Friday, 23 August 1991 Washington, DC
1. HUGE EOS PLATFORMS WILL BE BROKEN UP INTO SMALLER
SATELLITES.
Spending caps may have accomplished what
advisory panels could not: the six massive platforms planned for
the Earth Observing System will become 18 merely huge satellites.
Although outside review panels had consistently recommended more-
but-smaller EOS satellites, NASA insisted its concept of
grandiose multipurpose platforms would provide more and better
data. But if the space station continues eating into EOS funds,
as it has this year, it will be difficult to build things that
come in big pieces. It is also risky to put everything on a few
platforms that could fail, especially given current NASA
spacecraft problems: Hubble, which already has myopia and palsy,
seems to be developing an attitude problem, while Galileo's
arthritis may keep it from calling home.
2. DOD CENSORS WANT CONTROL OF UNCLASSIFIED NUCLEAR
INFORMATION.
A proposed rule would allow the Department of
Defense to prevent dissemination of unclassified information
pertaining to physical security of "special nuclear materials,"
which is a DOD euphemism for fissile isotopes of U and Pu. DOE
has had such a program for six years. The new rule would apply
even to information that has already become public. The APS
Council has consistently opposed restraints on unclassified
information. So why doesn't DOD just classify the stuff? It's
been suggested that the objective is to conceal politically
sensitive information, such as existence of SDI's Timberwind
nuclear rocket propulsion program (WN 5 Apr
91).
3. PROPOSED ETHICS RULES FOR FEDERAL EMPLOYEES WORRY
SOCIETIES.
Government scientists could become second-class
members of the scientific community, according to some
interpretations of the proposed standards of ethical conduct for
government employees published in the Federal Register last
month. Participation in the activities of professional
associations is encouraged by the proposed rule, but, aside from
the occasional use of a government telephone, official time
cannot be taken to serve as an officer of a professional
association. If academia and industry took the same position, it
would mean the end of scientific societies; the Office of
Government Ethics, which drafted the rule, is aware that this
section is likely to be controversial. Some societies have
already requested an extension of the comment period, which ends
September 20. For millions of federal employees, this is the
first substantial rewrite of federal ethics standards since 1965-
-and it calls for dramatic changes in the code of conduct.
3. HUNGER STRIKE IN FRONT OF CHINESE EMBASSY IN ITS EIGHTH
DAY.
Tiananmen student leader Li Lu, now a student at
Columbia, began his strike to show solidarity with Wang Juntao
and Chen Ziming. They are on a hunger strike in a Beijing prison
to protest their treatment. Wang, who was sentenced to 13 years
as "mastermind" of the 1989 democracy movement, is held in
solitary confinement, reportedly in handcuffs, and is suffering
from hepatitis B.
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