Interesting news story the other day that Alabama Senator Richard Shelby stuck language in a bill so that the american public would have to fund 500 million dollars for a defunct defense program that benefits his state.
The cancelled Ares rocket program must be funded through March, while many ongoing Nasa projects are shelved due to lack of funding. The President made his intentions clear in October when he redirected Nasa's mission but Shelby saw fit to place the language in the defense bill which would help contractors in his home state, even though the project had been canned and the technology deemed dated. Nasa believes that a liquid fueled rocket will be safer, cheaper and more powerful than the solid fueled systems planned for the Ares.
The federal government's 2010 budget contains Shelby inserted language that barred NASA from shutting down the Ares program until Congress passed a 2011 budget.
That should have been done before the Oct. 1 start of the federal fiscal year but Congress was unable to pass a 2011 budget and instead voted this month to extend the 2010 budget until March -- meaning NASA must abide by the 2010 language.
Now NASA and its contractors are required to keep building Ares I, even though President Obama killed it when he signed the new NASA plan that canceled the Constellation program begun under President George W. Bush.
The President's plan is to replace the Constellation program which includes the Ares with commercial "heavy lifting" rockets that can take astronauts and cargo to and from the International Space Station.
$165 million of it -- will be paid to Alliant Techsystems, or ATK, toward the development of a solid-rocket first stage for the Ares I the rocket. Alliant is one of the Senator's largest campaign contributors. Shelby’s 2010 reelection campaign was the top recipient of funds from ATK’s PAC, receiving the maximum $10,000. And the company’s employees gave more to Shelby than to any other politician in the 2010 election cycle. Guess the strategy worked. And the American taxpayer foots the bill once again.
(If sharp eyed readers think that they have seen this shot before, they are correct. Shelby is a notorious porker and I use it often.)
1 comment:
It is going to be interesting to see how the old Pols in D.C handle the Tea Party folks who are bent on cutting spending. Shelby and his ilk, of both parties, are going to be in a tough position. How can they reward their donors and keep the people on the far right happy? I think that this is referred to as a "conundrum".
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