Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site ames.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!bellcore!decvax!genrad!panda!talcott!harvard!seismo!hao!ames!eugene
From: eugene@ames.UUCP (Eugene Miya)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Re: Sagan
Message-ID: <970@ames.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 6-May-85 17:42:53 EDT
Article-I.D.: ames.970
Posted: Mon May  6 17:42:53 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 9-May-85 02:27:49 EDT
References: <1583@mordor.UUCP>
Organization: NASA-Ames Research Center, Mtn. View, CA
Lines: 31

> From: Dale.Amon@CMU-RI-FAS
> 
> Regardless of what Sagan may have said in print, he and others are lobbying
> hard at this moment to make sure the space station and not their pet
> projects get the knife.
> ...
> Folks, this is all out war. If you want there to be any future for yourself
> and your children, get off your can and DO SOMETHING RIGHT NOW!!!

I feel I have to response to this emotionalism.  [First, I appreciate not have
MY slice of the pie not cut.]  Appealing to individuals and children, come on!

Recently, my Division Chief made the decision to leave NASA.  His prior
experience was running portions of several nuclear research facilities
in CA and NM.  His comment to me was that he found a great deal of
political in fighting within NASA as opposed to the L*Ls.
I suspect that a lot of this is due to the Budget cutting nature of Congress,
the BIG engineering thinking which characterizes NASA, and the fact that 
BIG money only goes to BIG projects.  [Note the case for private space.]

Most of the programs Carl tries to defend: Voyager, Nuclear Winter,
the Planetary Program, are relatively small budget items: factors of $100M,
at most, whereas the Space Station is $5B.  NW can be measured in thousands.
If you want to appeal to Congress, you should not appeal that budgets in
NASA be directed to specific program like the space station.  Instead,
[personal opinion:] cut some of the fat from DOD budgets.

--eugene miya
  NASA Ames Research Center
  {hplabs,ihnp4,dual,hao,decwrl,allegra}!ames!aurora!eugene
  emiya@ames-vmsb.ARPA