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The case for public financing of scientific research is strongest for basic research that does not have a clear prospect of practical benefit. In the later instance, commercial and non-profit funding sources are usually available because the benefits can be touted, while basic physics research can have immense value but on a longer time scale and with uncertain consequences.

As for basic physics research, we are still in the early phase of understanding quantum mechanics, but gains are more and more arriving in the marketplace in the form of new materials that make new products possible. For most of us, the connection between understanding and control of quantum mechanics and benefits in ordinary life is best manifested in computers, flat screen TVs, and smart phones -- all resting on foundations laid decades ago by Einstein, Dirac, Bohr, and many others.

If the physics pans out, basic research being done now could yield cheap and limitless clean electric power, routine travel throughout the solar system, and a new wave of innovation and prosperity. The hope for all that though depends on someone -- often the federal taxpayer -- funding decades of scientific drudgery that makes such advances possible. And, it deserves mention that in the modern era, the country that leads in science more or less also gets to run the world.