Scientists to hold bake sale for NASA

The GEMS X-ray satellite program was recently scrapped / nasa.gov

(Space.com) Scientists are trading telescopes for aprons this week to sell Milky Way cupcakes, Saturn cake, and chocolate chip Opportunity cookies in an effort to salvage U.S. planetary science projects.

The 2013 budget proposal submitted by the Obama administration earlier this year would cut funding for NASA's planetary science projects by about $300 million. While Congress is still deliberating over the federal budget, groups of scientists are planning a series of demonstrations -- in the form of bake sales, car washes and other events -- for Saturday (June 9) to plead their case.

Though planet-studying spacecraft usually cost millions, or even billions, of dollars, every penny helps. That's the reasoning behind the Planetary Exploration Car Wash and Bake Sale to be held by University of Central Florida students and professors who hope to sway lawmakers into providing more money for studying the solar system. It is one of nearly 20 planned demonstrations for Saturday at sites across the country, organizers said.

"We're not asking for more of the pie, we're asking for less of a bite out of the pie," Laura Seward, a graduate student at the university who organized the event, said in a statement. "A strong robotic planetary exploration program is essential for a strong human planetary exploration program."

Like many federal agencies, NASA is strapped for funding under the current fiscal conditions. Just today (June 7) the space agency announced the cancelation of a new X-ray space telescope mission, the Gravity and Extreme Magnetism Small Explorer, because it is over-budget.

The University of Central Florida's bake sale is part of an overall effort sponsored by the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colo., to fight against the proposed budget cuts.

"This is being done to attract media attention and to help focus Congress on repairing the damage of the deep cuts planned to NASA's planetary science program," said Alan Stern, the institute's associate vice president for research and development. "It's important these cuts be repaired to maintain U.S. leadership in this area of science, to prevent mission cuts, and to prevent student and research job losses." [NASA's 10 Greatest Science Missions]

Other organizations planning to participate in the demonstrations include the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute in Mountain View, Calif.

"The nation risks the loss of a generation of upcoming, talented engineers and researchers whose careers are centered on the exploration of our solar system in the quest for life beyond Earth," said astronomer Jill Tarter, the outgoing director of the Center for SETI Research.

NASA has a number of ongoing planetary science missions, including the Cassini orbiter around Saturn, the New Horizons spacecraft on its way to Pluto, and the Mars Science Laboratory rover Curiosity, due to land on the Red Planet in August. The agency also has a number of missions under development, such as the OSIRIS-Rex asteroid sampling mission due to launch in 2016.

Yet the number and scope of projects NASA will be able to undertake in the future could be seriously hampered by the proposed cuts, scientists say.

For Central Florida residents: The planetary bake sale is planned for 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. EDT Saturday at the Chevron adjacent to the University of Central Florida campus on 1640 E. McCulloch Road in Orlando.

Follow Clara Moskowitz on Twitter @ClaraMoskowitz or SPACE.com @Spacedotcom. We're also on Facebook & Google+. 

• NASA's 10 Greatest Science Missions
• NASA's 2013 Budget: What Will It Buy?
• 50 Years of Presidential Visions for Space Exploration

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[remember_what_you_know]

We can all thank NASA's administrator, Charles F. Bolton, Jr., for boldly taking the agency....nowhere.

More than NASA's administrator, Bolton is NASA's undertaker.

It could be argued that Bolton is blameless and is merely "following orders" from above. But any self-respecting space enthusiast (and Bolton was an astronaut, for criminy sakes) would have resigned before agreeing to wield the axe which is crippling NASA's capabilities, and reducing them to a level below those of even China.

[Ted859684]

At Barry's request, Bolton has been focused on making the Muslim world "feel good about their historic contribution to science...and math and engineering." Which may be working because Iran now regularly launches satellites into orbit. Finally, a success for the Obama administration!

[sjc_1]

NASA's budget is $15 billion, the Defense budget is more than $600 billion. We get SO much more from NASA, probes to Mars and the other planets along with developing new technology.

Republicans want you to believe that spending all that money on Defense is necessary, when it is not. Remember who cancelled the moon program while he bombed in southeast Asia...Nixon.

[Ted859684]

All six moon landings happened during Nixon's term. He wasn't the one who started the Vietnam War, though. Our Food Stamp President spends $78 billion a year on SNAP. How about we cut that back to the 2008 level and put some of the $39 billion in savings toward the space program?

[hypnotoad72]

A telescope would be nice, I'll admit...

Still, is corporate welfare on the chopping block, since a "free market" would dictate no company (large or small) would be entitled to any free rides? I've yet to see an asterisk by "Free market" indicating what exceptions to the stated rule would be tolerable...

But more directly to the point of the article, I quote:

"It's important these cuts be repaired to maintain U.S. leadership in this area of science, to prevent mission cuts, and to prevent student and research job losses."

I agree.

You don't save a patient's life by removing a limb and promise to replace it. And government exists to do things that may not generate profit in the first place. Things that benefit all. If, for example, policemen were privatized, they would not protect all citizens. Only citizens deemed "profitable" and the anti-government people around here would be whining very quickly, despite their usual rants to everyone else about the exact opposite... but there would be so few people deemed 'profitable', and wages would be kept low because everybody would want to be a policeman, and if the wage is too low nobody will want to do the work since slavery isn't cool anymore.

Or roads. Everyone uses them, there's no direct profit (unless your business relies on roads, and most still do - directly or indirectly), so those should be for all.

There are fair contextual differences... and sometimes I need to rethink my beliefs at times as well.