Congress, NASA

When a 25-percent cut is getting off easy

Lost in yesterday’s hubbub about the State of the Union address was the introduction of legislation to radically cut spending by new Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY). Paul’s plan would cut $500 billion in discretionary spending in FY2011 (which is already well underway, although without final appropriations bills) by making major cuts in most agencies and zeroing out some. In the case of NASA, he would cut the agency’s budget by 25 percent, to $13.375 billion, according to a summary he released with the bill. (Paul appears to be cutting from FY2009 levels, when NASA got $17.8 billion, and not FY2010, when the agency got $18.7 billion.) His rationale:

With the presence of private industries involved in space exploration and even space tourism, it is time for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to step aside and allow innovation to flourish. Looking at ways to reduce NASA’s spending is long overdue.

In addition, NASA has consistently been flagged by organizations like Citizens Against Government Waste, which most recently highlighted NASA’s multibillion-dollar Constellation program, a project that has been focused on the exploration of the moon and Mars. Despite spending more than $10 billion on this program, NASA has made very little progress since the program’s inception.

Finally, since President Obama has determined to realign the goals of NASA away from human exploration, and more on science and “global warming” research, the need to fund the agency at levels not consistent with the goals of the past provides the opportunity to direct funds toward deficit reduction. National Science

That said, the agency does pretty well compared to other organizations. Sen. Paul would cut NOAA’s budget by 36 percent, claiming the agency “has become bloated and its breadth and scope has broadened”. The NSF would be cut by 62 percent under Paul’s plan, under his belief that “research in science is best conducted by private industry for economic purposes,” and he would eliminate the Department of Energy. While the legislation likely stands little chance of making it through Congress, it does add to the debate about spending cuts versus spending freezes, as the president proposed last night.

12 comments to When a 25-percent cut is getting off easy

  • So much for the claim by some posting here that the Tea Party will restart Constellation and increase NASA’s budget.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Of course this budget has no chance of being implemented…but as a Bakers excersize…

    13.XX is a little low…I would do about 15…but what would happen on 13 (does Paul give any indication)

    end the HLV program, end the shuttle, probably end Webb just give up. The “Curiosity” Mars rover either makes it on a set budget or we call it even and move on.

    Move JSC toward a University run organization, mothball all the KSC facilities completely moving NASA out of thelaunch business…either close MSFC or force it into heavy propulsion R&D….

    hmm just musing but a 13 billion could be made to work.

    Whittington and others of course are in shock.

    Robert G. Oler

  • With the presence of private industries involved in space exploration and even space tourism, it is time for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to step aside and allow innovation to flourish. Looking at ways to reduce NASA’s spending is long overdue.

    My-my, what a surprise.

    To those who look at reality, no shock.

    Others who thought Tea-Partiers would look at NASA like DoD, welllll……

  • CharlesHouston

    People should realize that this debate about the budget just extends the time when the Federal government limps along on last year’s budget, unable to move on either last year’s programs or this year’s programs. The Congress should pass some budget for LAST year and then worry about next year! Why is Rand Paul spending time trying to end the NSF when so many Federal agencies have had no idea what to spend for the last several months?

    This does show how Rand Paul, and many Tea Party people, will be marginalized and ineffective. They will propose large cuts that are not good for the US and that have no chance of being enacted. The NSF does have a large role in coordinating research and paying for research that will not pay off in the short term. Commercial research has to pay off quickly.

  • Senator Paul seeks to surrender America’s leadership in the world.

    I hope he fails as badly as his policies would fail this country.

  • sc220

    Well. My hat’s off to the Republicans and Tea Partiers. If they do indeed hold firm to this course, then I will applaud their efforts. I am especially impressed by Mr. Paul’s recognition of commercial space, something that we were told the Republicans didn’t endorse. How wrong that is!

    As many noted a year or two ago, a revival of Republican fortunes does not mean a return to Bush era policies. Big government design bureau projects like Constellation are unacceptable now, and will continue to be for some time to come.

  • Chance

    “research in science is best conducted by private industry for economic purposes,”

    I wouldn’t argue with that where there is an obvious short to medium term return on investment, but it seems less likely for basic research (“pure” science) where there may be no obvious benefit until way down the road. Has there ever been any kind of study to confirm or deny private industry does such research better than public sector?

  • German guy

    Can someone explain to me, why the US doesn’t cut spending in the military? I mean they don’t need stealth fighters to fight Talibans with AK47, right? And voices that China is a military threat is pointless. If there ever happens a war between two superpowers it’s all nuclear. Everything else won’t matter after that anyways….

  • sc220

    If there ever happens a war between two superpowers it’s all nuclear. Everything else won’t matter after that anyways….

    That was the original line of reasoning in developing our incredible and justified nuclear arsenal. Unfortunately between then and now, we decided to also become the world’s policeman. I know that this line of reasoning is simplistic, but it has painted us into a corner from which we can’t seem to free ourselves.

  • Its easy to cut the budget of an agency that barely has one especially when the President doesn’t have a mission for NASA. Cutting $4 billion dollars from NASA’s budget is insignificant compared to the $3.5 trillion dollar Federal budget.

    Of course, under Paul’s philosophy there would have been no satellite industry in the US in the first place until private industry figured out how to make a profit developing private space rockets for private industry. Sort of like the 1950 movie ‘Destination Moon’ when private companies got together to build the first space rocket to the Moon. So much for science fiction:-)

    In reality, of course, private companies have no loyalty to the United States. Profits are their god. And the only destination private companies seem to be interested in right now is China and their cheap educated labor!

    Too bad Paul won’t cut the 780 billion dollar military budget by 25%. That would save us $195 billion annually. Cutting the extremely inefficient Medicare and Medicaid budget by 25% which would save us an additional $169 billion. Cuts in those two programs alone would save the American tax payers $364 billion annually.

    But the most serious problem US citizens and private businesses located in the US have is private health insurance inflation which makes US products significantly more expensive than our foreign competitors and is also the leading cause of personal bankruptcy in the United States. And most labor strikes in the US are related to the rising cost of private health insurance.

  • John

    I’m going to call this a WTF over moment. Now you can cut the Obama insanity programs, but to use that kind of rationale to cut NASA funding is just plain nuts.

  • Matt Wiser

    At least he’s not as harsh with NASA as his dad was: ISTR an Ad Astra magazine article from 1988 (when Ron Paul ran for President on the Libertarian ticket) which asked the candidates their positions on NASA. Bush 41 and Dukakis were avid supporters, while Paul was the only third-party candidate who wanted to kill NASA and rely entirely on the private sector. The others wanted at least a 50% cut in funding and divert the money “for social and other programs.”

Leave a Reply

  

  

  

You can use these HTML tags

<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>