interesting info on the Columbia incident

[donsu]

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1155AP_NASA_Watchdog.html


Report: NASA watchdog too cozy with boss


NASA's top watchdog routinely tipped off department officials to internal investigations and quashed a report related to the Columbia shuttle explosion to avoid embarrassing the agency, investigators say.

-snip-

At one point, the report said, Cobb went "ballistic" when he learned that the Texas Rangers were planning to release a "Crime Stoppers Report" to the public to announce an alleged theft of jewelry from Columbia astronaut Laurel Clark, whose ring was taken from her recovered remains. The Rangers and Cobb's office were conducting a joint investigation of the alleged ring theft. NASA employees said Cobb felt NASA would be embarrassed by any suggestion it had not properly safeguarded the remains.

In a meeting with one of his staff, Cobb, who demanded that a tape recorder in the room be shut off, said no report on the ring would be issued because the "whole NASA Columbia investigation was not going well, NASA wanted it finished, and for the outcome to reveal nothing that would make NASA look bad."
-snip-
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if you read the whole thing your lip will curl in disgust

[petronius]

1. All you need to know is right here:

"...Cobb, who once was an adviser Cobb, who once was an adviser on ethics to then-White House counsel Alberto Gonzales, now the attorney general."

Being an IG must be a tough job - I don't think I'd want to do it. It's disgusting that the Bush Administration has such a deliberate habit of appointing cronies and lapdogs to 'independent' positions; that level of disregard for our system and country should be appalling to any genuinely patriotic American (which excludes most Republicans, these days).

On a personal, off-topic note, I was disturbed to see O'Keefe's role here: he left NASA to become chancellor at my PhD granting institute (LSU); he's the guy who handed me my diploma... :puke:

[Peace Patriot]

2. It's normal for agencies to try to protect themselves to some extent. Almost any

government agency, or public group, and certainly business corporations, do it. It doesn't necessarily involve crime or lying. It's a natural reflex, to some degree, and is greatly influenced by the culture of the group. A single honest individual can set the tone, and not necessarily someone in the top echelon of power. In the case of the federal government and its agencies, however, It really is up to the president to set a tone of openness and accountability.

And just one look at Bush...openness? accountability?

His INSTINCT is to lie. The same with other major Bush Junta players. Lying from the get-go. Lying from word one. And behind that facade of falseness and lies and hypocrisy, anything goes.

It's interesting how honest people have affected them. They can't have them around. Those lower echelon people--whose loyalty is to the USA and our Constitution--were/are a threat to their culture of pervasive lying. It's not that the honest people could change them or seriously influence events (which can happen in a less tyrannical structure than the current federal government). It's that they can't abide honesty. They have no handle on an honest person. They DON'T UNDERSTAND honest people. They just want to get rid of them--in some cases, in order to accomplish more lies and deception, and resulting profit, but in other cases, just because they don't fit in. They are not into false narratives and greed. They will not spout rightwing ideology. Their purpose in government service is to do a good job, for the country. And even if they are not obstacles to some particular nefarious purpose, their example is irritating. To keep up the Big Lie, its adherents need constant reinforcement. They need other ideologues and unquestioning Bush toadies around them. Anyone with even a hint of objectivity in their eye puts a tremor into this "house of cards."

And it's becoming clear that this culture of lying has been, and is, pervasive in the Bush Junta. In every agency, they are lying and covering up and telling a false story. Some of the honest people who are still around are giving us these eruptions of truth, within a pervasive context of false purpose, false narrative and corruption. The federal government is a huge institution, and they couldn't get rid of everybody who failed to give off signals of complicity. And I imagine that some people kept their lips zipped, or even played falsely to the ideologues, to keep their jobs. But those folks then reach a point where they can't stomach it any more. Thus, we have the EPA scandal, and the US Attorney scandal, and the Abu Ghraib scandal, and so on. The US Attorney scandal is interesting in that they didn't have to lie. They lied because it was second nature. They lied because that's all they know how to do.

It's pathological.