From: Mark Goodman <mwgoodman@igc.apc.org>
Newsgroups: sci.space
Date: 01 Oct 92 17:38 PDT
Subject: Re: Space and Presidential Politics
Nf-ID: #R:cdp:1469100016:cdp:1469100018:000:3185
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!mwgoodman    Oct  1 17:38:00 1992


Reply-To: mwgoodman@igc.org

Allen Sherzer writes:

>(quoting Mark Goodman):
>>I would like to comment on some of the more egregious
>>extrapolations that have been made.  For example, Allen Sherzer
>>accuses Al Gore of being insufficiently enthusiastic about the
>>space program because his subcommittee (Science, Space, and
>>Technology) has not produced an authorization bill for NASA in
>>years.  All the action in the Senate takes place in the full
>>committees, not the subcommittees, so this complaint is more
>>properly aimed at the full committee (Commerce, Science, and
>>Transportation) Chairman, Fritz Hollings.
>
>This is simply wrong. According to the rules, the full committee cannot
>act on a bill until the subcommittee reports it out. Gore routinely fails
>to do so therefore the full committee can do nothing. Who told you this
>anyway?

Excuse me, but you are quite wrong.  Bills get referred to committees.
Once they get there, the committee is free to do with it as it pleases.
It may refer it to a subcommittee, or not (the Appropriations Committees --
House and Senate -- are the exception, I believe).  The chairman has great
discretion in that.  Like many important committee chairmen (John Dingell,
Bennett Johnston, etc.), Fritz Hollings does not like to dilute his power
by giving it away to subcommitte chairmen.  In fact, it is quite rare for
Senate subcommittees to do markups on (write) bills.  So the fact is that
Hollings bears the bulk of the responsibility for the Senate's failure to
produce authorization bills for NASA.

I know this because I am working in Congress now.

[stuff deleted]

>>improve their lot while reducing the deficit
>
>Clinton going to reduce the deficit? Come on now, nobody actually
>believes that. Surely you don't?

I didn't say Clinton would reduce the deficit, but that it was a more
important issue than the space program.  I continue to believe that.
I find the pipedreams that human space exploration offers an economic
bonanza incredible, at least for the foreseeable future.  I don't think
such remote prospects deserve great weight in public policy, though I
continue to support modest efforts at space exploration for its own
sake.

However, I do believe that Clinton would do a better job of reducing
the deficit than either of his predecessors, whose performance has
been abysmal.  He has a strong record as a fiscal conservative.

Dennis Wingo writes:

> The Slick Willie plan to "Help the
>Poor" is no more than a regurgitation of the government policies that have
>brought our republic to the edge of bankruptcy.  There are currently 26 million
>people on public assistance.

Dennis Wingo obviously has not listened to what Clinton has actually said.
Clinton proposes to take people off the welfare rolls by 1) giving them access
to job training and 2) requiring them to get jobs after two years on public
assistance, assuming they are not disabled.  In the short run, this will cost
a modest amount of money.  In the long run, it would save money and offer
great benefits to the economy.

I single this out only because I have no time to respond to all the silly
things Dennis Wingo says.

Mark W. Goodman

Newsgroups: sci.space