NASA WATCH

Norm Augustine, chairman of the U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee (Augustine Commission) testimony to the House Science and Technology Committee (15 Sept 2009):

The Committee concludes that no rational exploratory program can be funded under the existing funding constraint and that plans for America's space exploration program would de facto be halted and human operations limited to low earth orbit.... The reason ... is, simplistically stated, that for sixty percent of the needed funds, one cannot go sixty percent of the way to Mars.

Given the proclivities of the current Administration, this doesn’t look good.