Maybe the Emperor's publicists have finally learned how to do their job? How else do you explain the partial release on New Year's Eve of the federal air safety study overseen by the minions? With Congress sipping egg nog at home, and everyone else struggling with Dick Clark's diction (or lack thereof), we doubt many will notice or read about near misses, poor piloting, or equipment failures plaguing our our airways. Mind you, we still haven't seen the entire data set that was promised during the Congressional hearings last fall. We'll likely have to wait for another slow news day for that.
And on this last day of the year, we don't believe we've seen the last of the deceptions, obfuscations, and sheer incompetence exhibited this past year by the Emperor and his henchmen. Like Jerry Lewis and his telethon, we here at RocketsAndSuch are waiting for the day when we can close up shop knowing a steady hand is on the rudder. Unfortunately, we suspect we'll be still here this time next year with high hopes.
Happy New Year from the staff at RandS!
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12 comments:
IT is with much consternation that I comment here today. I happened upon this blog from who knows where. Being in agreement with your belief in a strong space program I thought "Hmm, this could be interesting" and so read a lot of your posts.
My final analysis is Cripes! What a bunch of whining! No one can do anything right. NASA Management is f**cked up and you despise all of them. The new Ares/Orion is f**cked up. Even poor Dick Clark does not escape your wrath.
Yet no where do I see one word of constructive criticism, not one different idea on what should be done. You are obviously very intelligent and seem to know your business, but geez, you sound like a freakin' Democrat throwing endless diatribe against the wall to see what sticks today. WTF? Are you just a disgruntled ex-employee? Did you get fired for f**king up? I mean really. Just what exactly *is* your point? After all, if you're complaining without a solution, you're just bitching.
You do realize they're trying to put a high performance cryogenic upper stage, with a very large and heavy manned payload, on top of an in-line five segment SRB, right? That right there should have been your first hint of something seriously wrong at NASA, way back in September of 2005.
Again I ask: What would you do differently?
I would have done nothing, several very fine launch vehicles already existed, out of development and into operation and underutilized, and in the long run an order of magnitude cheaper to field. Even declaring the Moon and Mars as destinations was a huge mistake.
You realize I have file a COTS proposal, do you not?
So you advocate just staying in LEO forever and abandon space exploration altogether? Just stay with the Atlas and Delta? And no, I must have missed your COTS proposal. What is it about?
So you advocate just staying in LEO forever and abandon space exploration altogether?
Where did I say that? I advocate technical systems that either exist, or if a need exists for their immediate creation, that they be sustainable and affordable.
There is this thing called a budget. Are you even conversant with the salient situations that you have so naively barged into? You really don't sound like you are familiar with the requisite issues, such that it would be worth my while to explain them to you. What I suggest you do is some moderate amount of research first, and then reread every post on this BLOG with your newly acquired awareness of the issues in mind, and then check back with us here when you're done, and then perhaps a rational discussion can proceed. You should really be pleased that someone here is taking the time to inform you of the various inside machinations taking place in what is quite clearly an embarrassing situation.
So you advocate just staying in LEO forever and abandon space exploration altogether?
Where did I say that? I advocate technical systems that either exist, or if a need exists for their immediate creation, that they be sustainable and affordable.
There is this thing called a budget. Are you even conversant with the salient situations that you have so naively barged into? You really don't sound like you are familiar with the requisite issues, such that it would be worth my while to explain them to you. What I suggest you do is some moderate amount of research first, and then reread every post on this BLOG with your newly acquired awareness of the issues in mind, and then check back with us here when you're done, and then perhaps a rational discussion can proceed. You should really be pleased that someone here is taking the time to inform you of the various inside machinations taking place in what is quite clearly an embarrassing situation.
Maybe the editor can clean up the double posts, including this one. There is a bug (a delay) if I post with my user name instead of my email address, even though it gave me an error message - hence the double posts. Sorry. Thanks!
Please forgive my naive barging.
I look at blogs as places to learn (for the most part).
My point is that while I certainly *do* appreciate Rocket Man's knowledge, it gets very hard to take things seriously when it seems that every single post is negative. The constant snarking at the "Emperor" and his "minions" gets tiresome. How about a post of your vision for the future?
The constant snarking at the "Emperor" and his "minions" gets tiresome.
It has been a tired two and a half years of VSE and ESAS, which was doomed to failure from the start.
We're not expecting any of the bad actors to resign any time soon.
How about a post of your vision for the future?
Sigh. You are late to the party.
This isn't my blog, as such, it isn't the proper place to outline my vision of our future in space.
But you'll be able to catch it on the big screen in a few years hence, and after than, in the reruns. In the meantime, I suggest that you keep your eye on this number, it's only getting bigger :
http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/
And, of course, you can follow the links to my website. I took my blog down after two full years, when I filed this latest COTS proposal.
Tim,
Thanks for reading. And here's some answers to your questions. We decided to write this blog because of the very problems that are outlined herein. If you came here looking for sunshine and made-up complements, you are in the wrong place. You can get that spin directly from NASA. Rather, We are trying to point out the problems evident in NASA's execution and talked about within the industry underground. Only when problems are outed can they be begin to be worked upon.
We're not disgruntled employees, nor did we get fired, etc. We have chosen to write in the style of Benjamin Franklin in his early satires. All we can say is that if you don't like the writing, we can't help you there.
As for everything being f'ed up, it is. That is the unfortunate point of this blog. One person has surrounded himself with yes men, ignored technical data indicating upcoming failure, and egotistically stuck with the Constellation architecture despite more effective alternatives. NASA is loaded with excellent technical personnel, but the current leadership is not competent to lead them, as evidenced by the multitude of problems mentioned previously.
Finally, if you read carefully, many suggestions HAVE been offered for how to do things differently. Favor frequency over scale, use existing assets (e.g., EELV), simplify launch abort systems, etc. However, the point of our writings is to illuminate the nature of the beast, and in doing so we hope that people like yourself continue to ask questions of NASA and Government leadership. Questions as to why your tax money is being spent on systems that will have serious technical issues unlikely to be overcome with reasonable expense.
We can't be everything for everbody, as the saying goes, but nonetheless appreciate the comments.
thank you for all your work
now that your time is over
good journey on your future missions
my true heroes of arcadia, my noble warriors of yore
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