In article ,
ed kyle wrote:
What will President Kerry do with NASA? My guess is that
he will want to dump the Bush Moon/Mars plans ASAP, but
will he be able to stop CEV and the end of Shuttle?

Replacing the shuttle with the CEV is clearly a reasonable thing to do and
will probably continue, but CEV's beyond-LEO role will be firmly shelved,
as will any significant funding for return-to-the-Moon preparations. The
emphasis will be on ISS and meeting prior commitments, and on some modest
reductions in NASA's budget.

Bear in mind that even assuming Kerry wins and goes two terms, and the
CEV stays roughly on schedule, we'll be in the tail end of his presidency
before shuttle retirement and manned CEV LEO flights are an immediate
prospect. Only then will a big decision have to be made about funding for
more ambitious things. By that time, the easy thing to do will be to
stall and punt any major decision to the next president.
--
MOST launched 30 June; science observations running | Henry Spencer
since Oct; first surprises seen; papers pending. |