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NASA May Shut Down all Space Station's Research
jdoire writes "NASA is considering shutting down all the research programs it conducts aboard the international space station for at least a year to fill a projected budget shortfall of up to $100 million, a top station manager said on Thursday. Why the shortfall, you may ask? Because of $3 billion of Congress's pet projets"
I guess every minute in which the ISS isn't doing anything is money thrown away...
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
I find it wonderful how politicians are sapping money out of a lot of technology-based funding and using it for completely different means.
Where's IPAC (http://www.ipaction.org/) when you need them?
From TFA, what the money is being spent on instead:
Construction or renovation of dozens of museums, planetariums and science labs for colleges.
Computers, classrooms and lab space for colleges and schools across the U.S.
A website and laboratory for the Gulf of Maine Aquarium.
Arguably worthy choices to spend scientific $$$ on. If you have X dollars, and X+Y projects to spend them on, then Y of those projects are going to go unfunded.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
What this story is talking about is beuracratic nonsense... its the absolute right thing to do.
The only way we'll ever compete, or advance beyond the 70's in space technology, is to kill the shuttle and space station once and for all. Both were utter wastes of resources designed from the start to be nothing more than a civilian funding source for military research, then warped into corporate and international welfare programs with the fall of the cold war in the 80's.
The space station was never meant to be finished... it was meant to be as expensive and difficult to build as possible, to keep pumping billions into defense contractors, ensuring they were still around when the next big war came along.
It worked. Now our actions around the world more than support the funding of our defense contractors. Time to stop wasting money on the space station and put NASA's budget doing what it does best.
Just a question from a german ;-)
Why do you call those pet projects "pork" or "pork barrels"? It seems that there is a historical connection to a precendent of this kind which had to do with pork. But what exactly happened?
use Bielefeld.pm
The topic author points out $3 billion in "pet projects" -- many of which are a waste, but also many of which are valuable. Not that the budget should have itemized spending like this -- it is just absurd to say that pork of $3 billion in a year is the problem.
The problem is the nearly $5 billion per month (USA Today article with the numbers here) being spent in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Even if you think the wars are legitimate, logic dictates that this huge cost is the reason why our deficit is going up, and why programs are being shortchanged.
It's time. Split NASA into operations and research.
Turn the shuttle and space station and all non-research operation/facilities (including launch) over to the Navy (not the Air Force, despite the superficial similarities) with the mandate to provide the US a continuous capability to deliver large payloads into space on demand.
NASA keeps making robotic probes and running science programs and focuses on organizing and developing for the "return to moon and on to Mars". All rockets and launch services to be contracted from the Navy or private industry.
Actually, split it into three portions - the utter fat (museums and such) gets divided between various other agencies such as education. Or simply cut it out entirely.
> The same could be said about the early American and Soviet space programs - they really needed the experience the Germans had.
But of course! Keep in mind the reason "Our German scientists were so much better than Russia's German scientists" though. Their distribution was not random. Being 'rocket scientists' in both senses of the term they understood Germany was losing and made every effort to be captured by American or British forces instead of the Russians.
In other words, they wanted to be here building rockets for US instead of slaving away for the Soviet Empire.
Democrat delenda est