[uxbridge]

To promote the progress of science and useful arts

You forgot the second half of that provision:

by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries

[mnehring]

.. and the funding bill for NASA comes up each budgetary cycle. I would call that ‘limited time’. I would also say that NASA is quite involved with invention.

[Greg F]

Heh, we posted the same thing basically at the same time.