{"id":130499,"date":"2016-04-27T14:05:51","date_gmt":"2016-04-27T20:05:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/04\/27\/us-senators-love-funding-nasa-work-in-their-own-states.html"},"modified":"2016-05-02T22:08:36","modified_gmt":"2016-05-03T04:08:36","slug":"us-senators-love-funding-nasa-work-in-their-own-states","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/04\/27\/us-senators-love-funding-nasa-work-in-their-own-states.html","title":{"rendered":"US Senators love funding NASA [work in their own states]"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the defense industry, where a project is being built is a critical component of what sort of DoD money goes to it, under the protective eyes of Congresscritters with an electoral stake in bringing home the defense system bacon. Whether such systems work, or are the best to choose from, seems a secondary consideration to where such systems will be built, because that makes constituents happy.<\/p>\n

The same is also true with NASA, except it's a lot more ham-handed. So a couple of US Senators[1] have arranged for some big boosts to NASA's budget .. for programs that are operated in their state. But in doing so, they hamstrung other projects that are needed to actually make use<\/i> of those boosted programs. Because actual NASA space exploration is simply a coincidental byproduct of big NASA spending that benefits one's constituents.<\/p>\n

—–<\/p>\n

[1] And, to be fair, the two highlighted in the article are a Republican (Richard Shelby of Alabama) and a Democrat (Barbara Mikulski of Maryland). Pork barrel politics are not confined to just one side of the aisle by any means.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\n
\n
\n<\/a>
\nHow to land on Mars? Don’t ask NASA—the Senate just cut its test program<\/a><\/span>
\nParochial interests trump tech funding when it comes to reaching the Red Planet.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

View on Google+<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the defense industry, where a project is being built is a critical component of what sort of DoD money goes to it, under the protective eyes of Congresscritters with an electoral stake in bringing home the defense system bacon. Whether such systems work, or are the best to choose from, seems a secondary consideration … Continue reading “US Senators love funding NASA [work in their own states]”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106,82,376],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-130499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts","category-space","category-taxing-spending"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":128469,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/10\/29\/looking-inward-looking-outward.html","url_meta":{"origin":130499,"position":0},"title":"Looking inward, looking outward","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 29-Oct-15 11:01am","format":false,"excerpt":"It's ironic that budget hawks and conservatives who have long argued that manned space exploration is a money-wasting boondoggle and that NASA ought to be spending more time focusing on the Earth ... are now spawning folk insisting that NASA's core science program is space exploration and that Earth science\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10296,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2007\/02\/21\/hell_of_a_way_to_run_a_sp.html","url_meta":{"origin":130499,"position":1},"title":"Hell of a way to run a space agency?","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 21-Feb-07 10:58pm","format":false,"excerpt":"NASA may not be able to launch the space shuttle's replacement by 2014 as promised, according to the agency's 2008 budget request to Congress. This could increase the gap...","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Nature"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Nature","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/science"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":27736,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/05\/03\/exploration-by-committee.html","url_meta":{"origin":130499,"position":2},"title":"Exploration by committee","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 3-May-12 2:11pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Because nothing says \"Good Science\" better than legislatively-mandated space programs, right? Oh, especially while you're continuing to hack back the overall budget. Embedded Link House pares NASA's 2013 spending back to 1959 levels, may force Europa mission The US House is about to debate a budget that pares NASA back\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":133369,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/04\/28\/were-running-out-of-space-suits.html","url_meta":{"origin":130499,"position":3},"title":"We're running out of … space suits?","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 28-Apr-17 5:54pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The current suits are \"prohibitively expensive\" to make more of, have suffered unexpected attrition (due to shuttle disasters, mostly), and are reaching their expiry date. Meanwhile, NASA has been torn by too many missions, spending money in too many directions, and hampered by too little budget. (And, unspoken, launch vehicles\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10143,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/08\/24\/mercury_gemini.html","url_meta":{"origin":130499,"position":4},"title":"Mercury … Gemini … Apollo …","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 24-Aug-06 3:05pm","format":false,"excerpt":"... Orion. NASA announced Tuesday that its new crew exploration vehicle will be named Orion. Orion is the vehicle NASA\u2019s Constellation Program is developing to carry a new generation...","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Nature"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Nature","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/science"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/images\/orion-nasa.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":28030,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/05\/29\/not-everyone-wanted-to-live-in-the-space-age.html","url_meta":{"origin":130499,"position":5},"title":"Not everyone wanted to live in the Space Age","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 29-May-12 11:05pm","format":false,"excerpt":"George speaks sooth -- even during the height of the Apollo program, support for NASA and space exploration was always a struggle -- between folks suggesting it would be better spent on various other governmental programs (worthy or un-), or simply cut from the budget or applied to new ICBMs\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130499"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130499\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":130568,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130499\/revisions\/130568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}