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Senate Narrowly Confirms Trump's Pick to Head NASA

posted by janrinok on Friday April 20 2018, @07:46PM   
from the when-politics-runs-science dept.

realDonaldTrump writes:

Oklahoma Representative James Bridenstine, a Navy Reserve pilot, was confirmed as NASA's 13th administrator on Thursday.

In a 50-49 vote Thursday, Oklahoma Representative James Bridenstine, a Navy Reserve pilot, was confirmed as NASA's 13th administrator, an agency that usually is kept away from partisanship. His three predecessors — two nominated by Republicans — were all approved unanimously. Before that, one NASA chief served under three presidents, two Republicans and a Democrat.

The two days of voting were as tense as a launch countdown.

A procedural vote Wednesday initially ended in a 49-49 tie — Vice President Mike Pence, who normally breaks a tie, was at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida — before Arizona Republican Jeff Flake switched from opposition to support, using his vote as leverage to address an unrelated issue.

Thursday's vote included the drama of another delayed but approving vote by Flake, a last-minute no vote by Illinois Democrat Tammy Duckworth — who wheeled onto the floor with her 10-day-old baby in tow — and the possibility of a tie-breaker by Pence, who was back in town.

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Original Submission

• Re:It's official Re:It's official (Score: 4, Insightful) by krishnoid on Friday April 20 2018, @10:31PM (4 children)

  by krishnoid (1156) on Friday April 20 2018, @10:31PM (#669830)

  Instead of draining the swamp, Trump has drained all of the intelligence and skill out the State Department, EPA, and now NASA.

  Maybe that's what he actually meant when he talked about 'draining the swamp'. It seems like what we had here, was a failure to communicate.

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• Re:It's official Re:It's official (Score: 4, Informative) by requerdanos on Saturday April 21 2018, @12:27AM (3 children)

  by requerdanos (5997) on Saturday April 21 2018, @12:27AM (#669858) Journal

  Instead of draining the swamp, Trump has drained all of the intelligence and skill out the State Department, EPA, and now NASA.

  Maybe that's what he actually meant when he talked about 'draining the swamp'. It seems like what we had here, was a failure to communicate.

  If intelligence and skill in government was the will of the voters, which I doubt, then Trump was a strange choice for them to make.

  (No, he's not secretly a genius with a master plan so complicated that it just looks stupid. Hanlon's razor and all.)

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  • he made a career out of misunderestimation he made a career out of misunderestimation (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 21 2018, @04:07AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 21 2018, @04:07AM (#669939)

    You could take a Bushism and apply it to Trump: "They misunderestimated me."

    He has caught so many people off guard, to his advantage, that at some point you have to admit it isn't accidental.

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    • Re:he made a career out of misunderestimation Re:he made a career out of misunderestimation (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 21 2018, @07:31AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 21 2018, @07:31AM (#669999)

      I think we have found the Constitution has a ton of holes in it and Common Decency is not as strong a force as sometimes imagined.

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      • Re:he made a career out of misunderestimation (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday April 21 2018, @02:19PM

        by khallow (3766) on Saturday April 21 2018, @02:19PM (#670044) Journal

        I think we have found the Constitution has a ton of holes in it and Common Decency is not as strong a force as sometimes imagined.

        Welcome to 200 years of US history.

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