Guest: Greg Zsidisin was the guest for this Space Show program. We began our discussion with Greg about the type of space policy to expect from the new Obama administration. We focused in on the space policy transition team as Greg was asked to give us insights into their thinking and space interests. He concluded that space policy would likely unfold more or less traditionally rather than anything out of the box. Both Greg and I noted the challenges ahead for President-Elect Obama and we wondered aloud just how much attention space would get in the face of two wars and our current economic condition. Listen to what Greg had to say about this and see if you concur. The issue of Ares 1 and Direct again was brought up and I urged Greg, as well as those of you who have not yet done so, to listen to my in-person interview with Ross Tierney from Nov. 18, 2008. I also shared some of my thoughts about Direct 2 although as I keep saying, as one who is not an engineer, I am not in a position to determine on my own the merits or problems of either Ares 1 or Direct 2 but as I have said, I urge more diplomacy on the part of the Direct 2 team if they want to get a hearing on their proposals and ideas. In fact, I suggested Greg get together with them to advise on political diplomacy and you will hear this conversation on the air. In addition to covering the transition and the space policy subject, we talked about the winners in the SpaceContest.org program that Greg devised and partnered with SFF on and the recently selected winners. In fact, I played the audio for the first, second, and third place winners on this show, but you can follow Greg's directions and see the videos in full plus all the entry videos. I urge you to do so. You can also visit this website which has all the entries on it: www.youtube.com/SpaceFrontierOrg. Greg is open to feedback and suggestions for the next version of the contest which will probably happen this spring. To learn more about the contest, visit www.spacecontest.org. If you have a question or comment or want to provide some feedback for Greg Zsidisn, please email him at info@spacecontest.org.
Guest
The Space Show
