There are few stauncher proponents of space exploration in the House than Rep. Nick Lampson (D-TX). The congressman, whose district includes the Johnson Space Center, introduced the Space Exploration Act in both this Congress and the previous one. The bill (HR 3057) would set a series of ambitious space exploration goals for NASA. You would think, then, that he would be a strong supporter of the new space initiative introduced by Bush two months ago. While he was “pleased” by the announcement, he told attendees of a luncheon at the Goddard Memorial Symposium on Tuesday that a set of “less than auspicious circumstances” pose serious problems for the plan:
- The plan has been introduced during an election year, with all the politics associated with it;
- There are growing concerns among both Republicans and Democrats in Congress regarding the size of the budget deficit (he said that there is “serious talk” within Congress about a year-long freeze of all discretionary spending programs except defense and homeland security);
- The plan is seen as the President’s initiative, not the nation’s (a point made by several other speakers at the symposium). Worse, the president has said nothing about the plan since his January 14 speech;
- There has a been a lack of details about the plan, which Lampson said has made some people uneasy;
- The plan leaves some NASA programs with “an empty wallet”, notably some earth and space science efforts;
- The plan is based on some other policy decisions that are questionable, such as shutting down the shuttle program before the CEV comes online.
In short, he said, he has “serious concerns regarding how to implement the space initiative” but later said “I’m going to vote for it regardless.” He added that he planned to talk with John Kerry in the near future about space issues.
