Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-01-11 17:30:40

The senator is on-record denying climate change and has regularly pushed for government cutbacks
By Colin Lecher
• on January 11, 2015 03:03 pm
•@colinlecher

As expected, after a major GOP win in the last Congressional election, there's been a shuffling in the ranks of committees, including those that oversee science in government. Next up to chair the Senate subcommittee on Space, Science, and Competitiveness, and thus oversee NASA in the 114th Congress: Texas Senator Ted Cruz.

Cruz has denied climate change exists

Cruz, a republican, has said it is "critical that the United States ensure its continued leadership in space," but his stances on established science will no doubt be concerning: he's gone on record, for example, denying that climate change exists. Cruz has also promoted himself as a Tea Party spending hawk, attempting to slash budgets across the government.

Whether the appointment, which will be confirmed later this month, results in that happening to NASA remains to be seen. Cruz serves a constituency in Texas, home of many NASA employees who would likewise hope to see America's "continued leadership in space." But on that front, there is some history. In July 2013, Cruz attempted to amend a spending authorization bill so that it reduced the amount of funding for NASA, only to have the amendment shot down along party lines.

Cruz will also have some new GOP company in other subcommittees for the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee. Marco Rubio, a Florida republican, will chair the subcommittee overseeing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

JoshNH4H · 2015-01-12 16:18:26

From The Verge

I'd have to say that the appointment of a Senator who's supported cutting NASA's budget to the position of chair of the Senate Space, Science, and Competitiveness (Formerly Technology, I think) subcommittee is a bad thing.

Also, moved to space policy.

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-01-12 18:28:20

JoshNH4H wrote:

From The Verge
I'd have to say that the appointment of a Senator who's supported cutting NASA's budget to the position of chair of the Senate Space, Science, and Competitiveness (Formerly Technology, I think) subcommittee is a bad thing.
Also, moved to space policy.

Should help Space X though, it has landed a first stage on a barge, if it can succeed in recovering stages like that, it can reduce launch costs, this can more than make up for any cuts in NASA's budget. How much do you think the Saturn V would have cost if we could have recovered the bottom stage and reused it, and simply manufactured new upper stages? Besides, NASA was one of those agencies the Democrats never had trouble cutting, along with Defense. This is the 21st century, we need to get the cost of space travel down, then it wouldn't matter what NASA's budget was. I think the first people to walk on Mars may indeed be private citizens rather than government employees, it will be more like settling the West.

GW Johnson · 2015-01-12 19:01:05

Not all of us in Texas think well of Ted Cruz. I find him to be a total embarrassment to the state of Texas. Too bad so many of my neighbors fell for his nonsense that he got elected.

GW

SpaceNut · 2015-01-12 19:31:24

Thats true of all states as here is another article that captures his ignorance.... http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015 … a-congress

Excelsior · 2015-01-12 20:22:30

Who else will be more outspoken on the pork barrel nature of the Orion/SLS programs?

Who will fight harder for American leadership in space, independent of imperialist Russian influence?

Last edited by Excelsior (2015-01-12 22:29:39)

JoshNH4H · 2015-01-12 20:30:36

Presumably someone like the outgoing subcommittee chair, the US Senator from Florida Bill Nelson, who was an astronaut aboard STS-61 in 1986 and had the rank of Captain in the US Army.

Excelsior · 2015-01-13 10:21:27

JoshNH4H wrote:

Presumably someone like the outgoing subcommittee chair, the US Senator from Florida Bill Nelson, who was an astronaut aboard STS-61 in 1986 and had the rank of Captain in the US Army.

And how's that been working out for us?

JoshNH4H · 2015-01-14 01:47:38

Not great, although no worse than any other federal agency, and NASA did actually get a significant budget increase recently.

I don't think someone with a history of trying to cut NASA's budget is going to be good for NASA in this position.

JoshNH4H · 2015-01-14 19:40:20

From BusinessInsider:

Ted Cruz's Plan For NASA Is Epic

"Texas has a major stake in space exploration," he said. "Our space program marks the frontier of future technologies for defense, communications, transportation and more, and our mindset should be focused on NASA’s primary mission: exploring space and developing the wealth of new technologies that stem from its exploration. And commercial space exploration presents important new opportunities for us all."
"We must refocus our investment on the hard sciences, on getting men and women into space, on exploring low-Earth orbit and beyond, and not on political distractions that are extraneous to NASA’s mandate," Cruz continued. "I am excited to raise these issues in our subcommittee and look forward to producing legislation that confirms our shared commitment to this vital mission."

I still don't trust him, but this sounds like a good start.

GW Johnson · 2015-01-15 09:39:36

Cruz is nothing but a self-promoter and publicity hound, but with enough legal education to make him dangerous.

He tells audiences only what they want to hear, so they'll vote for him. Speaking in Texas, he promotes space stuff. In DC, it's cutting budgets. See why he seems to say different things?

He also will do anything, no matter how bizarre, for publicity. He's really good at that. But not at governance.

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2015-01-15 09:40:53)

SpaceNut · 2015-01-15 18:15:50

You do remember the way he tried to filabuster the bills that cause the government shutdown last year due to GOP not wanting passage of Obamacare to stay law.....

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-01-15 23:56:15

GW Johnson wrote:

Cruz is nothing but a self-promoter and publicity hound, but with enough legal education to make him dangerous.
He tells audiences only what they want to hear, so they'll vote for him. Speaking in Texas, he promotes space stuff. In DC, it's cutting budgets. See why he seems to say different things?
He also will do anything, no matter how bizarre, for publicity. He's really good at that. But not at governance.
GW

Why can't you do both? Must one spend like a drunken sailor to prove how responsible he is? By the way, what politician is not a publicity hound? Publicity is how politicians get elected. I don't know a single one that got elected without it! Do you? Another word for Self-promotion is campaigning, which is what a bunch of politicians are doing now, those that don't promote themselves never get elected.

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-01-16 00:05:56

JoshNH4H wrote:

Not great, although no worse than any other federal agency, and NASA did actually get a significant budget increase recently.
I don't think someone with a history of trying to cut NASA's budget is going to be good for NASA in this position.

You know without proper spending discipline that money will simply go into people's pockets without getting anything done. Rich people basically pay politicians to put Federal dollars in their pockets, and the way most Federal dollars end up in their pocket is by doing as little for those Federal dollars as they can get away with. A lot of NASA's spending decisions had to do with what campaign contributions flowed into various influential politicians campaigns, at first when NASA was established. much of this money was spent to beat the Russians, afterwards it was more to enrich campaign contributors, decisions were made like the Shuttle to enrich various contractors, the Shuttle was expensive so the company that built and maintained the shuttle fleet profited from it. There are limits however, other people could think of more wasteful ways of spending money, because NASA was just getting too much done with what it had, each piece of hardware developed was less money because of cost that would otherwise be going into someone's pockets. For example each scientist who got paid was less money for the campaign contributor that wanted to profit off of a government contract. Scientists were there to justify the project so public enthusiasm doesn't dry up due to no results. The contractors did realize they'd eventually have to build that space station, but only after reaping hundreds of billions of dollars in profits from the Federal government spending.

GW Johnson · 2015-01-16 12:11:31

Tom said: "By the way, what politician is not a publicity hound? Publicity is how politicians get elected." I quite agree. But I would add this: The trouble we have now is that campaigning is completely out of control at 90+% of term in office. That's no time left to actually do the job we pay them for. A job which they don't want to do, because of the necessity to extremize everything for purposes of campaigning.

GW

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-01-16 14:54:18

It becomes power for its own sake, not to accomplish anything in particular, just so office holders can wield it. I think we need campaigning so the vote has an idea of who they are voting for, now the people who need to campaign the most are the people who aren't the current office holders. Ted Cruz as you may well know is a potential presidential candidate, and he is competing against more establishment politicians like Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney, who have lots of rich friends that make contributions, Ted Cruz therefore has to call attention to himself, give people who don't know him too well a reason to contribute to his campaign. I think the more challengers there are the better, the more comfortable and safe the politicians feel in their offices, from competition, the worse off we are. I think term limits for all office holders in all three branches of government is a good idea, that would be the Executive Branch, the Legislative, and Judicial Branch of government. Politicians develop ways to stay in office that is counter-productive to the people they are supposed to represent. Most people, when they go to the voting booth will vote for the incumbent if they feel okay and have no complaints, so we need to even the playing field. even politicians that do a good job, should be forced to seek employment elsewhere after a certain amount of time has expired.

SpaceNut · 2015-03-15 20:33:41

As the opening post indicates Ted Cruz does not believe that Global Warming is real.

A battle of interplanetary proportions is brewing on Capitol Hill over Nasa Funding

On one side are Republicans who accuse the Obama administration of taking its eye off the ball by funneling too much money into research about the planet Earth, rather than focusing on distant worlds and stars.
On the other, Democrats argue that the administration’s plan is critical to harness the best of NASA’s talents, protect our planet and consistent with the agency’s wide-ranging mission.
“In the past six years, too much of NASA’s focus has been driven by the political agenda of politicians in Washington rather than the core mission of focusing on space exploration,” said Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who leads the Senate subcommittee on Space, after a hearing on the agency’s budget this week.
“That’s what NASA was created to do and it’s where its energy should be focused.”
In its budget request for fiscal 2016, NASA asked for a total of $18.5 billion, a 3 percent increase from last year.
Of that, more than $1.9 billion is slated to go to earth science programs, which will pay for high-quality mapping and the development of a slew of satellites for monitoring the planet, among other issues.
About $4.5 billion is requested for exploration, meanwhile, including development of rockets to be launched into deep space. Another $4 billion is slated for space operations, including support of the International Space Station.
According to Cruz, that represents a 41 percent increase in earth science funding since 2009, compared to a 7 percent decrease in funding for exploration and operations.

Now no Flame wars.....

Good to see an increase in funding but why do we need the political circus clowns trying to dictate what gets done with it....

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-03-23 08:35:24

As I write this Ted Cruz is announcing his candidacy for President. I think a Cruz Administration will probably spend more for space exploration and less for Earth science. Probably Space-X would do well.

GW Johnson · 2015-03-23 16:20:29

Tom Kalbfus wrote:

As I write this Ted Cruz is announcing his candidacy for President. I think a Cruz Administration will probably spend more for space exploration and less for Earth science. Probably Space-X would do well.

I don't really believe that would come to pass. Cruz's real history is only telling whoever he is talking to whatever he thinks they want to hear. His actual actions bear little resemblance to what he tells various constituencies, excepting the tea party extremist crowd. It's all lies, lies, lies.

He really does act to oppose the Democrats in any way possible just because they are Democrats (not for any valid reason), no matter how much that mode of opposition might actually do harm to the state and the country. This is a man for whom party politics and getting elected outweigh any possible considerations of civic duty. I consider that a violation of his oath of office, and would recommend that oath-breaking be a crime (it currently is not, unfortunately).

Now you know exactly (1) why I consider him to be an embarrassment to the State of Texas, and (2) why I did not, and will never, vote for him.

GW

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-03-23 16:50:40

What do you expect a Senator to do anyway, as a Senator, he only has one vote, and since their aren't 67 other Ted Cruzes in the Senate, he can only use his vote to obstruct bad policy, he can't formulate alternative policy without 66 other Senators who will vote for it. As President he could though.

SpaceNut · 2015-03-23 18:03:10

Not seeing anything good from this..... Next....

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-03-23 20:58:41

It is a simple question, he can answer it, he never said anything specific that he says he wouldn't like about Ted Cruz's Space Policy, just that he doesn't like the man. My point is, since he doesn't believe in global warming, he will not want to spend money studying climate change, that means more probes to other planets instead of Earth monitoring satellites. Do you disagree?

Terraformer · 2015-03-24 09:23:48

Or, it could mean just no money spent on studying climate change, period.

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-03-24 11:28:37

Do you think Ted Cruz would have accepted the chairmanship of the Space Science Subcommittee if he wasn't interested in Space Science? He could have said no to John Boehner, and the Speaker would have given it to someone else. Ted Cruz represents Texas, and Texas has a big NASA facility in Houston. I don't even think Ted Cruz believes that most of the United States problems stems from overspending on space exploration, do you?

GW Johnson · 2015-03-24 16:52:11

Tom:

Logic and common sense have absolutely nothing to do with anything about modern US politics, and this has been true for multiple decades now. You're supposedly grown up, you should know that by now.

Cruz is nothing but a selfish, power-hungry politician. Having any chairmanship of anything is more power. They just gave him the science thing. Could have been anything. Too many of them are just like him: worthless. Not even worth the price of the ammo to get rid of them.

GW

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#1 2015-01-11 17:30:40

Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#2 2015-01-12 16:18:26

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#3 2015-01-12 18:28:20

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#4 2015-01-12 19:01:05

Re: Senator Ted Cruz appointed to oversee NASA in Congress

#5 2015-01-12 19:31:24

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#6 2015-01-12 20:22:30

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#7 2015-01-12 20:30:36

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#8 2015-01-13 10:21:27

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#9 2015-01-14 01:47:38

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#10 2015-01-14 19:40:20

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#11 2015-01-15 09:39:36

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#12 2015-01-15 18:15:50

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#13 2015-01-15 23:56:15

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#14 2015-01-16 00:05:56

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#15 2015-01-16 12:11:31

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#16 2015-01-16 14:54:18

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#17 2015-03-15 20:33:41

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#18 2015-03-23 08:35:24

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#19 2015-03-23 16:20:29

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#20 2015-03-23 16:50:40

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#21 2015-03-23 18:03:10

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#22 2015-03-23 20:58:41

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#23 2015-03-24 09:23:48

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#24 2015-03-24 11:28:37

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#25 2015-03-24 16:52:11

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