I am professionally involved in space tech. Have to say, I like Trump's administration stance on NASA (quote):<p>"We see NASA in an exploration role, in deep space research," Bob Walker, a senior Trump adviser, told the Guardian newspaper. "Earth-centric science is better placed at other agencies where it is their prime mission."<p>...much more then I liked the previous administrator (Charles Bolden) mission:<p>"When I became the NASA administrator, (President Obama) charged me with three things," Bolden said in the interview which aired last week. "One, he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math; he wanted me to expand our international relationships; and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math and engineering."<p>Why were Muslim national relationships a NASA mission? Thought we had State Department for that.
"Also on the chopping block: the entire NASA Education office, which ... provides internships and scholarships for young scientists"<p>I was an intern last year working on one of the listed missions (now slated to be cut), and was planning on returning again this summer. I knew this was coming from Trump, but not this quickly or this hard. It's difficult to describe in concrete terms how I feel - I don't mean to be a sad sack; it's just a surreal situation. This means that many months of my work on my first real job were all for naught. Do you ever get personally attached to your work? I felt like my effort there was making an impact; it wasn't a boring sort-a-filing-cabinet internship. And it just disappeared for good, since I don't think there will be funding for a reboot later. I feel listless, which is also helped by the fact that it doesn't sound like I have a career in the near-term. Kinda pulled out from under me. And I only just found out about this from this news article; at least the concrete specifics.<p>Is anyone still taking applications for an undergrad intern, with intern-level experience in aerospace controls engineering (rising senior CS major)? I don't want to limit myself to that specifically either; anything with a decent cross-section of either math, software, or robotics is my jam. Sorry to put this out here like this, but I'm wary that I'm running out of time to find something since aerospace intern hiring seems to conclude all the way back in early Fall.
The most alarming thing is that they are explicitly cutting anything to do with climate change (there's a more comprehensive overview here: <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-presidential-budget-2018-proposal/" rel="nofollow">https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-presi...</a>). That's also a large part of what the NASA budget cut is aimed at...
The Dept of Education budget also is proposed to be cut significantly, including deep cuts in financial aid to college students.<p>NIH research also is proposed to suffer large cuts.<p>And while I'm at it, the National Endowment for the Arts and National Endowment for the Humanities are proposed to be eliminated entirely.
One of those gadgets is designed to measure refraction and radiance from greenhouse gasses. I.e. to confirm or correct the only assumptions in climate modeling that are even remotely controversial.<p>Gee, I wonder why they want to cancel it.