Congress to GAO: Illegal Activity at NASA?

Two major fallacies in this argument. Specifically, that
* Stopping the initiation of a contract is equivalent to canceling a contract.
* Defining and describing an alternative plan is equivalent to implementing that plan.

Both are false. This ploy is on very thin legal ice. It seems intended only to stifle the debate rather than win it with reason. The central issue is whether CxP is the best program moving forward, but this gambit does nothing to advance that discussion.

The signatories are almost all only from the NASA center locations. The list pretty much confirms that Congress does not have the traction to stop the Obama redirection.

If they are going to open NASA up to criminal investigations, I hope they cover all aspects, like where a half billion dollars for an off-the-shelf SRB might have gone; how an ATK official got on NASA's payroll as an associate Administrator and immediately gave the sole source contract to his company....

Actually, this argument isn't that far off at all. By not initiating new contracts, we have altered course of where we were going, under the old plan. If we had done this before the Obama announcement, Congress would have asked (and rightly so), "why are you not doing this?

By not initiating these new contracts to take care of the business that was supposed to happen either this fiscal year or next, we are, in effect, going against Congress' wishes...something we would not have done otherwise.

You can spin this one way or the other and we have had many a debate internally regarding whether we ourselves are comfortable with what we are now being asked to do.

It is known that work on certain parts of Constellation has already stopped. The vehicle moves forward, but the support equipment does not. Conveniently there is no NASA hands on that contractor direction.

Right on the money, Libby. That was one of the sorriest episodes in NASA's history.

like where a half billion dollars for an off-the-shelf SRB might have gone;

What are you smokin'? I would like some!

and immediately gave the sole source contract to his company....

There is one reason... ATK is the only American company that can produce this!

Libby,

I don't know anything about the specific scenarious mentioned, but it would seem that an action like this might invite counteraction

like somebody investigating deeper under the CxP hood, somebody doing more than just scratching the surface

it might be interesting if real trained independant FBI investigative types seriously dug in to past CxP activities