Although NASA funding is actually seeing an increase, they are shifting the goals to research, exploration and unmanned flight.  In short, canceling the Constellation program.

First, I must confess: I am a space junkie.  I love everything about it, and have since I was a young kid.  So, I should have guessed that after watching the NASA video about the program would feel emotionally “connected” to the program.

There were those who criticized the program as being “over budget, behind schedule, and lacking in innovation due to a failure to invest in critical new technologies,” but I still feel as if I were losing something that I hold dear . . . .

Some are concerned about the jobs that will be lost at NASA because of the cancellation of the program.  Former astronauts wrote an open letter to President Obama and have cautioned that without a manned-space flight program, we would lose our position quickly as the leader in space exploration (and waste money buying bus passes for the Russian Soyez spacecraft).

My opinion is much simpler.  The program looks so cool–with all of the in-flight docking and rockets and boosters that it is hard to imaging anyone NOT enthralled by the program . . . .

UPDATE: A bit more research uncovered this Popular Science article that put a lot of things in context.  Namely, the goals o NASA have been shifted to help privately-owned American companies to do the grunt work of Low Earth Orbit trips (like supplies and people to the International Space Station), and to take some time an come up with something NEW for going into deep space.  The entire Constellation Program used a lot of existing designs (from the 60s) to meet the time deadline of 2020 to the moon.  There was no time for research and/or innovation.  Every NASA program gets left behind, eh?