If anyone's interested in reading about NASA administrator Mike Griffin defending science spending cutbacks -- and the challenge to that launched by a figure familiar to many Utahns, Gil Moore -- here's my story. Thanks, Joe Deseret Morning News, Tuesday, August 15, 2006 NASA chief justifies cuts during session at USU By Joe Bauman Deseret Morning News LOGAN - Mike Griffin, NASA's administrator, was feisty in defending the space agency's deep cuts in science projects during a question-and-answer session Monday at the Utah State University Small Satellite Conference. Hundreds of scientists, engineers and students from the United States and other countries gathered in the Eccles Conference Center for the meeting, which is marking its 20th year. When Griffin spoke, the auditorium was packed. Many stood in the doorway or along the walls. In the formal part of his talk, Griffin lauded small satellites, explaining they may do important work in the future - mapping or serving as communications relays for moon and Mars projects. He also talked about gambling on entrepreneurship to handle some future tasks. But during the question-and-answer session that followed, fireworks flew. The brightest sparks came when Gil Moore grilled Griffin about funding student experiments. Moore, a professor who taught at USU and the Air Force Academy before retiring to Monument, Colo., has been a longtime champion of student involvement in space. Among many student projects he has helped with were the Get-Away Specials, the so-called GAS cans that flew aboard the shuttle carrying experiments of budding scientists and engineers. "I respectfully disagree with you that you have to wait until you're an employee of an aerospace company to start getting enthusiastic about space, to start learning the discipline that will make a good employee," Moore said. "The generation that you need to be targeting . . . is the educational level of the university student." In the past, USU officials could promise students they were recruiting that by the time they graduated or earned a master's degree in an aerospace field, they could fly an experiment of their own in a GAS can, he said. That was a time-honored program that "went on for 25 years." "There's no present access for students in space," he added. Universities could pay for Russia to fly the experiments, but they don't want to turn in that direction, according to him. "Can't you figure out a way to get us some opportunity to fly on U.S. launch vehicles?" Moore asked. "We're not asking you to pay for the satellites. Just get us some rockets, get us some access to space." The room erupted in applause when he finished. Griffin responded that he has a lot of problems ahead of that one. "NASA cannot be responsible for everything that needs being done in the space community," he said. "NASA is not the galactic overlord of space and shouldn't be." If educators want to negotiate with firms to get students' experiments into space, he added, "I wish you well. But it is not my job to be the broker for those launches." Griffin added that he did not say and does not believe that a student has to work for a company or lab or the government in order to be enthusiastic about space. "I was enthusiastic about space when I was 5 years old," he said. The first question took aim at NASA's deep cuts in science funding. A member of the audience asked Griffin how he reconciles the budget pressures. "It's a difficult thing to reconcile because we are doing fewer missions of any kind than I would like, and we're doing fewer small missions than I would like, if I lived in a well-ordered world," the administrator replied. "But I don't. I live in a NASA world that is defined by the loss of Columbia," he said. Columbia is the space shuttle that blew up on re-entry in February 2003, killing all seven astronauts. NASA's expenses to get the shuttle fleet safe to fly again have amounted to $2.7 billion the last he checked. Meanwhile, the agency did not get extra funding for that process. Also, the U.S. government is committed to finishing the International Space Station, a project he agrees with. "And we shall do so," Griffin said. "It's half done," and it's a big expense. "I live in a world where about 15 minutes after I walked in the door the James Webb Space Telescope community presented with me with . . . an underfunding of about $1.5 billion." The National Academy of Science ranked the orbiting telescope on its highest priority list for astronomy, he said. "I respect the priority and we will complete the James Webb, but the billion and a half comes from somewhere. So that's the world I live in." Speaking of President Bush's decision to replace the space shuttle with the proposed Crew Exploration Vehicle as soon as possible after the space station is finished, Griffin said that is a "direction that I support in the strongest possible terms." It will not happen as quickly as he and many others would like, "but it will be done by 2014," he pledged. Griffin admitted he does not have a good answer for these difficulties. "We gotta do these things in the next few years, and let's just all hang in there and do the best we can," he said. The background to Moore's questions is that earlier, a USU student asked about NASA funding for student projects. "I doubt if there is any," Griffin said. "It simply is not among the top priorities that I have at NASA to fund student experiments. As students you need to learn science and engineering and those disciplines, and then you need to get out among companies or laboratories =85 and continue to learn your trade." That's how to grow in the space business, he said. "It is nice when we can afford to do student experiments in a context of a university. But right now, as strapped for cash as we are, I'm simply not sure that's a luxury we can afford." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ E-MAIL: bau@desnews.com