The Queen Of All NASA Media | NASA Watch: Today a NASA Watch reader made a very insightful comment about the many messages within the Space advocacy community, which range from support, to the removal, of NASA Administrator Mike Griffin. Phil poses the question of how can we expect the public to get behind Space if Space advocacy community can’t even agree on anything concerning manned Space exploration?
Phil’s insightful point goes to the central problem the Space advocacy community has of being “off-message”, ranging from “Kill it because it’s not perfect!” to “Love it because it’s all we have!”. This bipolarity has only contributed to the problem of confusing the general public, and by extension their representatives, about getting behind (an albeit imperfect) Space program and the funding to complete that program, thus helping the enemies of the Space program to kill it. This is the reason Mike Griffin raised the subject of self-censoring by the Space community of those voices that do not support VSE or try to distract it with alternatives.
We need a consistent message presented to the public of publicly supporting the manned Space program as it is presently constituted while behind the scenes talking with NASA about concerns, and any recommendations to solve those concerns, that we might have. Yes, the community is very passionate. But we are also smart enough to channel our passion so that it is (hopefully) constructive to achieving the goals we all have, of exploring Space.”