We’re a little heavy with NASA news this week, but it’s not like I’m making this stuff up.
Now Congress is under fire for taking money away from NASA for pet projects. This is called pork barrel politics. Basically, Congress tells NASA they get X billion dollars for their budget, but Congress can also "earmark" that money, forcing NASA to spend it on certain things. Since NASA’s budget isn’t very large in the scheme of things, they have to take money away from important projects to fund the earmarks.
This has been a thorn in NASA’s side for a long time; Congresscritters wanting to build special projects in their home districts, or somehow use the money flowing through NASA to benefit their home turf. At some level this is understandable; Representatives are supposed to watch our for their district… but not at the level where it hurts NASA’s mission!
So this situation is pretty weird. Congress isn’t giving enough money to NASA in the first place, forcing NASA to cut vast amounts of science from its projects, and then Congress is earmarking money the money it does give, making less for NASA’s projects. At least there’s one fewer political appointee to suppress what science there is.
I really couldn’t make this stuff up if I wanted to.
June 12th, 2006 at 9:36 pm
And then you have stories like this coming from the election cycle. It really pisses me off just how Congress wastes our money. It really makes me wish we had hard term limits for Congress along with some forward thinkers capable of thinking about what is good for the country as a whole as well as their respective turf.
June 13th, 2006 at 9:18 am
One of the big problems in NASA is that there has to be a major center wherever a Senator wants the money to flow. SO, we have to break up projects between CA, TX, LA, FL, AL, OH, VA and then spread the rest of the money (heh) around to colleges in every state of the union. Not that good work isn’t being done in every last one of these places. (Some maybe not, but thats not the issue) It takes a lot of management hours to coordinate my requirements from AL with the builders in TX and the launchers in FL. NASA ends up with a very top heavy, and meeting coordinated, organization. But the money has to flow, so we take a hit and send a project to wherever the Senator funds it.
We will always want more pure science. But the US has not backed a lot of pure science lately. I think NASA is probably not the right vehicle for it, to keep public interest, Exploration has to top Science. NASA dies without public interest. If it becomes purely the vehicle of Senatorial pork, the space-program will be over.
June 13th, 2006 at 9:40 am
Ok, I lurk here because I love reading about science, but since this falls into an area that I know something about; I’m going to post. But a warning, it may get little long.
Dukrous-I certainly understand the desire to see changes made to the system, such as implementing term limits, but we should be careful to make sure that it is not a case of reform for reform’s sake, and that it will accomplish what we want.
An obvious concern is that you want forward thinkers, which would appear to be in limited supply in politics, but you also want them to be forced out. Now the thinking may be that this will get them out before they become “part of the system” but is a hard term limit the most effective way to do that? What if they are just entering their prime? I worked with a professor who did research on the affects of congressional term limits (state level, and I don’t have time to dig up the papers right now) and the effects are not always what are intended. One of the main issues is the loss of institutional organization, and the loss of expertise.
Early in their careers congressmen tend to gravitate towards certain fields, out of desire, experience, and availability of committee positions. Over time they become something like the resident expert on issue X for a party (or for both parties). Because not every bill is read by everyone (or anyone) in its entirety, these people become very important for conveying the message of what the bill actually does (and are also the people who actually write these bills.)
With term limits these experts are not separated from the pack. Committee leadership positions are filled much more politically than before (they are always a combination of politics and expertise, but this skews it more towards politics) and since committee chairs have arguably the most influence over legislation out of committee, the effects are widespread. There is also anecdotal evidence that it leads to increased nepotism, as term limited candidates look to spouses and children to replace them, but I honestly haven’t seen a study with a large enough data set for me to say that is anything but a hypothesis worth examining.
I guess my point is don’t count your chickens to spite your face… or something like that. I think we may be able to accomplish our goals without doing unintentional damage. I would propose severely limiting the power of congress to earmark funds for anything, allow congress to set the overarching budget appropriations, and let the agency make its own spending determinations.
June 13th, 2006 at 9:44 am
Sorry, I want to add one thing. The appropriations committee is one area where politics reigns supreme. It has the power to earmark funds, so the people there are the most senior politicians, because it has the most power. Eliminating earmarks may lead to more expertise on this committee as well, since its power to fund district specific projects would be limited.
June 13th, 2006 at 10:28 am
earmarking…business as usual. oh wait..$3 billion!?!?! Over 18% of the entire budget earmarked away from important projects? WTF? Is this a typical chunk of pork or are we seeing a trend toward larger earmarks?
June 13th, 2006 at 10:50 am
This kind of stuff really is disturbing. The worst part is that NASA somehow takes the black eye.
The problem is that there can be justifications for allowing a certain amount of earmarking. That is Congress’s way of mandating priorities to the agency. Okay, maybe I should reevaluate that argument… The thing is, these types of practices have a justifiable explanation if used benignly, but can be devestating when not used judiciously.
For instance, the Line Item Veto for the President. Sounds like a great way to allow him to eliminate the pork that Congress seems to run on. Except it requires a benign President to make judicious decisions, and not push his own personal agenda. The reason for not allowing the Line Item Veto is to keep the President honest – he can veto outright and tell Congress to try again, but he can’t take their hard work and change it to suit his agenda and pass it into law. That negates the intent of having the elected representatives from all the people sort out the laws in the first place. It concentrates power into the Executive. It [i]reduces[/i] the checks and balances built into the system.
It really would be good to find ways to reduce the ability of Congress to enact pork. But how do we get Congress to write and enact laws that limit their own power? Heck, we can’t get them to stop voting themselves pay raises.
June 13th, 2006 at 10:57 pm
I do not, and will never agree with, the Line Item Veto for precisely all the reasons you list, Irishman. It’s Congress’s duty to come up with good, solid proposals, and the President’s job is to approve or deny it, not be part of the drafting process.
Perhaps the best way to stop the pay raises is to make the pay for public office a Constitutional Amendment. The problem is no one would go for it…you’re asking Congress to shackle themselves.
June 14th, 2006 at 6:55 am
NASA has done some great things in spite of – not because of Congress. The best way to cure the ills of Congress is to put in real election reform. Namely, only allow political contributions from people in that congressional district. Why should a rich person in another state be allowed to contribute to the election of a local congressman from my state – except to BUY favors?
June 14th, 2006 at 1:22 pm
“Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”
- Mark Twain, a Biography