouncements and congressional oversight.
Ideally, this all needs to be collected together into a simple, basic paradigm under which the agency conducts itself. Are we still doing #JourneyToMars or is it going to be #BackToTheMoon instead? And if so will the agency pivot in an integrated fashion or will it fractionate with lots of uncoordinated pivots to keep pet projects alive, make sure that all big aerospace and new space companies are happy, that stovepipes are as tall as they need to be, and that everyone’s sand box is always full?
As accomplished as NASA is, it is running on fumes in many ways – with aging infrastructure and a chronic lack of the requsite influx of new skils – all while the private sector is using their own money to mount space programs on a scale that only countries used to to be able do. Someone needs to pump some energy back into the agency.
Bridenstine does not have the luxury to wait for Scott Pace and Vice President Pence to give him specific marching orders from the National Space Council. Nor should he wait since so many of NASA probelms are self-evident in terms of what needs to be done. He’s going to have to figure that out himself. And he is going to need everyone’s help to do that. Or (once again) y’all can sit there and wait for someone else to make a move or wait until the next guy shows up – or do whatever it takes until your carpool leaves at 3:30.
A generally good analysis though I think one of his biggest challenges is to get the Congress and the Administration to agree on a path forward for these many areas – especially human space exploration. With one party supposedly in charge, that should not be too hard but as we’ve seen in so many other areas, the Republicans do not know how to govern. If VP Pence and Scott Pace can provide a coherent and achievable Administration objectives and funding in the budget request, hopefully Bridenstine can shepherd it through the House and Senate. Of course, that assumes that no Senator puts a hold on his nomination moving forward.
If only it was NASA builds a cislunar gateway with a COTS system and China builds the lander 🙂
Why does anyone think this is a good idea? I think past experience has shown space politics does not work, and I failed to see how China is more capable of building a lander than US commercial space industry.
I think people have picked up on the assumed sarcasm …
Money we have not for a human crew lander
Senator Nelson is up for re-election next year and is currently the only statewide elected Democrat in Florida. Do you think that is a factor in his opposition or at least in dragging it out?
He could think it will help him but I suspect the resistance strategy may backfire. Depends on who is opponent is.
Yes, and if the folks think his delaying of the appointment of a NASA Administrator helps or harms the state. But it appears to be the foremost thing on Senator Nelson’s mind at the moment.
http://www.politico.com/sto…
Florida’s Senate race shaping up as a clash of titans
‘”The way I approach an election, I assume nothing,” Nelson said in April when asked about Scott. “I run scared as a jackrabbit.” ‘
and
“Nelson has also sidled up to one of the state’s most popular Republican politicians, his Senate colleague Marco Rubio. After Hurricane Irma ripped through the state, the pair went to events together throughout Florida, reinforcing Nelson’s campaign theme of bipartisanship.”
Recall that Senator Rubio joined him in objecting to Rep. Bridenstine.
So it is likely the nomination of Rep. Bridenstine, and NASA, are mere pawns in this chess game Senator Nelson is playing. It also provides a motive for encouraging the scientists in Florida to oppose the nomination, (which seemed odd, limited as it was to one state), as it will help his fund rising among environmentalists, and he will need every dime to win re-election.
“It also provides a motive for encouraging the scientists in Florida to oppose the nomination…”
Nelson is a pragmatist on the issue and Scott has not even decided whether he “believes in” climate change.
But Florida scientists think the issue is important because Florida is unusually vulnerable to both hurricanes and sea level rise and because the scientific evidence of human-induced climate change is overwhelming. There might be little objection to Bridenstine as long as he makes it clear in his confirmation hearing that he will not continue the Trump Administration’s attempts to stamp out scientific research on the Earth’s climate. Ignorance is not a solution.
Tying hurricanes and Human CO2 emission together in your post is highly unscientific
It will help Nelson to be seen as giving priority to the climate issue, which is really important in Florida, even to many Republicans. It’s entirely possible that Bridenstine will modify his anti-climate stance, a least publicly, to avoid a contentious confirmation process. Of course NASA policy is still driven by the WH, but this administration now has so many irons in the fire that NASA may not be micromanaged – except by Congress, so in the end Nelson will presumably go along with the appointment.
Nelson will likely be running against Rick Scott, who does not yet know what his views on climate change are, and will arrive at them following the appropriate polls and meetings with various lobbyists. http://grist.org/briefly/fl… so there is no risk to Nelson in taking a strong pro-climate stand.
I think as long as Bridenstine commits to funding the standing army Nelson will eventually go along…or at least not object all that much.
With luck, it could go a bit differently. The phrase, “standing army”, usually means a very large number of people working on one project. I’m not sure of Mr. Nelson’s views, but I suspect he is interested in a large number of people employed in Florida. Higher efficiency and smaller numbers of people per project could mean more projects (or business, for commercial space.) If that means the same number of people employed in Florida, I suspect Mr. Nelson wouldn’t object. A good NASA administrator would be able to convince Senators of that logic.
Nelson probably has good reason to suspect that instead of SLS (which Bridenstine may not be a fan of) option B would include much less money flowing to his standing SLS army, and instead money flowing to Hawthorne, Mcgregor, Boca Chica, and Seattle
Nelson almost certainly has quid-pro-quo deals with senators in Alabama, MD, Utah, and Colorado which requires him to find a reason to dislike a future NASA admin that would be less than supportive of SLS/Orion.
In considering the options available to the Congressman, my thinking returns to the same data points: the portion of the NASA budget consumed by SLS; the portion of NASA programming consumed by SLS; and the inevitable arrival of BFR.
Meanwhile, the smart people at NASA are no doubt watching Hawthorne. There has got to be a pit-of-the-stomach feeling when all of these managers lay out plans using SLS, all the while knowing that
their lunch sack is jeopardized by SX.
Nobody talks about it in public, but everyone knows that there are two massive objects hurtling towards each other. When they collide, careers will suffer. Finger pointing will be elevated to an entirely new dimension.
Eventually the MSP— beyond Mr. Berger — will notice BFR and make the appropriate development and operational comparisons.