Houston loses out on space shuttle prize

Subhead: Obama administration finds another way to screw Texas.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden on Tuesday announced that Space Center Houston will not receive a retired space shuttle. The orbiters will instead be housed in Florida, California, Washington, D.C., and New York City.

Specifically, the space shuttle Atlantis will retire to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Endeavour will be housed at the California Science Center, just outside of Los Angeles.

Discovery, as previously promised, will go to the Smithsonian Institute.

The prototype Enterprise, which is currently housed at the Smithsonian, will be moved to the Intrepid Museum in New York City.

The first human city directly addressed from another world, and in which astronauts have trained for decades, and from which shuttle missions were controlled, loses out to New York City? With the loss of the shuttle, Houston loses out on a major part of its history, and millions of dollars in tourism every year.

And don’t say politics had no role in NASA’s decision. Politics plays a role in far too many NASA decisions. I spent eight years on one of its flagship projects, so I’m all too aware of where the science can give way to less lofty concerns. Among the sites that were under consideration to house a retired shuttle, Houston stands out for being in the nation’s largest and deepest red state. Florida is a swing state where Obama currently trails badly. This decision stinks of politics, and it’s a travesty.

Update: And we get this news on the 50th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s space flight. Obama disses a red state on the date of a Red state’s space triumph. Lovely. Really lovely.