jim@pnet01.cts.com (Jim Bowery) (06/15/91)
Charles J. Divine writes: >[ bunch of stuff about Traxler/Green porkbarrel deleted ] Complain about Traxler/Green's porkbarrel if you want, but its sort of like a Dr. Mengele complaining about his patients' bad attitudes. Get rid of the really big problems first and the other problems, like SSC and EOS, will be much easier to deal with. That is, in fact, why true porkbarrel devotees are so obsessed with supporting Fred no matter what the cost. In the words of one House staffer (not on the space committee) "It's a fire sale. Everyone is cashing in their chips." The debate was even more intense than the civil rights act! This issue is such a wonderful spot-light, exposing the real evil in Congress for all to see. We're talkin' Judgement Day here. The list of Congressmen who fought for Fred is a distilled and purified essence of why people hate government more than ever. Names are named. The evidence is on video tape. The FBI never did such a well-designed sting operation. >shaping the activities of large corporations. A very considerable part of >the cost in developing and building Fred lies in the current need to play >some very nasty political games (e.g., NASA has learned DOD's trick of >putting a subcontractor in every Congressional district). So.... DON'T BUILD FRED! The only NEED to play some those nasty political games comes from the big project approach to space. Unlike DoD, there is no good reason JSC has to choose activities that require large projects. They could pursue lots of small ones and quickly synthesize enough of a market for space services that the private sector would build the REAL WORKING space industry we actually need. The history of Adam Smith vs Karl Marx and the market vs communism is on my side in this argument and very clearly against JSC and its minions. The fact that aerospace contractors prefer to be spoon-fed government capital rather than risking their own is not sufficient justification to ignore history and stew in this kind of political garbage. When you're 85 years old and still sitting in a high chair drooling Gerbers, maybe it's time to either pick up the spoon and feed yourself or (horrors) RETIRE ALREADY! Lots of small projects also have the political advantage of spreading out the money across districts so as to "buy constituency" but in a way that is difficult to manipulate politically. In other words, you depoliticize space with small diverse projects, but you still have constituency. Combine that with the synthesis of a commercial market, which makes Adam Smith instead of Karl Marx work for you, and you have a compelling argument for axing JSC/Fred et al and going small science, exclusively. >To eliminate the >very considerable waste one sees in political managed activities, I recommend >finding ways of changing the fundamental situation, not wasting time going >after a fairly minor player (NASA) in a very nasty game. Waste isn't the problem. If JSC were simply wasting the money we send it, I wouldn't give a hoot. JSC is, quite deliberately and for obvious reasons, making it virtually impossible to raise real private space capital (as opposed to politically connected space capital). If you want to talk about a "nasty game" talk about THAT game. Kill JSC DEAD DEAD DEAD and we might have a chance of creating markets for space goods and services thereby attracting private capital to the field. Then we could get on with dealing with the real problems that affect our technology competitiveness which related to needed fixes in our securities laws and tax policies -- not which big techno-project to blow our wad on for the next N decades. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Jim Bowery 619/295-3164 The Coalition for PO Box 1981 Science and La Jolla, CA 92038 Commerce -----------------------------------------------------------------------------