On 12 May 2004 03:11:15 GMT, in a place far, far away,
(MattWriter) made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

Does federal law require that all of NASA's funding
come from the federal budget?

Yes. If someone wants to fund this privately, they're free to do
so--no need to give money to NASA.


If I understand it correctly, individual Federal agencies cannot accept funding
in grants, loans, or donations: any such money (and there is some left in
people's wills) simply goes into the Treasury.

I worked on a study for MSFC in 2002 on future propulsion options in which we
strongly endorsed what is now Prometheus but pushed to keep funding the BPPP as
well. So much for NASA taking MY advice

Yes, Stan Kent learned this the hard way a couple decades ago when he
raised money to try to extend the Viking mission. NASA was happy to
take his money, but could not guarantee that it would be spent in any
particular way.