3 GOP Congressmen Are Whining About SpaceX to NASA. Want to Guess Why?

Why would three seemingly
random congressmen suddenly taken an interest in relatively minor
delays in SpaceX’s otherwise
wildly successful push to provide launch services?

Well, here’s our story so far, as
ably chronicled in Slate:

Three House members—Mike Coffman (R-Colo.), Mo Brooks (R-Ala.),
and Cory Gardner (R-Colo.)—have
sent a memo to NASA demanding that the agency investigate
what they call “an epidemic of anomalies” with SpaceX missions.

This is ridiculous for many reasons. For example, the
congressmen say that SpaceX should be accountable to the American
taxpayer, but in fact as a contractor the rules are different for
them than they would be if NASA themselves built the rockets, just
as the rules are for Boeing or any other contractor. In
fact, as
reported bySpace News, NASA didn’t actually pay for
the development of the Falcon 9; Elon Musk did.

Another reason this is silly is that every rocket ever made has
undergone problems; they are fiendishly complex machines and no
design has ever gotten from the drafting board to the launch pad
without issues. Sure, SpaceX has experienced launch delays and
other problems, but the critical thing to remember is that those
problems are noted, assessed, and fixed … sometimes within hours or
minutes. I remember a
LIDAR issue in 2012 that prevented a SpaceX Dragon capsule from
berthing to the ISS; the issue was examined and fixed so
rapidly I was stunned. “Anomalies” are inevitable; what’s important
is if the lessons were learned, and the mission was successful. If
SpaceX were suffering more than the usual number of problems that
would be worth investigating, but that’s not the case here.

So what could those congressmen—along with Sen. Richard Shelby
(R-Ala.)—have in common? Hmmm. Oh right: Porky deals in their
states or districts with the big legacy government contractors who
are threatened by SpaceX’s success. 

I’ll note that Boeing (the major SLS contractor) has a big plant
in Alabama, Brooks’ (and Shelby’s) home state, and United Launch
Alliance has its HQ in Colorado, home to Gardner and Coffman (it’s
even in Coffman’s district). This sounds more like they’re trying
to protect their own turf more than honestly wanting transparency
from SpaceX.

This is just the latest in a long line of WTF
Republicans moments, where the supposed party of free
enterprise has repeatedly moved to squelch, redirect, or otherwise
discourage moves to allow private competition into the top heavy,
state-dominated space sector. In recent month, Congress has tried
to
saddle SpaceX with extra costs and more
paperwork. When
it comes to space, House Republicans still prefer big
government, space
pork, and crony capitalism.