White House may seek to slash NASA’s science budget by 50 percent

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And there it is:
https://edition.cnn.com/politics/live-news/trump-presidency-news-06-01-25#cmbe7hzut00003b6m8inab0yx
https://twitter.com/x/status/1929303606571761906
View: https://twitter.com/jackiewattles/status/1929303606571761906

NEW: Source told me Musk’s exit left room for Sergio Gor, director of WH Presidential Personnel Office, to advocate for installing a different nominee.

Elon "rubbed a couple people wrong...I wouldn’t be surprised if other Elon-connected people are going to find their way out."
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Frank Herbert's best known for Dune, but 'DOGE' makes me think of the need for this:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21475392
https://en.everybodywiki.com/Bureau_of_Sabotage
http://www.fact-index.com/b/bu/bureau_of_sabotage.html

Bureau of Sabotage​

The Bureau of Sabotage is a fictional government entity set in two of Frank Herbert's science fiction novels, Whipping Star and The Dosadi Experiment. It is colloquially known as BuSab.
In Herbert's fiction, sometime in the far future, government has become terrifyingly efficient. Red tape no longer exists: laws are conceived of, passed, funded, and executed within hours, rather than months. The bureaucratic machinery has become a juggernaut, rolling over human concerns and welfare with terrible speed, jerking the universe of sentients one way, then another, threatening to destroy everything in a fit of spastic reactions. In short, the speed of government has gone beyond sentient control (in this fictional universe, many alien species co-exist, with a common definition of sentience marking their status as equals).

BuSab begins as a terrorist organization, whose sole purpose is to frustrate the workings of government and to damage the incredible level of efficient order in the universe in order to give sentients a chance to reflect upon changes and deal with them. Having saved sentiency from its government, BuSab is officially recognized as a necessary check on the power of government. First a corp, then a bureau, BuSab has legally recognized powers to interfere in the workings of any world, of any species, of any government, answerable only to themselves (though in practice, they are always threatened with dissolution by the governments they watch). They act as a monitor of, and a conscience for, the collective sentiency, watching for signs of anti-sentient behaviour and preserving the essential dignity of individuals.

In the novels mentioned above, Jorg X. McKie is a saboteur extraordinary, effectively the James Bond of BuSab.
 
Flyaway said:
It’s being reported on NSF that this proposed NASA budget is likely dead on arrival, that there is no appetite on either side of the house for these kind of cuts.
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It's small comfort given the current administration's attitude that the President Proposes, Disposes, and doesn't care if the law says otherwise.
 
Jared Isaacman speaks out, and it’s clear that NASA lost a visionary leader:
https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/...-its-clear-that-nasa-lost-a-visionary-leader/
Although Isaacman did not name anyone, multiple sources have told Ars that it was Sergio Gor, an official in the White House Presidential Personnel Office, who moved against Isaacman after Musk left the White House. Gor was irked by Musk's failure to consult him and other personnel officials on some decisions.

As a result of what appears to be political pettiness, NASA lost a visionary leader who had the potential to lead the space agency into the middle of the 21st century at a time when an aging agency needs to modernize. If you listen to him, losing that potential in such a way is downright painful. It's a damn shame.
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https://twitter.com/x/status/1930377696191672801
View: https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1930377696191672801
 
Well it’s all kicking off online now with the president threatening to remove Musk’s government contracts.

“The uneasy alliance between the two men was also strained by a recent move by the White House to nix Trump’s nominee to run NASA, Jared Isaacman, according to people familiar with the matter. Musk, a close ally of Isaacman, had advocated for him to get the job.

The decision infuriated Musk, who complained to associates over the weekend that he had donated hundreds of millions of dollars to help get Trump elected in last year’s campaign, only to see Isaacman’s nomination pulled, a person with direct knowledge of the matter said. Musk’s frustration over the NASA episode made him more willing to aggressively criticize the tax bill, people close to him said. Musk didn’t respond to a request for comment.”
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https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/elon-musk-trump-tax-spending-republicans-5b779d6b
 

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Flyaway said:
Well it’s all kicking off online now with the president threatening to remove Musk’s government contracts.


https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/elon-musk-trump-tax-spending-republicans-5b779d6b
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The survival of the system requires keeping outsiders out of the system. Once they have done their job, they are expelled by the usual procedure.

Is it that no one remembers how the system rejected all the innovations proposed by Howard Hughes?

Money is not printed so that these guys act freely and at a certain point in their career the system begins a smear operation that ends with them, if possible, in a way that looks like an accident caused by disorderly personal behavior.
 
Flyaway said:
Musk in response to the president’s threat to cancel his government contracts stated on X that he would immediately begin decommissioning the Dragon spacecraft.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1930718684819112251
View: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1930718684819112251
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Popcorn time!

Dang, I see I was a few seconds too slow!!!

But also, it must be traumatizing for certain parts of the electorate to see daddy and daddy fighting with each other all of a sudden...
 
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I imagine new love will now be found for SLS especially in light of this from Congress.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1930700844694983119
View: https://twitter.com/MicahMaidenberg/status/1930700844694983119

https://twitter.com/x/status/1930751772131201114
View: https://twitter.com/SpaceflightNow/status/1930751772131201114

The reality is that it signals that Republicans in the US Senate are not particularly interested in sending humans to Mars, probably are OK with the majority of cuts to science programs at NASA, and want to keep the status quo on Artemis, including the Space Launch System rocket.
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https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/...e-house-budget-for-nasa-keep-sls-nix-science/
 
NMaude said:
Now that he's no longer in the running to be the next NASA Administrator he can afford to be as candid as he wants to be.
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Yep. SLS needs to die and most politicians are self-serving.
 
Hmmm... Chickens fly and dogs jump. Is there a possibility of any impact on other projects besides the Dragon spacecraft at the moment?
 
NMaude said:
The SLS can be replaced when there is something viable to replace it.
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By the time the 2-3 that are built, fly, there will be. Basically, what Isaacman said in the interview.
 
SUPER=BUG said:
Hmmm... Chickens fly and dogs jump. Is there a possibility of any impact on other projects besides the Dragon spacecraft at the moment?
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No and, as we've seen, not Dragon either.
 
Isaacman seems like a capable fella. Now, looking back at Trump's various dealings, I'll have to question myself if all of this is a big stunt just like the 145%->30% gambit, because Isaacman seems to belong to the classic Democrat camp and AFAIK those don't rub Trump the wrong way.
 
martinbayer said:
Blame middle American US political, scientific, and technological hostility/illiteracy/ignorance/bias and general mouth-breathing hillbilly idiocy for that. But on the bright side, you can watch this for a brief diversion to lift your spirits: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idiocracy
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I blame the fifty years of comprehensive education cuts in the name of "tax cuts" for this. There are things in life more annoying than tax bills, and anti-intellectualism is one of the more lethal examples.
 
exclaimedleech8 said:
This is the most weirdly vindictive feud since the Sino-Soviet split
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Jeffrey Tambor should play Elon a la Death of Stalin.

"I just wanted the NASA Centers shuttered--I didn't mean kill my contracts too!"

Don't make me call Lavrentiy Cheney on you.

Poor Elon…his sink is likely leaking.
 
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jcf said:
What "innovations" would that be?
Howard didn't "innovate" anything in aerospace and there was nothing for the "system" to reject.
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Of course not. He didn't do anything.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hughes_Aircraft_Company
You may or may not have heard of these.

Hughes Aircraft - Spruce Goose, XF-11
Hughes Missile Systems - AIM-47 / 54, AIM-120 AMRAAM
Hughes Helicopters - AH-64 Apache, XH-17
Hughes Space and Communications - Surveyor (did over half a century ago what today's companies consistently fail to do). The Galileo probe to Jupiter.
 
Sferrin said:
Of course not. He didn't do anything.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hughes_Aircraft_Company
You may or may not have heard of these.

Hughes Aircraft - Spruce Goose, XF-11
Hughes Missile Systems - AIM-47 / 54, AIM-120 AMRAAM
Hughes Helicopters - AH-64 Apache, XH-17
Hughes Space and Communications - Surveyor (did over half a century ago what today's companies consistently fail to do). The Galileo probe to Jupiter.
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You didn't read all of your link. "In a 1953 accounting maneuver designed to reduce his income tax liabilities, Howard Hughes donated most of Hughes Aircraft's stock and assets to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), a charity he created himself, and subsequently ceased managing the company directly"

So, other than Spruce Goose on your list, he wasn't involved with the rest
 
Byeman said:
You didn't read all of your link. "In a 1953 accounting maneuver designed to reduce his income tax liabilities, Howard Hughes donated most of Hughes Aircraft's stock and assets to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), a charity he created himself, and subsequently ceased managing the company directly"

So, other than Spruce Goose on your list, he wasn't involved with the rest
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Well, bummer. Learn something new every day. He definitely had his hands in a lot of pies. Just not those pies apparently.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Hughes
 
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