From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.policy
Subject: Re: Skeptics put Glenn, NASA under the microscope
Date: 19 Jul 1998 15:39:53 GMT

<<At least two members of Congress have flown on the shuttle: Senator Garn
from Utah, and Congressman Nelson, from Florida. Both, at the time, were
in the critical path of NASA's Congressional funding process.>>

Both were already pro-NASA so their flights were not to "buy" them. However,
both played leading roles in Congress in supporting the NASA push to destroy
the rest of the US space launch industry and monopolize launchings on the STS.

While Garn was hated as a "humorless obsessive", Nelson was kinda liked as an
"amiable dunce". But both grabbed seats that had originally been assigned to
Greg Jarvis, bumping him twice down the schedule and condemning him to death
aboard Challenger.

Don't forget there were MORE space-VIP flights scheduled in 1986 and later,
where working PS's had been bumped by bigwigs.

It should be noted that since 1984 there has NEVER been a real payload
specialist without a backup in training, except the two fake congressional
"payload specialists" -- and Glenn, like them, has no backup in training. If he
can't go for some reason, he doesn't seem to care about his precious "aging
research", does he?

From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.policy
Subject: Re: Skeptics put Glenn, NASA under the microscope
Date: 20 Jul 1998 14:48:50 GMT

<<Steady on, James.  There was no reason to suppose when scheduling
these flights that Mr Jarvis would be killed; only that he'd have
to wait a little longer for his company lottery prize.  I think
"condemning him to death" is too strongly put.  It's a damn shame,
of course.>>

Strong, yes. The contribution is that STS 61-A with Nelson would probably have
been cancelled due to loss of most major payloads if NASA hadn't been worried
about embarrassing itself in front of Congress. So keeping it in the manifest
-- stuffed with every available GAS can -- contributed to the launch pressure
panic for 51-L, IMHO.

From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.policy
Subject: Re: Skeptics put Glenn, NASA under the microscope
Date: 20 Jul 1998 18:34:10 GMT

Regarding the absence of a backup for Glenn as a payload specialist, NASA
officials in Houston are now insisting that this is actually normal, that most
payload specialists on previous shuttle missions didn't have REAL backups
either. I'm trying to get clarification to make sure this isn't a gross
misunderstanding, but if that's their official position, then they are deeply
into historical revisionism, another sign of the ascendancy of political
themes.

From: cass54@aol.com (Cass54)
Newsgroups: sci.space.policy
Subject: Re: Skeptics put Glenn, NASA under the microscope
Date: 20 Jul 1998 22:14:12 GMT

James Oberg pointed out;

>Regarding the absence of a backup for Glenn as a payload specialist, NASA
>officials in Houston are now insisting that this is actually normal, that
>most
>payload specialists on previous shuttle missions didn't have REAL backups
>either. I'm trying to get clarification to make sure this isn't a gross
>misunderstanding, but if that's their official position, then they are deeply
>into historical revisionism, another sign of the ascendancy of political
>themes.

All Spacelab payload specialists had backups, and between 1990 and 1996, so did
the very few non-Spacelab PS.

But Guidoni (TSS-1R), Tryggvason (STS-85) didn't have backups.  Nor does Mukai,
Glenn's fellow STS-95 PS.

Michael Cassutt

From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.policy
Subject: Re: Skeptics put Glenn, NASA under the microscope
Date: 21 Jul 1998 02:25:09 GMT

<<Nor does Mukai,
Glenn's fellow STS-95 PS.>>

Since she rotated in from the recent Neurolab flight backup position, I had
expected another of the Neurolab flown PS's to take the spot of backup. Let's
see if that has happened.

From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: sts-95 JOHN GLENN
Date: 21 Jul 1998 02:33:38 GMT

<<As a first question....i am not from the us but have read that some say that
glenn is being given a free-ride because of some help he gave to clinton during
the elections? can someone tell me what help was this?>>

Two years ago during Senate hearings on campaign contributions, particularly
potentially illegal ones from China, Glenn was pivotal in frustrating the
inquiries, mainly by not going along with grants of immunity to potential
witnesses. Of course, in recent months, much of the more interesting stuff
about the source of a lot of illegal contributions has finally come out. Glenn,
when asked about his role, gets huffy about his personal honor and then dodges
the question by saying, "I never received instructions from Daschle (top Senate
Democrat)". I never talked to the White house about my committee activities."
Of course he didn't have to -- anybody and everybody knew implicitly what the
White house wanted done, and Glenn did it. He carried out this work at a time
when he already was campaigning with NASA for the flight, so since he's not
stupid, he knew that he had to have White House good will -- or at least, no
ill will -- to get the flight. No secret conspiracies and messages passed in
invisible ink are required here, just a politician knowing what it was politic
to do and not do for his own ends, and then carrying through.

From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: sts-95 JOHN GLENN
Date: 23 Jul 1998 00:37:08 GMT

The other cost of Glenn's flight is the seat could have gone to somebody who
might have been able to do more with it, such as another scientist or the
teacher-in-space. Instead, the teacher is condemned to a three-year or more
detour through complete Mission Specialist training, absolutrly useless as far
as the original program mission is concerned. May even be harmful -- the
Spaceflight Participant program was nobly founded on the ambition to fly
DIFFERENT kinds of people with unique insights who may be able to communicate
the space experience better than the homogenized "Stepford astronauts" NASA has
become infamous for producing in its training programs and its cultural
indoctrination. So now, to fly in space, Barbara Morgan must undergo a
three-year Stepfordization process. Glenn's presence I think contributed to
that decision -- at least, I'm about 70% serious!!

From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: sts-95 JOHN GLENN
Date: 26 Jul 1998 12:30:17 GMT

<<I don't know about the pre-Shuttle astronauts, but I've
worked with the Shuttle crews since before STS-1, and this
doesn't reflect my experience at all.>>

They are fine people indeed and mostly are excellent space workers, -- but
regarding their publicly expressed impressions of the space experience, I
suggest they are homogenized, in large part due to cultural pre-selection and
then to training. If you have some counter examples regarding uniquely
expressed insights by astronauts, please share them with us.

From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: sts-95 JOHN GLENN
Date: 27 Jul 1998 01:15:26 GMT

<<That would be Brian O'Leary's book >>

You've -GOT- to be kidding. Brian -- who later made significant contributions
to developing ideas on space colonies, manned flight to Mars and its moons, and
other frontier/fringe science topics, has written a number of intelligent,
interesting books. But he spent only a few months in Houston as an "astronaut"
(what today they call "astronaut candidate") and got no closer to outer space
than either of us.

Please try again.

From: jamesoberg@aol.com (JamesOberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: sts-95 JOHN GLENN
Date: 28 Jul 1998 17:30:42 GMT

<<	(Personally, I've always favored flying as many people as practical on
a flight, the additional cost can be minimal.  As long as they don't get
in the way and can provide some sort of input...  Hence I favor the
Teacher in Space, Reporter in Space, Poet in Space, Walter Cronkite in
Space programs.)>>

I totally agree. If flying the congressmen was part of the 'package deal' that
also involved flying 'observers', I would happily go along. But it's ONLY
congressmen so far. MAYBE we'll get a teacher in space three or four years from
now. We should have had the journalists and the photographers and the artists
and the poets and the gurus and Arthur C. Clarke and Ray Bradbury and other
voices...

(Sigh) So it's the choice, not the concept, that upsets me re the Glenn thing.
AND the level of hypocrisy and make-believe by the top officials who justify
it.

Newsgroups: sci.space.history
From: henry@spsystems.net (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Reinventing the Mercury 7
Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2000 20:39:52 GMT

In article <20000716203633.19046.00000079@ng-fz1.aol.com>,
Michael Cassutt <cass54@aol.com> wrote:
>Glenn's education was actually a big lacking, too, so I would drop him.

Indeed, reportedly one reason why Glenn was eager to go into politics was
that -- quite aside from whether his "we don't want to lose this guy"
grounding would have stuck -- his technical skills were weak enough that
he wasn't likely to be high on the list for later flights, and he knew it.
--
Microsoft shouldn't be broken up.       |  Henry Spencer   henry@spsystems.net
It should be shut down.  -- Phil Agre   |      (aka henry@zoo.toronto.edu)