Clinton & NASA's Fall: Is Bill Clinton responsible for the Columbia disaster?

FrontPageMagazine.com ^ | February 3, 2003 | Lowell Ponte

[Atlas Sneezed]

Clinton blame aside, here is the real point of the article:

Ironically, NASA should be downsized – or, better, completely privatized. NASA, despite the dedication and heroic efforts of thousands of its workers and astronauts, is a socialist institution. The wonder is that the Clintons did not love it more.

By its very nature, NASA monopolization of space for government is a violation of the deepest pioneering, free enterprise values of America.

What sane person wants to see the Moon, Mars – indeed the whole human future as we migrate into outer space – undertaken on NASA’s socialist model?

[Brytani]

As much as I dislike Clinton and do blame him for the security/intelligence failures and the like that lead up to September 11, I can not justify blaming him for this tragedy.

During Clinton's administration we had a GOP congress that continued to cut NASA's budget. Both sides of the political aisle have used money earmarked for space research for other pet projects.

From all indications, the Challenger and Columbia accidents were caused by mechanical failures of some kind. That is where the blame lies, not on any one person.

[timestax]

Nor should we. The Clinton Administration did more than gut America’s defense budgets and devastate our military as no foreign enemy has ever done, tempting terrorists to exploit our weakness. Presidents Bill and Hillary did more than choke off America’s intelligence budget, greatly reducing our ability to detect what potential enemies were preparing to do to our World Trade Center and Pentagon. Bill and Hillary Clinton deserve a large share of responsibility for the destruction of the World Trade Center and the deaths of more than 3,000 Americans on September 11, 2001.

You're darn tootin!!

[My2Cents]

There's an entropy at NASA that has been steady and prevelant since the middle of the Apollo program. Despite all the talk of "America's love affair with the space program," it hasn't really fired the imagination of the nation since Apollo 11. Budget reductions (in comparable dollars) have gone on since the Nixon Admistration, and maybe that's justified since the space program through the Apollo program was involved in a "race" to the moon. Once we'd won the race, the fevered pitch of space exploration subsided, understandably.

But inspite of insipid declarations from previous Administrations (wasn't it George H.W. Bush who set the goal of sending a manned mission to Mars?), space has not been a high priority for any Administration since Lyndon Johnson's. Perhaps George W. Bush should consider what the nation's goals are in space and rededicate the nation to a clear mission.

[Jael]

"NASA knew from the second day of Columbia's 16-day research mission that a piece of the insulating foam on the external fuel tank had peeled off just after liftoff and struck the left wing, possibly ripping off some of the tiles that keep the ship from burning up when it re-enters Earth's atmosphere." http://www.washtimes.com/national/20030203-87326768.htm

http://ltp.arc.nasa.gov/space/team/journals/katnik/sts87-12-23.html
"Damage numbering up to forty tiles is considered normal on each mission due to ice dropping off of the external tank (ET) and plume re-circulation causing this debris to impact with the tiles. But the extent of damage at the conclusion of this mission was not "normal."

The pattern of hits did not follow aerodynamic expectations, and the number, size and severity of hits were abnormal. Three hundred and eight hits were counted during the inspection, one-hundred and thirty two (132) were greater than one inch. Some of the hits measured fifteen (15) inches long with depths measuring up to one and one-half (1 1/2) inches. Considering that the depth of the tile is two (2) inches, a 75% penetration depth had been reached. Over one hundred (100) tiles have been removed from the Columbia because they were irreparable.

During the STS-87 mission, there was a change made on the
external tank. Because of NASA's goal to use environmentally
friendly products, a new method of "foaming" the external tank
had been used for this mission and the STS-86 mission. It is
suspected that large amounts of foam separated from the external
tank and impacted the orbiter. This caused significant damage to
the protective tiles of the orbiter."



http://www.arnold.af.mil/aedc/newsreleases/1999/99-041.htm
"According to NASA, during several previous Space Shuttle flights, including the shuttle launched Nov. 29, 1998, the shuttle external tank experienced a significant loss of foam from the intertank. The material lost caused damage to the thermal protection high-temperature tiles on the lower surface of the shuttle orbiter.

Although the AEDC Tunnel A tests did not replicate the in-flight failures, they did provide detailed measurements to better understand the flight environment and fundamental failure mode. From these tests, NASA determined the failure is caused principally by foam cell expansion due to external heating at approximately Mach 4 combined with pressure change and aerodynamic shear. Specialized miniature shear gages and other instrumentation were installed during the test to measure these forces."

[Kryptonite]

Fact: The Rats are already trying to pin the blame on the current administration. This type of article is a must to combat such skullduggery.

[snopercod]

bump

[RadioAstronomer]

Scientists in their rational minds reject all such notions of jinxes, bad omens and superstition.

To a degree. :-)

I remember on a second must not fail launch (the first one failed), it became almost taboo to shave about 4 weeks prior to launch. The whole flight team, including managers, were sporting a Van Dyke! LOL!

p.s. The launch and subsequent mission was a success.

[RadioAstronomer]

Thanks for the bump. :-)

[PatrickHenry]

I understand that the newest NASA budget has gone up a bit, and I think I've read that some of their funds are being shifted from the shuttle program to other areas of research -- basic research. Not a bad idea, really. The shuttle is old stuff.

[nightdriver]

"Today, as a result, we should regard the Democrats no longer as an "American" political party, but as the wholly-owned subsidiary of a foreign power."

This has been true for the last 50 years at least.

[fish hawk]

If Bush can be blamed for the Hurricanes in Florida why not make Clintoon responsible for the NASA failure?

[r9etb]

Dan Goldin gets my nod as The Biggest Cause of NASA's recent problems. He was appointed by Bush I in April, '92, and was a noted Clinton butt-boy through that administration. He finally left in November, 2001, having left behind him the scattered debris of his "faster, better, cheaper" approach.

[RightWhale]

It isn't just Clinton who shares responsibility for the incoherency of NASA's programs that resulted in the Algore Earthsat. Every President from Nixon on was involved. Dubya has finally restored coherency to NASA, but you need to be a systems analyst to understand what NASA is today. Equal blame can go to Congress as a whole--the monstrous committee. Sagan can have the rest of the blame.

[RightWhale]

It's not socialism. However, the state should ennable private enterprise rather than compete with it.

[Physicist]

Scientists in their rational minds reject all such notions of jinxes, bad omens and superstition.

Legend has it that Niels Bohr kept a horseshoe on his office wall. When asked why it was there, he would say that it was for luck. When the questioner would inevitably object that Prof. Bohr surely didn't believe in such a superstition, Bohr would reply that that was of no consequence, as he had been assured that it would work whether he believed in it or not.

[Calvin Locke]

Sorry, but you can't lay the blame on Clinton for this one. Bush has been president for over two years.

On the contrary. Increased budgeting doesn't mean immediate results. Then, there's the lag time with the Algor
voter-friendly foam.

In any case, Clinton does deserve a great deal of blame for with the space program, helping the Chicoms, bribing Glenn to
derail accountability, etc.

That's not to mention his whoring for votes. The guy never stopped campaigning.

Yes, NASA is a government bureaucracy.

Oh, and didn't Bush-41 appoint the NASA chief Dan Goldin who was quite content to let most of the agency's problems fester?

Plenty of blame to go around.