From The Empty Promises Department:
File this alongside of other empty promises made by GWB, like his “uniter, not divider” spiel or vowing to bring morality back to the White House. “No Child Left Behind” ended up being No Child Left Unfunded (or is that Untested?). Dare we say “Mission Accomplished?”
Now we learn, via WaPo, that (gasp!) Mr. Bush’s promise, boldly called his “Vision for Space Exploration,” is more political vaporware. NASA doesn’t have the money.
A large deficit in NASA’s troubled shuttle program threatens to seriously delay and possibly cripple President Bush’s space exploration initiative unless the number of planned flights is cut virtually in half or the White House agrees to add billions of dollars to the human spaceflight budget.
Sources familiar with ongoing negotiations between NASA and the White House say the administration has no intention of spending extra money to deal with a shortfall that some space experts say could exceed $6 billion from 2006 to 2010, when NASA plans to retire the shuttle for good.
We know where that money is going: Halliburton, et al. After all, who is going to pay for the white phosphorous chemical weapons we use to combat terrorism and its phantom WMD’s? That money has to come from somewhere. NASA, build on the backs of Democratic administrations past, seems a likely fall guy for diversion of funds into the pockets of Republican shareholders present, in the guise of “rebuilding.” Right: Ask Philip Bloom about that.
George is consistent, I’ll say that. He fails to deliver even now, when his “political capitol” is spent and the bills are overdue. He creates the Department of Homeland Security, which can’t function during a crisis. His Federal Emergency Management Agency incompetence cost untold lives, and his War on Terror has turned America into a nation of terrorists in the eyes of the world. The only Department that works in this administration is the Department of Empty Promises, one which no one admits exists.