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A comment on Texas politicians warn Smithsonian it must not lobby to retain its space shuttle. Parent comment

Re:Texas politicians warn Smithsonian it must not lobby to r... by derbOac on Friday August 08, 2025 @06:07PM (#44842182)
Also, no one is providing the rest of the "message sent to Congress" in which "the organization said it would be 'unprecedented' for the federal government to remove an object from its collection and send it somewhere else."

There's nothing about noting that something is "unprecedented" that counts as lobbying or opposition per se. It could be "unprecedented" in a good way; the organization might have also just been answering a question or asking for clarification -- which seems reasonable given that the law specifies something involved in the Commercial Crew Program, not the shuttle.

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Re:Texas politicians warn Smithsonian it must not lobby to r... by AlotOfReading on Friday August 08, 2025 @07:47PM (#44842855)
Not defending this specific case, but is it really unprecedented to remove an item from the Smithsonian and send it somewhere else? There's been a similar order for them to return cultural remains to their owners since 1989.
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Re:Texas politicians warn Smithsonian it must not lobby to r... by Animats on Saturday August 09, 2025 @12:38AM (#44844067)
NASA at least gets to pick which shuttle, if they have to go through with this. Enterprise, which is stored in a tent near the Intrepid aircraft carrier in New York, might be an option. There's no historical relationship between Intrepid and the Space Shuttle. Enterprise was placed where it is now by lifting it from a barge with a large crane. So it could be put onto a barge again and moved to Houston by water.[1]

[1] https://intrepidmuseum.org/exhibitions/permanent-exhibitions...

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Re:Texas politicians warn Smithsonian it must not lobby to r... by LorenDB on Sunday August 10, 2025 @08:21AM (#44854718)
Sadly this won't work. The bill requires the designated spacecraft to have flown humans to space.
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