Frederick Gregory as NASA Administrator?

Unlike some other people who have posted here (e.g. Keith Cowing or Jim
Oberg), I have absolutely no access to NASA or Washington rumors about
who might be the next NASA Administrator. From the safe vantage of zero
inside information, I would think that the Bush Administration is sorely
tempted to appoint Frederick Gregory, the acting NASA Administrator, as
the next de jure NASA Administrator. They picked the current NIH and NSF
directors in exactly this way. One reason for these "pocket appointment"
might be just to avoid nannygate spectacles. Be that as it may, Gregory
(no relation to yours truly) also has the political advantages of being
African-American and having a military resume.

Gregory is neither a rocket engineer (like Dan Goldin) nor a professional
bureaucrat (like Sean O'Keefe). He is an astronaut. There are many
astronauts in high places at and near NASA these days. Some people have
said that astronauts have a lot of political influence over space policy.
I would expect Gregory to generally do what the astronauts want.
So what do they want? They like the space shuttle, the Winnebago of
manned spaceflight that can fly 7 astronauts several times a year.
They have little reason to like the CEV, which (a) might be more like
a barrel than a Winnebago, (b) might only hold 4 astronauts, (c) might
only fly once a year or so, and (d) doesn't exist. That last one is a
killer; an enormous corps of astronaut trainees have been waiting for
years for their turns in space.

Even though Bush is supposedly drawing the curtain on the space station
and space shuttle, it has led to strikingly little commotion in the
space station and space shuttle establishments. People like Frederick
Gregory and William Gerstenmaier are (at least publicly) treating the
VSE as business as usual. Especially if Gregory is appointed, their
complacency would seem to reflect the real truth of the VSE.

--
/\ Greg Kuperberg (UC Davis)
/ \ Home page: http://www.math.ucdavis.edu/~greg/
\ / Visit the Math ArXiv Front at http://front.math.ucdavis.edu/
\/ * All the math that's fit to e-print *