I'm Brian Lehrer. This is my daily politics podcast from WNYC Studios. It's Monday, May 3rd.

You know, if all went according to plan, about 10 minutes ago, Vice President Kamala Harris swore in former Senator Bill Nelson as the

administrator of NASA. Now, considering what's happening in this country and around the world,

with COVID, with racial injustice, with the climate, and a whole bunch of other things,

this might not seem like the biggest story for a Monday morning, right? But consider this.

It was just on Saturday that Vice President Harris herself was officially named to chair the

National Space Council, an agency that most presidents over the last 30 years essentially

disbanded, but that Biden says he will use. It's another groundbreaking, or maybe we should say

atmosphere breaking, leadership role for Harris as a black and South Asian woman in a role only

associated in the past with white men. And it's not just about the fun stuff like Biden's goal

of sending humans back to the moon, but also national

security, economic development, and they might even have to create a sanitation department for

space one of these days with all the floating debris that human beings are leaving up there

that's becoming a real problem. And consider this. Chair of the National Space Council

is just the latest job to land on the vice president's crowded plate, which include, as listed

by Politico, her leading roles in dealing with situation at the border, plus diplomacy with

Mexico and Central America

with respect to that, also leading the anti-COVID vaccine hesitancy efforts, the impact of the

recession on women and on black on businesses, a pro-union task force that she'll be heading

up and a push to

increase broadband internet access across the country. And yet, as everyone took note of

President Biden hitting his 100th day in office last week, not much has been written about

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