Here we go again. Appeasement as usual!
Washington, DC: White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said on Monday that NASA administrator Charles Bolden was wrong to say that reaching out to the Muslim world was a top priority of the US space agency.
Bolden raised eyebrows in the space community and outrage among conservative pundits by telling Al-Jazeera television recently president Barack Obama had instructed him to work for better outreach with the Muslim world.
He said Obama told him one of his top priorities was to "find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math and engineering."
Improving relations with the Muslim world was a top foreign policy priority for Obama on taking office last year and he delivered a major speech on the topic in Cairo in June 2009.
The White House last week sought to clarify Bolden's comment, saying Obama wanted NASA to engage with the world's best scientists and engineers from countries like Russia and Japan, Israel and many Muslim-majority countries.
Gibbs, at his daily news briefing, was asked why Bolden had made the comment.
"It's an excellent question, and I don't think -- that was not his task, and that's not the task of NASA," Gibbs said.
Many in the US space community, such as moon astronaut Neil Armstrong, are disgruntled by Obama's proposals to bolster support for private space companies and abandon an over-budget NASA moon program.
lol....obama is acting like our sickularist....NASA to reach out to PoP?
Obama has lost his mind. Hence proved.
Lets see now ... so now NASA is to make Muslim majority countries feel good? I personally feel very good after receiving a good bj.
World's best scientists and engineers from Muslim majority countries? India's reservation system coming to NASA.
President Obama is very naive.
Last edited by dhurandhar; July 13th, 2010 at 06:43 AM.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said on Monday that NASA administrator Charles Bolden was wrong to say that reaching out to the Muslim world was a top priority of the US space agency.
(Reuters) - Muslim parents, students and civic groups are campaigning to add two of their religious holidays to the New York City public school calendar, pinning their hopes on state lawmakers after failing to win over Mayor Michael Bloomberg to the idea.
Putting Eid Ul-Fitr, a holiday marking the end of Ramadan, and Eid Ul-Adha, celebrating the end of the hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca, on the list of official school holidays will help ease suspicion and reduce anti-Muslim sentiment nearly a decade after the September 11 attacks, they say.
Supporters say there are more than 100,000 Muslim students in the public schools, or about 12 percent of the enrollment.
Hundreds of supporters gathered outside City Hall on June 30 to pressure Bloomberg on the issue, saying the holidays could be recognized by adding just five days off over the next decade, since many fall on existing holidays or weekends.
Bloomberg rejected the proposal, arguing city students cannot afford more days off. Just four in 10 students graduate on time and one in 10 drops out, according to statistics.
"Everybody would like to be recognized but the truth of the matter is we need more school days, not less," he said.
Supporters now are looking to a bill that calls for instituting the Muslim holidays as days off in city schools. It is pending in the state Senate and Assembly and if it becomes law, it would supersede Bloomberg's decision despite his control of New York City schools.
The school calendar currently has 13 observed holidays, including Jewish ones such as Rosh Hashana and Christian holidays such as Good Friday. The religious holidays have been on the calendar for at least several decades.
Of the 11 generally observed Muslim holidays, none are on the school calendar.
"There is a large group of people who feel like they have to choose between religion and school," said Faiza Ali, a spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
The issue surfaced in 2006, when Eid Ul-Adha fell on the same day as a statewide reading test. Some Muslim students stayed home, missing the crucial skills test. Others attended, missing the holiday with their families.
Some Muslims say they are frustrated by Bloomberg's decision in the wake of public opposition to proposed construction of several mosques in the city and the 2007 ousting of an Arabic school principal after neighbors accused the school of being a breeding ground for militants.
Bloomberg often speaks of tolerance and diversity and supports the mosque construction, including one near the site of the World Trade Center towers destroyed on September 11, 2001, in al-Qaeda suicide attacks.
"Our kids know other holidays but then they see that their holidays are not recognized. It sends a mixed message," said Isabel Bucaram, a Muslim with two children in city schools. "My daughter says to me, 'They do it for others. Why not us?'"
A resolution in support of adding the holidays was approved last year in the City Council and the proposal has support of the teachers' union and the city's borough presidents.
For parents such as Ayman Hammous, a physical therapist originally from Egypt whose four children attend city schools, the debate comes down to acceptance.
"Putting the holidays on the calendar will send a positive message to the Muslim community that you are welcome here," he said.
The White House is disavowing a plan to have NASA conduct outreach to Muslim countries, but a congressman who talked to Administrator Charles Bolden about that plan last month said the initiative was very real until somebody pulled the brake on it.
Rep. Pete Olson, ranking Republican on the Space and Aeronautics House Subcommittee, told FoxNews.com that Bolden described the outreach program as part of the administration's space plan during a conversation they had in June.
"He confirmed it to me," Olson said. The Texas Republican said he thinks the program existed until the "uproar" compelled the administration to rethink it.
Though Bolden mentioned the outreach months ago during a speech in February, it drew widespread attention after he described it as a "foremost" priority during an interview with Al Jazeera last month. The administration initially stood by the claim, but White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Monday that Bolden misspoke and that the outreach is "not the task of NASA."
Olson said that to his knowledge no collaboration with Muslim countries actually took place. He said such a collaboration could raise concern about missile technology falling into the wrong hands. But at the same time, he said NASA doesn't have much classified information to share. He described the agency as a cash-strapped arm of the federal government in dire need of some TLC. His main concern with the outreach program was that it would divert badly needed money away from space exploration.
"The last thing we need to be doing now is spending precious space dollars ... on outreach to any religion," he said. "We need to spend money on human space exploration."
John Bolton, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under the Bush administration, echoed Bolden's comments to Al Jazeera in saying NASA now needs international help to do what it once did on its own.
For instance, a U.S. manufacturer working on a NASA project reportedly is eyeing a Russian booster for its Taurus II launch vehicle. A Russian rocket booster on Saturday was used to launch a U.S. satellite into orbit for DISH Network.
"That's appalling but that's basically where it is," Bolton said, adding: "I'm not sure at this point ... whether there's much in technology that they have to share."
He agreed with Olson that the outreach program was probably a bona fide initiative before Bolden spoke up about it.
"I think (Bolden) was reflecting exactly what he heard the president say," Bolton said.
The comments drew fire from conservatives and former NASA officials already on high alert over the administration's move to cut funding for the NASA Constellation program.
Michael Griffin, NASA administrator under the Bush administration, said NASA was in danger of becoming an "empty shell."
However, he said that while international cooperation is welcome at NASA it's wrong to say the U.S. needs the aid of other countries to travel beyond low-earth orbit.
Wow, very interesting , Obama is really very radical or a secret pop!