... but don't actually, you know,
do anything with the science. That might lead to inequality.
Dig this.
"When I became the NASA administrator, [Obama] charged me with three things," NASA head Charles Bolden said in a recent interview with the Middle Eastern news network al-Jazeera. "One, he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math; he wanted me to expand our international relationships; and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering."
Yay! Outreach to the Muslim world! (Is that on another planet? We may get some space flight out of this after all!) Oops! No, we won't.
At the same time, Bolden gave a bleak assessment of the space part of NASA's mission. More than 40 years after the first moon landing, he told al-Jazeera, the U.S. can no longer reach beyond Earth's orbit without assistance from abroad. "We're not going to go anywhere beyond low Earth orbit as a single entity," Bolden said. "The United States can't do it."
I don't know about you kids, but I feel inspired to suffer the ridicule of my jock classmates to study physics and math so I can help Muslims feel good about themselves!
Space flight is a hive of social injustice because some countries can do it and some cannot.
Good to see Obama is charging NASA with the priorities that are in their core competencies. Diplomacy and Public Relations.
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