Politics &Science & Technology admin on 01 Feb 2010 02:01 pm
Obama Budget Shifts NASA Funds From Exploration To “Ooo, Pretty”
(FiniteTimes.com) – The annual budget put forth by President Obama this week manages to pack much into its $3.8 trillion framework, but robust support for NASA is not one of the blessed. Among the agency’s cuts is the Constellation program, a Bush II-era initiative that would have placed man again on the moon within the next decade.
While supporters of the US space program are decrying the budgetary slight, many critics see the shifting of funds as a way to assure that the agency’s returns will be more practical and rewarding.
“The agency’s primary, and cheaper, goal now will be to warn about upcoming solar and lunar eclipses, so the fundamentalists don’t start freaking out and shooting people,” said an executive staffer familiar with the President’s thinking on the subject. “They’ll also, of course, be responsible for tracking meteor showers, lunar phases, comets and stuff… basically anything that we’ll want to be looking up to ‘ooo’ and ‘ahh’ over.
“This is all important stuff, granted, but how many billions of dollars does it really take to tweet out a ‘Hey, look up’ once or twice a month?”
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