[PEN-L:34288] The Slavoj Zizek Moment in the Columbia Disaster

[Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1@xxxxxxx>]

*****     It is not too much to say that along with an Israeli flag
and a drawing by a child who was a victim of the Holocaust, Colonel
Ramon, a 49-year-old father of four, carried Israel's dreams with
him. He represented the accomplishments this young country would
prefer to dwell on - its astonishing progress in technology and
science - as well as its preferred self-image, as an honored member
of the family of nations, cooperating with others to advance humanity.

Colonel Ramon, an Air Force pilot, had performed his share of
military missions, even taking part in the bombing of an Iraqi
nuclear reactor in 1981. But as he rose into space more than two
weeks ago, he seemed to transcend the conflict here, to slip the
bonds of history, geography and politics that can make other Israelis
feel trapped.

"One cannot remain indifferent to the sight of an Israeli who has the
great privilege of being so detached from everything that happens
here, floating there in another world, like one of the angels," wrote
Avraham Tirosh in Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel's largest newspaper, on
the day Colonel Ramon took off.

Although he jokingly expressed concern about the possibility of an
Israeli settlement on the moon, Yasir Abed Rabbo, the spokesman for
the Palestinian Authority, had also set the conflict aside to wish
Colonel Ramon a safe return.

<http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/02/national/nationalspecial/02ISRA.html>
*****

*****   Unlike the Challenger, which crashed at sea, the Columbia
fell to earth this morning in fiery and potentially toxic bits over
the cities in Mr. Bush's home state, like a scene from "War of the
Worlds." NASA spokesmen warned the public not to touch any debris,
but report it instead to law enforcement authorities.

In a twist of nomenclature that would seem implausible in fiction, a
craft carrying Col. Ilan Ramon of the Israeli Air Force apparently
broke up over an East Texas town called Palestine.

<http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/01/national/01CND-MOOD.html>   *****

*****   The $25 billion space shuttle was envisioned in the 1970's as
the successor to the successful moon-landing program. Less expensive
and ambitious than a manned mission to Mars, the reusable shuttle was
to revolutionize exotic space flight by turning it into an
inexpensive, once-a-week event, paying its own way by deploying and
repairing satellites and selling other space services.

But almost from the start, the shuttle was plagued by design
failures, cost overruns, delays, fraud and mismanagement within NASA
and its contractors. Many problems were hidden until the 1986
explosion of the Challenger, which killed seven astronauts. More
recently, an aging work force and management shortcomings have
continued at NASA, experts say, and these and other problems are
expected to be explored in the inquiries into yesterday's Columbia
tragedy....

The Nixon administration embraced it initially to promote scientific
and military goals and to help shore up the ailing aerospace
industry. It was sold to Congress on the assumption that it would pay
for itself through business it would generate: shuttling up to deploy
and repair many private commercial satellites, and other tasks.

From the start, however, the program set unrealistic goals, as many
as 60 flights a year, and was plagued with cost overruns, delays and
other problems. By 1981, when Columbia became the first shuttle, each
launch was costing $250 million, 16 times the original estimates. But
many of the worst problems were hidden until the shuttle Challenger
exploded on Jan. 28, 1986.

Investigations later showed that faulty welds in a booster rocket -
faults that had been concealed through falsified X-rays by a
subcontractor to avoid the cost of repairs - had gone undetected and
uncorrected until NASA auditors were tipped off by former employees
of the subcontractor.

Investigators also learned that NASA had drastically cut spending on
safety testing, design and development, even skipping thermal and
vibration tests on the shuttle and its engines. Instead of testing
component parts, contractors only tested assembled systems,
investigators said. And they said NASA had misled Congress on costs
and schedules, withheld documents, violated federal codes and
squandered billions.

<http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/02/national/02HIST.html>   *****
--
Yoshie

* Calendar of Events in Columbus:
<http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/calendar.html>
* Student International Forum: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/>
* Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/>
* Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio>
* Solidarity: <http://solidarity.igc.org/>