NASA Scientist Fired - Promises Disclosure

Originally posted by rhw007
Rather than tie up this post with a copy and paste of Mr. Ken Johnston's statements about his being either 'asked to resign or he was being fired' I'll post link where you can read the C2C interview yourself and see Mr. Johnston's email back to Ms. Ferrari and read his own words here:

darkmission.blogspot.com...

As you can see, the registered letter was mailed October 22nd, 2007, three days after Ken’s phone conversation with Ferrari and his subsequent email sent to her declining to resign – and which she never acknowledged. The termination letter is back dated to make it appear that it was written on October 19th, even though it clearly wasn’t.

October 22nd was a Monday. Ms Ferrari could very well have written the letter on Friday the 19th, yet had it postmarked on the 22nd. Mr Bara's accusation that she back dated the letter in order to perpetrate a fraud is, in my opinion, unfounded and slanderous.

Furthermore, Ken Johnston's association with Dark Mission is no secret. He is openly promoting it. Yet, they are blaming Jim Oberg for getting Johnston "fired" as if they'd just hoped that Ferrari would never find out about Enterprise Mission and his curious claims?

"...ask if that is an honest and neutral and unbiased inquiry into Mr. Ken Johnston's credentials".

Bob has not addressed the results of the inquiry, which so far indicate (subject to revision as Johnston provides more proof):

1. Johnston was never in any responsible position or authority at NASA that would have enabled him to destroy unique Apollo imagery, as Dark_Mission claims. He was a lunar sample shipping clerk who sent out moon rocks and photographs of them to scientists. He was not "in charge" of any imagery data bases, he was an end-user of images provided to him (and many other end-users) by the real lunar imagery archives in a different organization in an entirely different building.

2. Johnston was never a 'jet jock' who served a duty tour in F-4's, as Dark-Mission claims. The only documented association with pilot duty was as a cadet in 'PRE-flight' training, following which Johnston, then ~23 years old, reported for work as a Grumman employee in Houston.

3. Johnson was never a 'Lunar Module Test Pilot', as Dark_Mission claims.
He was a test subject and operator -- what the men involved themselves called 'switch monkey' -- in the simulators, where real training experts (NASA employees) conducted lessons for astronauts.

4. Johnson does not have a real "PhD" in "Meta Physics" or "metaphysics" or anything. He obtained a certificate entitled "Doctor of Metaphysics" (NOT "Doctor of Philosophy", a true PhD) from a short-lived company in Denver that styled itself a 'seminary' (and hence was exempt from state educational standards) but as far as can be determined had no campus (save a mailing address), no faculty (save the company officials), no library -- only a printing press (and maybe even that was rented).

5. Johnston was not 'fired' from any 'job' over his association with Dark_Mission. He continues to have the full right to perform the very same functions as before, with the same pay. He can talk to any school group that requests him as a volunteer. What he cannot do is use a 'NASA' aegis for his talks, which shouldn't be surprising since his public views include the accusation that NASA has falsified the findings of the Apollo mission (Bara has written that Johnston is not in agreement with many other claims made in Dark_Mission). He can say that as often and whereever he wants; he just can't use a NASA podium to proclaim it from. What is so unreasonable about that?

These findings go to the heart of the credibility of claims associated with Johnston's names about alleged destruction of Apollo evidence for anomalous phenomena and objects on the Moon. It is these issues -- not the style of people making the inquiries -- that deserve center stage.

[edit on 17-12-2007 by JimO]

reply to post by rhw007


I would like Bob to address his comments about Dr. Gonzalez and whether he now agrees they were unjustified.

Is it time for an Emily Latella moment?

"Never mind...."

Some of the theories in Dark_Mission can actually be compared with other accounts of events, such as the loss of three Mars probes in the 1990s. Dark_Mission alleges the probes either were destroyed intentionally, or were switched to 'black' control. Here is a detailed refutation of those theories:

Mars Observer

Dark_Mission portrays the failure of the Mars Observer probe in 1993 as a deliberate act by NASA to prevent the publication of its expected photographs of Martian ruins. But the description of the events is inconsistent with well-documented accounts, reports non-existent events, and omits well-known explanations for important features of the probe's flight plan. All of this can be easily confirmed through internet searches.

DM, pp. 87-88: "NASA, in another unprecedented move, had inexplicably ordered Mars Observer to shut off its primary data stream prior to executing a key pre-orbital burn. ...Because NASA had violated the first rule of space travel - you never turn off the radio - no cause for the probe's loss was ever satisfactorily determined."

Actually, practically all orbital insertion burns on lunar and planetary missions occur out of radio contact. This is a result of the geometric alignment of the probe passing behind the planet (or moon) and hence having its radio signals blocked.

The maneuver that Mars Observer was to perform was not, as DM claims, a `key pre-orbital burn'. It was not a burn of any kind. Instead, it was the firing of explosive bolts to open two pressurant tanks that would allow the fuel to be pushed into the probe's engines several days later.

To my knowledge, there is no "first rule of spaceflight" about never turning radios off. Interplanetary probes do this all the time. The `rule' is imaginary. I can't find any documentation anywhere that provides this `rule'.

There is nothing `inexplicable' about turning off the radio for the firing of the pyrotechnic bolts. The sharp shock of the detonations was thought to be a hazard to the hot filament in a key radio component, which is much less brittle when cold.

This is clearly explained in on-line documents, including the accident report. You only have to search "Mars Observer" accident report to be led right to the 313-page `Failure Investigation Board Report' (Dec 31, 1993)

Why was the radio turned off? "In accordance with the mission's published flight rules, the transmitter on the spacecraft had been turned off during the propellant-tank Pressurization Sequence on 21 August... To protect the spacecraft radio frequency transmitter from damage during the Pressurization Sequence (albeit a very low probability), the software included a command to turn off the Mars Observer transponder and radio frequency (RF) telemetry power amplifier for a period of ten minutes. This was a standard procedure that had been implemented several times earlier during the mission."

Details on the sequence: "This sequence included the firing of two normally-closed pyrotechnic valves, that would allow high-pressure gaseous helium to pressurize the nitrogen tetroxide oxidizer tank and the monomethyl hydrazine fuel tank."

More on p. 25: "Concern existed in the Mars Observer project team that the pyro-firing event might damage the traveling wave tube amplifiers in the spacecraft telecommunications system if the amplifiers were left on."

Nor is it true that "no cause for the probe's loss was ever satisfactorily determined", as DM claims. To the contrary.

"The Board was unable to find clear and conclusive evidence pointing to a
particular scenario as the "smoking gun," the report explained, but "the Board concluded through a process of elimination that the most probable cause of the loss of downlink from the Mars Observer was a massive failure of the pressurization side of the propulsion system. The Board also concluded that the most probable cause of that failure was the unintended mixing of nitrogen tetroxide (NTO) and monomethyl hydrazine (MMH) in the titanium tubing on the pressurization side of the propulsion system. This mixing was believed by the Board to have been enabled by significant NTO migration through check valves during the eleven-month cruise phase from Earth to Mars. This conclusion is supported (but not proven) by NTO transport-rate data acquired by JPL, by NTO/IvIMH reaction simulations performed by NRL, and by NTO/MMH mixing tests performed by AFPL."

As to why the propulsions system hardware, adapted from a military prop module that normally needed a lifetime of only 12 hours, was used for a year-long mission, the report added that "Too much reliance was placed on the heritage of spacecraft hardware, software, and procedures, especially since the Mars Observer mission was fundamentally different from the missions of the satellites from which the heritage was derived." It specifically criticized the propulsion system for "Inappropriate isolation mechanisms between fuel and oxidizer for an interplanetary mission.

"The original [money-saving] philosophy of minor modifications to a commercial production-line spacecraft was retained throughout the program. The result was reliance on design and component heritage qualification that was inappropriate for the mission. Examples of this reliance were the failure to qualify the traveling wave tube amplifiers for pyro firing shock [and] the design of the propulsion system."

Whether or not this particular proposed failure mode is plausible (and from my own research I've concluded it was very plausible), it remains untrue to state (as DM does) that turning off the radio was `inexplicable' (and a violation of a `rule number one') and that no satisfactory explanation for the failure was ever determined. Leaving out these easily-available views resulted in a passage that I think was incomplete and misleading.


(more)

Mars Climate Orbiter

Dark_Mission's treatment of the Mars Climate Orbiter failure in 1999 (pp. 313-315) is erroneous, misleading, and unintentionally deliciously ironic.

All observers are free to offer their own hypotheses about the causes of space disasters. But their fundamental credibility must be founded on an adequate understanding and accurate recounting of the 'official' theories that they want to supplant. Here, the authors fail spectacularly.

"According to a terse press release, the spacecraft was thrown off course when one navigational team in Colorado and the other at JPL used two separate measurement systems (metric and imperial) in key navigational calculations." DM called this 'highly implausible and bizarre', and added: "The notion that this error could have been induced from the beginning of the mission and gone unnoticed is ridiculous... [T]o anyone with the slightest understanding of measurement systems and orbital mechanics, this statement... is ludicrous... That is why NASA's explanation is so unbelievable."

But the proximate cause of the navigation error was exactly as NASA admitted -- a units foulup. Dark_Mission's problem is that the authors completely misunderstood the NASA description, a description verified by independent investigators with private access to the space navigation team. While denouncing the 'official version' of the accident as 'ludicrous', they themselves never understood it, and so grossly misreported it in their book.

In reality (and interested readers can search the internet for both official and unofficial contemporary stories with full details -- I recommend my national magazine award winning article in IEEE Spectrum, "Why The Mars Probe Went Off Course", Dec 1999), the units problem was isolated to one data table that specifed expected minor course disturbances from routine 'attitude control' (pointing control) maneuvers during the coast periods. As small thrusters were fired on autopilot to correct for the gradual buildup of small orientation errors, the thrusters did not impart purely rotational impulses because of the way they were attached to the probe's exterior. Instead, they induced small propulsive forces as well.

Based on a reference table, an adjustment factor of these accumulated disturbances (which were too small to be detected by the probe's on-board accelerometers) could be calculated and factored into the periodic course corrections.

The table of expected accumulation of propulsive disturbances based on the amount of orientation control firings was the document that was in the 'wrong' units, but was not labeled so explicitly. This led to an unexpected and persistent 'trajectory disturbance' that was noticed, wondered about, and periodically corrected for during the trans-Mars cruise.

All tracking and course correction maneuvers were calculated exclusively in metric, so the flight path was under close observation and control. DM's allegation of a wildly-off-course spacecraft based on its authors' misunderstanding of the fundamental error is entirely illusory. Their mocking rebuttal of the units error cause is a joke on themselves, since they never knew enough about the probe's navigation error to fairly judge its cause.

Approaching Mars, the disturbances grew. The uncertainties proved too high, and the error factor was in the wrong direction, when the probe skimmed around the backside of Mars to fire its braking engine but was a few hundred kilometers too low -- so it hit the upper atmosphere. Management flaws -- the refusal to respond to navigators' concerns until they could 'prove the probe was off course' -- were ultimately responsible for not reacting correctly to the suspicious disturbances in time.

In hindsight, it is an instructive example of a 'bad attitude' toward safety and reliability that had infected NASA culture in the 1990s when under White House pressure, politics superseded safety as primary motivator. The spread of that attitude led directly to the bad decisions that later destroyed 'Columbia' and killed its seven astronauts.

That hideous cost underscores the importance of correctly understanding space disasters, learning their lessons (often lessons already learned once, but forgotten), and responding correctly and constructively to them. And this suggests that bizarre 'conspiracy theories' with false causes and phantasmagorical explanations (as in Dark_Mission) aren't merely 'entertaining' -- in the worst case than can be distracting, misleading, and ultimately, costly. And that's much worse than merely 'ludicrous'.

Mars Polar Lander:

Page 316. "The Mars Polar Lander simply disappeared during its deorbit burn."

The Mars Polar Lander was on a direct atmospheric entry trajectory.

It had no 'deorbit burn'. Ever.

By 'disappear', what the authors meant was 'lost contact' (a stretch, but literary license might tolerate it), and contact was 'lost' because it was turned off on purpose. Contact was never regained. Where in the descent sequence the probe actually was destroyed remains to this day undetermined. It could have burned up. The braking engine could have exploded when first ignited. The probe could have tumbled during braking and crashed. It could have landed on a rock and broke apart. It would be nice to know.

One possible descent phase it could NOT have disappeared in was deorbit burn -- the one phase claimed by the book.

Because there wasn't any such maneuver.

More on page p. 316: "Former NASA chief debunker James Oberg published a story on UPI that accused JPL employees of knowing full well that the MPL was doomed (due to software problems related to the spacecraft's landing legs) from very early on in the mission. " On p. 317 this is called a "bizarre UPI accusation". Over on p. 472 I'm also referred to as one of "NASA's sycophants" - how that jibes with issuing "bizarre accusations," I can't figure.

In any case, the brief account of the UPI article is garbled almost beyond recognition, casting serious doubts on the reading comprehension level of the author who did this section.

Alleged foreknowledge of the impending failure had nothing to do with software. The article stated: "As explained privately to UPI, the Mars Polar Lander vehicle's braking thrusters had failed acceptance testing during its construction. But rather than begin an expensive and time-consuming redesign, an unnamed space official simply altered the conditions of the testing until the engine passed. `They tested the [engine] ignition process at a temperature much higher than it would be in flight,' UPI's source said. This was done because when the [engines] were first tested at the low temperatures predicted after the long cruise from Earth to Mars, the ignition failed or was too unstable to be controlled. So the test conditions were changed in order to certify the engine performance. But the conditions then no longer represented those most likely to occur on the real space flight. `I'm as certain as I can be that the thing blew up,' the source concluded."

That potential failure mode was NOT known "from very early on in the mission", but only at the very end: "Following the September loss of the first spacecraft due to management errors, NASA had initiated a crash review of the Mars Polar Lander to identify any similar oversights. According to UPI's source, the flaws in the [engine] testing were uncovered only a few days before the landing was to occur on December 3. By then it was too late to do anything about it."

The software problem with the landing leg sensor scenario was NOT known before the landing at all, and the UPI article clearly states that it was discovered AFTER the crash: "The Mars Polar Lander investigation team has also reportedly identified a second fatal design flaw that would have doomed the probe even if the engines had functioned properly. Post-accident tests have shown that when the legs are initially unfolded during the final descent, springs push them so hard that they "bounce" and trigger the microswitches by accident. As a result, the computer receives what it believes are indications of a successful touchdown, and it shuts off the engines. Gound testing prior to launch apparently never detected this because each of the tests was performed in isolation from other tests. One team verified that the legs unfolded properly. Another team verified that the microswitches functioned on landing."

In a simple reading comprehension verification test, this one incident indicates a severe problem with the book's authors' ability to understand, and restate, simple English about space technology. In one sentence, there were three swings, and three misses - three strikes. Be warned!

By the way, after NASA's official freak-out denunciations of the UPI story I had written (and the not-long-after death from a stroke of the public affairs officer leading the shrieking), the story turned out even worse than I had written. Space engineers hadn't fudged the test results, after all -- they had decided that any tests weren't even necessary. The engine ignition system was NEVER tested at temperatures expected to be encountered out by Mars, because (JPL said) the engine had already flown in space on some other mission and so didn't need to be requalified. But NASA press officials, despite repeated inquiries from me and promises of cooperation from them, NEVER disclosed the space mission(s) that these special engines had been originally flown on.

The same-design engines are installed aboard the 'Mars Phoenix' lander now on route. Hopefully, improvements have been made.

You gotta see this new picture of the 'Face on Mars'.. !!!

The truth, it is out there…
by Dwayne A. Day
Monday, December 17, 2007
The classic movie A Christmas Story—currently in heavy rotation on cable—features a subplot involving the hero, Ralphie, who is excited to finally receive his Lil’ Orphan Annie Secret Decoder Ring. He has been waiting forever to join the exclusive fraternity of people who have access to the secret knowledge broadcast to everybody on the radio. But when he decodes his first message he is stunned to learn that it is a commercial for Ovaltine. He swears and throws it in the trash.
That kind of intense disappointment must greet conspiracy buffs virtually every day. They’re looking for some great secret message, something that gives them access to the hidden world that they know is out there. But what they often get is lame, stupid, boring—a commercial pitch to “buy my book.” Most of them are so thrilled to be part of the club that, unlike Ralphie, they don’t realize that they’re being had.


thespacereview.com...

photo
thespacereview.com...

reply to post by JimO

It was long and tedious and filled with the kind of tortured logic that turns out to be rather common for conspiracy theorists who take disparate pieces of data and insist that they’re connected and that they make more sense than, well, more logical explanations

Hehe, I loved that article
Summons it up so politely.

To JimO:

Sir, thank you for extremely educational and well written posts. What a sip of fresh water in the desert.

Originally posted by JimO
You gotta see this new picture of the 'Face on Mars'.. !!!

And read Dwayne Day's entire article (two pages). It is laugh out loud funny.

thespacereview.com...


And thank you for all of your posts today, JimO. Excellent research and excellent presentation of your research.

Originally posted by JimO
You gotta see this new picture of the 'Face on Mars'.. !!!

Nice Touch... and a whole page to boot... looks like a book in the making



Well after all that.. seeing as this was buried and no one took notice...

Message from Mike Bara...

Ron\Zorgon,
For more than a decade now, many of the images in Dark Mission have been available for free in the Planetary Lab section of Enterprise Mission.com. All other images are copyrighted by our publisher, and I know of no plans at this time to publish them on the web. However, they were all included in a CD that was given away at the Los Angeles lecture in November, and there are plans to make that available for a nominal fee and\or to include it in the revised edition of Dark Mission.

I’d be glad to drop by your forum, but how about soliciting 10-20 questions from your users and I’ll try to answer all of them by email, which you can then post as a topic on your board. That way I can come in and address questions resulting from that set of answers.

So how about it? Not even ONE QUESTION? Or are you all so happy with JimO's one sided presentation that you decline the opportunity to hear the other side?

reply to post by zorgon


I, for one, would like to ask questions of Ken Johnston since he is the topic of this thread.

Okay, here's one for Mike: It's already been noted that Ken Johnston does not agree with all the assertions made in the book, Dark Mission. But, Mike, does Ken agree with all the assertions made by yourself at the Enterprise Mission site regarding his credentials and of the specific details of surrounding his resignation from the Solar System Ambassadors program?

Not much of a question, but hey.

Incidentally, there was a thread some time ago by Johnny and Dave to collect questions for an upcoming ATS MIX interview with Hoagland and Bara. Is that interview still in the offing?

Also, if Mike is willing, I invite him to notice the ATS buttons along the bottom of this post. He can click the "Thread" button and see all of my posts in this thread. They should take not too long to read and, by doing so, Mike will gleen from them what questions I'd have for him, if I were to pose them to him directly.

Thanks for the opportunity, zorgon.

I also read the article and it just one more 'political hit piece' to divert attention to the FACT that there WERE first generation copies made of the ORGINAL negatives, and SOME of them were ORDERED to be destroyed. PERIOD.

Apparently this 'author/reporter' is like most MEANSTREAM MEDIA...they don't know squat about their subject matter.

A first generation copy of the ORIGINAL negative would be the MOST pristine copies available...other than the originals..like plain paper copiers..copies of copies of copies of copies...introduce "noise" into
the data, image or document being copied.

At least Ken Johnston SAVED one of those PRISTINE 1st sets and gave them to his school, which in fact IS HEROEISM because he disobeyed a direct oder to DESTROY all five sets of the first generation copies that were made at that time. Something the article doesn't get into because the BRUTAL TRUTH is NOT the purpose or point of the article.

The writer could also have mentioned where are the more than 690 plusboxes of RAW TELEVISION footage....which NO copies were made...and NASA seems to have aparently..."lost" them. Why isn't THIS item being mentioend EVERY time someone brings out 'conspiratists' claiming NASA 'coverups'??? Nor the misfiling of the Viking HEAD frames and the LOSS of the Ancillary data for BOTH of those Viking images, or the 1998 infamous CATBOX image?

This article is more poltical bull manure and typical of MEANSTREAM MEDIA.

Of which, we have YET to have Mr. Oberg PRODUCE evidentiary evidence he was HIRED by 'someone' in 'some department' and was then authorized to use the NBS NEWS credentials in this "inquiry" into Ken Johnston's credentials..

Since Mr. Oberg has NOT produced a copy of an email from a NBC/MSNBC person stating this, I would presume (giving Mr. Oberg the benefit of the doubt since he said he would be contacting Mr. Boyle on the matter that not EVERYONE within a large organization can be aware of what is going on in other departments) that his permission came via phone call which was not recorded. Likely not even time and date of call and who and from what department they called from? Unlikely. IF called I am sure Mr. Oberg made note of the time, date, who called, what department and other infomration...since he would NEED such information when submiting a BILL for his services as NBC NEWS Space Consultant.

So Mr. Oberg....did you REALLY have the "authority" to sign that biased and mudslashing first email to Ms. Ferrari to USE the NBS NEWS Space Correspondent...i.e. were YOUR actions and methodology ASKED for and ENDORSED by 'someone' at 'some department' ( other than Mr. Boyle's ) at NBC/MSNBC News??? If so...then please provide the evidentiary evidence of it. otherwise it seems as if you "misused' or "abused" the priviledge of having NBC News "credentials".

As for OTHER Moon Anomalies...someone sent this link today which is eye-poping with stills showing through the video:

From the 1999 NOVA program Moon Smokestack with puffer:
ie.youtube.com...

And just so that EVERYONE understands we could ALL be wrong at some future point by CLINGING to old and cherished "beliefs":

MEANSTREAM Academia proven WRONG again:
www.livescience.com...

Zorgon,
I am as astounded as you are that no one wants a chance to ask the Authors of the book in question aren't jumping in here with POINTED questions....whether prompted by Mr. Oberg or their own opinions about what THEY think is on the Moon or not.
It would be nice if Mr. Oberg answered the questions who and what department and when 'someone' and the 'somewhere' within NBC/MSNBC approved of this type of "inquiry"....Mr. Oberg is BIG on credentials yet we haven't seen anybody from NBC/MSNBC coming forward to say they authorized that FIRST email to Ms. Ferrari, as slandorous and biased as it was. It's HARDBALL time.
Where's Mr. Oberg's NBC/MSNBC authorization to send this first email to Ms. Ferrari on THEIR behalf????
Bob...

Originally posted by rhw007
At least Ken Johnston SAVED one of those PRISTINE 1st sets and gave them to his school, which in fact IS HEROEISM because he disobeyed a direct oder to DESTROY all five sets of the first generation copies that were made at that time. Something the article doesn't get into because the BRUTAL TRUTH is NOT the purpose or point of the article.

Actually, it seems to me that Dwayne Day mentioned the "facts" just as Ken Johnston presented them. Johnston has never claimed to have received a "direct order to DESTROY all five sets of the first generation copies that were made at that time".

So Mr. Oberg....did you REALLY have the "authority" to sign that biased and mudslashing first email to Ms. Ferrari to USE the NBS NEWS Space Correspondent...i.e. were YOUR actions and methodology ASKED for and ENDORSED by 'someone' at 'some department' ( other than Mr. Boyle's ) at NBC/MSNBC News??? If so...then please provide the evidentiary evidence of it. otherwise it seems as if you "misused' or "abused" the priviledge of having NBC News "credentials".

Early in this thread -- before I'd ever even heard of Jim Oberg -- I emailed Kay Ferrari for information on the circumstances of Johnston's alleged "firing". (Mainly, because it seemed odd that he could be fired from a voluntary "position" and the fact that it was a voluntary "position" was never mentioned by Johnston.)

I sent it late at night and Ms Ferrari replied to my email the next morning. My only "credential" was that I am a member of ATS. Jim, of course, needed no authorization from NBC or MSNBC in order to send an email to Ms Ferrari.

So, where are we going here, Bob? Is it that Jim's evidence, as presented, be thrown out of this "court" on the technicality that it's an intrusion into "meanstream media"'s jurisdiction?

Or shall we stay on topic and discuss the evidence?

(Edited for suspicious punctuation anomolies.)

[edit on 18-12-2007 by Tuning Spork]

Originally posted by Tuning Spork

Incidentally, there was a thread some time ago by Johnny and Dave to collect questions for an upcoming ATS MIX interview with Hoagland and Bara. Is that interview still in the offing?

I will check I was not aware of that...

As to Ken Johnston... lets get Mike in first to answer that one.. but I will add it to the list...

Okay questions noted... anyone else?

reply to post by zorgon


Zorgon, don't wait for more questions. Mike Bara can answer molre than one, don't ya think?

Just pass it on that we're waiting for more. (Especially because more may never come.)

So, a question, answered?

Mike?

Hey there Zorgon, unfortunately, I havent been able to read Dark Mission yet so I have no questions in regards to the book for Mr Bara. However do you think he'd be able to comment on the "Blue Light Special" at all? Or would that be an RCH related thing?

Forgive me if my response time is slow. It may be awhile before I am able to get back on today...thanks Z..

spikeD

RHW: "At least Ken Johnston SAVED one of those PRISTINE 1st sets and gave them to his school, which in fact IS HEROEISM because he disobeyed a direct oder to DESTROY all five sets of the first generation copies that were made at that time. Something the article doesn't get into because the BRUTAL TRUTH is NOT the purpose or point of the article."

If that donated set were all that important, Robert, why don't you call the school to find out what they did with it? I called, and found out, and posted a report to Bara's blog -- and he blocked it. He refused to allow his readers to be made aware of what happened to that 'saved' set. Why don't YOU go call them yourself, find out, and report back to us here -- once you recover from your heartbreak.

Your brutish 'truth' that there were only "all five sets" of originals is an example of how you have been misled. Why don't you think there were ten sets of originals, or two hundred? Why do you think that the Lunar Receiving Laboratory, where Johnston was a shipping clerk, had the ONLY 'original sets'? And if there WERE dozens, even hundreds of OTHER sets in other offices across NASA and around the world, what's the big deal over the LRL cleaning out its storage cabinets when the contract expired at the end of the moon landing missions, when the flow of new samples stopped?

Robert: "Since Mr. Oberg has NOT produced a copy of an email from a NBC/MSNBC person stating this, I would presume (giving Mr. Oberg the benefit of the doubt since he said he would be contacting Mr. Boyle on the matter that not EVERYONE within a large organization can be aware of what is going on in other departments) that his permission came via phone call which was not recorded. Likely not even time and date of call and who and from what department they called from? Unlikely. IF called I am sure Mr. Oberg made note of the time, date, who called, what department and other infomration...since he would NEED such information when submiting a BILL for his services as NBC NEWS Space Consultant. "

You live and learn. Contrary to what I have thought for decades in my role as an educator and author and parent, I now realize that there ARE such things as 'stupid questions'. Thanks for opening my eyes, Robert.

Your 'questions' are so full of ignorant assumptions of non-fact that they are essentially unanswerable. And since they deal with my professional business contracts and contacts, you have no right to expect to be told any details anyway. This is my anchor client and they pay me, so it is not a volunteer non-paying activity, for fun -- and any attempted interference in it can be very serious matter.

Robert: "Mr. Oberg is BIG on credentials yet we haven't seen anybody from NBC/MSNBC coming forward to say they authorized that FIRST email to Ms. Ferrari, as slandorous and biased as it was. It's HARDBALL time."

You keep working to make me an issue, and not the fundamental claims of the book. I posted preliminary results of my inquiries and you are pretending you haven't even read them.

Aside from typos, a plague we all are prone to, and age-induced 'brain farts' (OK, they hit me too), writers of nasty attack-messages really, really ought to use 'spellcheck' so that they at least don't look foolish misspelling their main accusatory terminology.

In my view, it is your message about Dr. Gonzales that is slanderous (note: slandErous), based as it was on your incapacity to actually READ the exact names of the institutions involved. It would establish your credibility if you reexamined your message (posted several pages back, here), and issued a brief 'oops, never mind' retraction about your error in going on 'attack mode' over your own mistake. Can you do that?


[edit on 18-12-2007 by JimO]