U.S. Congressman Alan Grayson (D-Orlando) took NASA Chief Charles Bolden to task in a hearing before the House Science and Technology Committee on Thursday. Charging that the agency was “taking a shot in the dark” by having commercial entities put astronauts into space, Grayson appeared to reject the shutting down of the Constellation program and implicitly, the more ten thousands jobs that would be lost.
After getting Bolden to acknowledge that the Administration had accepted the “Flexible Path” recommendation of the Augustine Report, Grayson challenged him as to why the agency was not moving in this direction, which he said entailed continuation of the Constellation program. Bolden, for his part, noted that budgetary considerations were a major factor in the Constellation Program. Irritated, Grayson asked rhetorically why then was a team assembled to review U.S. human space flights if its recommendations are being ignored?
Grayson showed much exasperation too, when he could not get a clear answer from Bolden as to NASA’s next destination.
See Video of exchange between Rep. Alan Grayson and NASA Chief.
Running out of his allotted speaking time and clearly dissatisfied with the answers provided by Chief Bolden, Grayson opined that NASA’s program was being turned into a “faith-based initiative.”
