<story><title>The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/16/us/politics/pentagon-program-ufo-harry-reid.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>volgo</author><text>IMO, the fishy part of the article is the cronyism involved in this program:&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;The shadowy program — parts of it remain classified — began in 2007, and initially it was largely funded at the request of Harry Reid, the Nevada Democrat who was the Senate majority leader at the time and who has long had an interest in space phenomena. Most of the money went to an aerospace research company run by a billionaire entrepreneur and longtime friend of Mr. Reid’s, Robert Bigelow, who is currently working with NASA to produce expandable craft for humans to use in space.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;So... Harry Reid&amp;#x27;s friend is absolutely convinced there are aliens, gets Reid to convince congress to fund the program, and all the money goes back to his own company? Not fishy at all.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>frankquist</author><text>Say that you are interested in investigating puzzling phenomena, and you have the money. What more logical step is there than to approach your senate majority leader friend?&lt;p&gt;Such oddball connections are probably the only the way such a program would ever get funded.&lt;p&gt;Edit: well, obviously he didn&amp;#x27;t have the money. Misspoke. I meant the means (a company with the required infrastructure).</text></comment>
<story><title>The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/16/us/politics/pentagon-program-ufo-harry-reid.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>volgo</author><text>IMO, the fishy part of the article is the cronyism involved in this program:&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;The shadowy program — parts of it remain classified — began in 2007, and initially it was largely funded at the request of Harry Reid, the Nevada Democrat who was the Senate majority leader at the time and who has long had an interest in space phenomena. Most of the money went to an aerospace research company run by a billionaire entrepreneur and longtime friend of Mr. Reid’s, Robert Bigelow, who is currently working with NASA to produce expandable craft for humans to use in space.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;So... Harry Reid&amp;#x27;s friend is absolutely convinced there are aliens, gets Reid to convince congress to fund the program, and all the money goes back to his own company? Not fishy at all.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Teever</author><text>Robert Bigelow has been interested in aliens and UFOs for most of his life and has essentially dedicated his life to amassing the resources to start an aeronautical company.&lt;p&gt;Hiring him to do this is like hiring Robert Ballard to find the Titanic.</text></comment>