Obama’s Space Plan: What the Frak is Going On?

NASA's Orion spacecraft - now with 100 percent fewer astronauts

It’s not very clear:

NASA, the White House and Congress have been hammering out the details of a three-pronged plan for America’s future in space. The plan that’s emerging would restore hundreds of skilled jobs that might have been lost due to the retirement of NASA’s shuttle fleet, and would revive elements of the Constellation.

A consensus is beginning to build in support of the revised plan, which will get NASA moving ahead on three fronts.

— “Reshaped spaceflight plan gains support”
MSNBC‘s Jay Barbree
May 7

President Obama’s grand plans for NASA appear in big trouble. Three weeks after Obama told an audience at Kennedy Space Center that he wants to land astronauts on an asteroid by 2025, Congress remains unconvinced, largely because Obama’s proposal also puts commercial rocket companies in charge of getting astronauts to the International Space Station after the space shuttle is retired this year.

Few Democrats have publicly endorsed the entire plan, while opponents such as Alabama Republican Sen. Richard Shelby, who looks after the interests of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, continue to blast the proposal as “unrealistic” and “destructive.”

– “Obama’s NASA plans appear in jeopardy”
Orlando Sentinel‘s Mark K. Matthews and Robert Block
May 6

So far it does not appear the Obama administration’s plan is winning many hearts and minds. A session with a range of space organizations produced a few tidbits, like word that the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate plans to release a bunch of requests for information in the next couple of weeks to get industry input as a Houston-based NASA study panel prepares road maps for human space exploration. Those would replace the Constellation Program, which refuses to lie down and die on Capitol Hill even though President Barack Obama wants to kill it.

NASA Managers Push Plan In Congress, Academia
Aviation Week’s Frank Morring, Jr.
May 11