I am dismayed and frustrated by the proposed out-year budget levels, particularly in the Exploration account.

So the start date is not a problem. It is entirely dependent upon the length of time that the Shuttle flies.

We had a unique opportunity... to craft a COTS-D plan that would have funded the program at the level that the folks needed.

It is extraordinary that you can take humans and machines and put them together and make them do wondrous things.

Will you notify us immediately if your assessment of probability changes?

For the Space Station to function as a National Laboratory, it has got to have the ability to bring cargo back.

That sounds very promising if you can do data links and bring them back.

Instead of putting the dollars into the various component pieces that would enable crew capability, would it not make more sense just to invest that in a milestone-based demonstration flight?

We cannot afford, as a country, to surrender our long-held leadership in space exploration.

Sometimes NASA does not want itself to be helped. We have got to get our act together.

OK, 65 percent.

When is that design review?

And what do we pay per seat now?

In last year's authorization bill, we emphasized the importance of the ISS as a National Laboratory.

Last year then Senator Obama noted that the Bush Administration had underfunded NASA.

Let me say parenthetically that that question may be, and I hope it will be, answered by Dr. Augustine in his report.

In last year's authorization bill, there was guidance to NASA about COTS-D Space Act agreements to develop a U.S. commercial alternative to Soyuz.

When do you expect to make a decision on those changes?