Thanks For the Algebra

Here are NASA honcho Charles Bolden's actual words (to an al Jazeera interviewer):

When I became the NASA administrator, or before I became the NASA administrator, he charged me with three things. One was he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math. He wanted me to expand our international relationships. And third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me 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.

That's NASA's mission--puffery and pandering? Making Muslims "feel good" about themselves? What--is the U.S. now the Muslim world's therapist or something? The United States of Am-Oprah? Imagine if JFK post-Sputnik had made it his business to make Russians "feel good" about their historic scientific contributions (along the lines of "that Lysenko sure was aces"). There likely would still be no man--and certainly no American--on the moon.

How can Americans stand to have this wuss as their president?

Update: Rich Lowry quotes Bernard Lewis re the "science gap".

Update: Elmo writes about Islam's contributions to science (which, go figure, seem to have ebbed more than a millennium ago). Hey, Obama--how about Elmo for NASA administrator? He seems to have the credentials and mindset you're seeking.

Update: Jay Nordlinger comments re Obama's turning NASA into an affirmative action program for underachieving Muslims:

I was thinking that, in the interest of evenhandedness in our Middle East policy, we could reach out to the Jews to make them feel good about their contribution to science — just in case they’re feeling low. Really, you can’t expect them to have made any contribution to science: They are so few in number, and they have been storm-tossed for centuries, driven from one country to another, sometimes murdered en masse . . .