Here are my thoughts about the four questions:

1) In a Sept. 25th article in Space News, NASA Administrator Bolden says, “I would be telling you a lie if I told you we’re on board, we’re really excited about this.”  And yet, while acknowledging that "Old habits die hard" and "Many of us who have grown up in the traditional space program, you know, we really believe we have all the answers," he does recognize the value of NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program.

My interpretation:  Bolden recognizes that NewSpace is important to NASA's success, yet he knows that there are many powerful NewSpace foes within NASA and Congress that he must either co-opt or crush if NASA and NewSpace are to achieve their full synergistic potential.  Whichever path he chooses, it will be a path where NASA has already gone before, as it has already made both half-hearted and sincere efforts to nurture NewSpace, and it has worked hard to crush NewSpace companies such as Mir Corp.  Perhaps even worse, it has ignored similar NewSpace advice from the past:

•  In 1986, in the wake of the loss of the space shuttle Challenger, Congress created and President Reagan appointed The National Commission on Space.  On p. 110 of its report, "Pioneering the Space Frontier," you will find this statement:  "The Commission therefore recommends:  That next-generation cargo and passenger transport vehicles be designed and developed to be readily operable by commercial firms after the operational phase is reached.  The sooner the private sector can assume responsibility for design, specification, development, fabrication, fight test, production, and operation of space vehicles and launch and landing facilities, the sooner the United States can begin to pattern Earth-to-orbit transportation after commercial airline operations."

• In January 2004, President Bush directed NASA to a new "Moon, Mars and Beyond" mission and convened the "President's Commission on Implementation of United States Exploration Policy," which presented its recommendations in June 2004.  Recommendation 3-1 states, "The Commission recommends NASA recognize and implement a far larger presence of private industry in space operations with the specific goal of allowing private industry to assume the primary role of providing services to NASA, and most immediately in accessing low-Earth orbit.  In NASA decisions, the preferred choice for operational activities must be competitively awarded contracts with private and non-profit organizations and NASA's role must be limited to only those areas where there is irrefutable demonstration that only government can perform the proposed activity."

The results are the bleak options listed in the Augustine Committee report.

2) Among other things, I see in President Obama a manager who sincerely attempts to please all parties who will be affected by his decisions.  Sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn't.  Sometimes all parties are willing to accept a compromise in which they all benefit more or less than they want.  But sometimes a manager needs to crack heads, draw the line, and make it clear that not all parties can be made happy with a decision, and while some may be furious with the decision, that decision will be made in support of the greater good.  I do not expect President Obama to dramatically change the status quo by directing NASA to do as reported in the aforementioned Wall Street Journal article.

3) Considering the to-be-expected efforts by Sen. Bill Nelson to save NASA jobs in Florida, and similar efforts by Sen. Richard Shelby (read here), and the political ramifications thereof, I do not expect Congress to support dramatic changes at NASA.

4) Considering all the above, even if the President, Congress, and Administrator Bolden agreed to radically alter NASA's relationship with the NewSpace industry, I expect the "old habits" to which Bolden referred will fight progress every centimeter of the way, thereby continuing to delay, perhaps fatally, NASA's rejuvenation.

When it's all said and done, political inertia to maintain the status quo will over-power the political momentum for change, and the result will be NASA visibly struggling as NewSpace visibly advances.