President Barack Obama could have searched far and wide — and probably did — without ever finding a more qualified candidate than Charles Bolden to lead NASA as it prepares for a new era in the exploration of space.

Let's begin with the right stuff. Bolden is a former astronaut and veteran of four space shuttle flights, commanding two of them, and was a member of the Discovery crew that deployed the Hubble Space Telescope in 1990. All combined, he logged more than 680 hours in space. He served in numerous other technical and administrative positions within NASA, several of them related to astronaut safety, and was an assistant deputy administrator of the agency.

Before NASA, Bolden was a Marine aviator, flying more than 100 sorties during the Vietnam War.

He returned to the Marine Corps after his astronaut days and was responsible for three Marine Expeditionary Units at Camp Pendleton, Calif., from 1997 to 2000, then served as commander of the Marine Aircraft Wing at Miramar, Calif., from 2000 to 2002. He retired from the Marines as a major general in 2004.

In the spring of 2002, at the urging of NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe, President George W. Bush nominated Bolden for the No. 2 NASA post. Less than a month later, on the day before Bolden's Senate confirmation hearing, Bush withdrew the nomination. The only White House explanation — a lame one — was that all qualified military personnel were needed for the war on terror. Bush then passed over Bolden again in 2004 in naming a successor to O'Keefe.

The shuttle program is now winding down, and NASA is at a crossroads. Does the future of space exploration lie mostly in manned or unmanned missions, and what is the appropriate mix of the two?

Despite potential conflicts stemming from his ties since he left the Marines to aerospace contractors involved in NASA projects, nobody is more qualified than Bolden to help answer those questions. One more thing: If confirmed by the Senate, he would be the first African-American at the helm of the world's premier space agency.

REPRINTED FROM THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE.