Joseph Cao: “I am disappointed that the President's budget proposal for fiscal year 2011 recommends canceling NASA's Constellation…”

“I am disappointed that the President's budget proposal for fiscal year 2011 recommends canceling NASA's Constellation Space Program. In agreement with Neil Armstrong, I am very concerned this proposal will leave our Nation with no means of transporting our astronauts to and from the International Space Station and could set the U.S. space program back decades. To this day, we enjoy countless practical benefits from Apollo technology in things that affect our everyday lives, such as improved weather forecasting, which is vitally important to those of us who live in Louisiana and on the gulf coast. The Michoud Assembly Facility in my district was slated to build components of the Constellation Program. Michoud now faces the prospect of losing thousands of high-skilled jobs. This world-class manufacturing facility has been used to build the Saturn rockets for Apollo and the main fuel tanks for the Space Shuttle, among other notable achievements. If the President's proposal is adopted, we will lose all that experience and manufacturing know-how, along with 9 billion tax dollars already spent developing the Constellation Program.”