Friday, July 31, 2015

Baseless Smear Article: "Opinion: Despite Boozer’s claims NewSpace needs NASA"

Article by Jason Rhian here at Spaceflight Insider: http://www.spaceflightinsider.com/editorial/opinion-newspace-needs-nasa-know/

First inaccuracy:
"Despite Boozer’s claims, NewSpace needs NASA"
Fact:
I never said NewSpace doesn't need NASA and have never believed that.

Another whopper:
"... would be wise to tamp down the “defund NASA” rhetoric"
????
Where did he get the nutty idea that I want to defund NASA?  I have made it plain numerous times over the years that what I and most other anti-SLS advocates really want is for NASA to not be milked by pork-barrel politicians.  Defunding of NASA is the last thing I want.

"The refrain employed by Boozer that NASA didn’t “want” SLS – bears little resemblance with what these officials have stated repeatedly."
OK, I did say NASA didn't want SLS.  It is Rihan's long standing claim that this is not so which is patently false. An article by me with links embedded in its text that lead to documents backing up my assertion can be found here: http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2532/1

Rhian states, "NASA should serve as a pathfinder, with commercial companies taking over operations that NASA has left behind."
A true statement, but not in the way he means.  As I have always stated, NASA indeed should be the pathfinder developing new cutting edge technologies with the commercial companies doing the stuff that has been tried-and-true for so long that it is beneath what NASA should be doing.  The trouble is that SLS is NOT new cutting edge tech and it costs more than it should, as explained in the article by me to which I supplied the link above.

There are many other misrepresentations in Rhian's piece that I do not have time to address.  It is starting to really bother me because this B.S. article now comes up on the first page of results from search engines when they are queried about my name.