Split From http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=64757

That's cause Congress is cutting NASA's budget by $1.9 Billion, among other things, Money already spent on JWST: $3 Billion and its down a rat hole.

It's not down a rat hole. Look at all the people who had a job with the $3 billion. It is like most any other government function that doesn't actually produce a physical thing. They take money from taxpayers and divert that money into a rat hole. Now when government produces a thing, e.g. telescope, rocket, road, dam, then there is a useful item. It is only when goods aren't produced that government fails.

The stupidity of cutbacks in projects that actually produce goods is amazing. You would think that politicians understand their function is to produce infrastructure. That is the one thing that private industry isn't interested in making as it takes too much capital and the payback is too long.

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