Whenever you read a Keith Cowing report you have to remember that his fundamental bias was in support of SFF and Tumlinson: in other words, kill the shuttle, kill the ISS, and then used the money "saved" to fly men to Mars. It harkens back to his youth and the Apollo program, when the US went it alone. All of his reporting is colored by that vision, and his view of himself in it as the saviour of NASA. (The last I heard, Walt Anderson was still in jail.)

The curious thing about this piece is Keith's repeated mention in it of Paul Shawcross. Note that Shawcross came out of OIG, especially financial and information systems (where he certainly would have stumbeld across TMIS) and he was very critical of NASA safety lapses. He also worked in shuttle improvements, which would certainly have brought him into contact with ATK.

While Keith supports the end of the shuttle, and really wants to kill ISS (look for his intense coverage of the Iran Nonproliferation Act to begin soon), my guess is that he is upset to find out that W. is serious about returning to the Moon. It is certainly his hope to kill the return to the Moon, and he will protect those working to do that.

I have not read Keith's book on the VSE yet, but I am pretty sure he is baffled as to exactly how returning to the Moon came to the President's attention. I am pretty sure that in his account somehow it just magically appears despite his and his cronies best efforts to see that only manned Mars flight was considered.

I suppose one could read all of Keith's reports and nail down his contacts if one was really interested in doing it. I don't have the time and could really care less. The OMB staffers can be called down to the Hill if necessary, and the Space Subcommittee will do that if they have to.

Another thing to remember about Keith's reporting is that everything is always a crisis. There are people looking out for Europe's interests here, and you can be sure that the are working the problems caused by the Columbia disaster.

Back to the Moon, this time to stay, and then on, on to Mars.