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Author
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Topic: Senator Edward Kennedy's position on NASA
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BMckay
Member Posts: 3218
From: MA, USA
Registered: Sep 2002
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posted 07-18-2015 05:03 PM
   
Was Senator Edward Kennedy a friend, a foe or neutral about the space program and NASA?
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pupnik
Member Posts: 114
From: Maryland
Registered: Jan 2014
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posted 07-18-2015 06:34 PM
Probably leaning towards foe. NASA tended to be an easy target for him when he wanted more social spending. He was also one of the loud voices about scaling back NASA in the late 60's/early 70's. |
Fra Mauro
Member Posts: 1586
From: Bethpage, N.Y.
Registered: Jul 2002
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posted 07-19-2015 02:37 PM
Definite foe. |
randy
Member Posts: 2176
From: West Jordan, Utah USA
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 07-19-2015 03:41 PM
I agree. Definite foe. |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 42981
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 07-19-2015 04:15 PM
Interestingly, Ted Kennedy's election to the Senate and NASA's history are intertwined in the form of the Electronics Research Center in Cambridge, the only major NASA center to be closed. The Electronics Research Center was at the heart of political controversy from the start. The conception, siting, and shutting down of the ERC is an engaging political tale. President Kennedy and Webb kept the project out of the budget process until after Ted Kennedy's successful first election to the Senate. His campaign slogan had promised that he could "do more for Massachusetts." After the President belatedly put the ERC project in the budget process, Congress rebelled. In addition to Republican members, Representatives from the Midwest and other regions feeling swindled out of the NASA largesse repeatedly fought efforts to fund the ERC. The issue split the Congress along both party and regional lines (Murphy). As a result, the ERC had the most deliberated and defended existence and siting of any NASA Center. Had the ERC remained open, who knows, Sen. Kennedy may have become an advocate for NASA, at least where it applied to the ERC's activities, just as Sen. Mikulski became a steadfast supporter of the Goddard Space Flight Center and Space Telescope Science Institute. |
Go4Launch
Member Posts: 542
From: Seminole, Fla.
Registered: Jul 2003
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posted 07-19-2015 10:52 PM
Sen. Kennedy and then-wife Joan were guests at the Apollo 8 launch. |
Blackarrow
Member Posts: 3118
From: Belfast, United Kingdom
Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 07-20-2015 02:54 PM
Is it true or apocryphal that Ted Kennedy declined an invitation to the launch of Apollo 11, which would probably have been followed by a visit as a guest of honour to Mission Control, because he was going to a party on Martha's Vineyard, where he met a girl called Mary Jo...? |
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