Is it me or does it the every time a rat is President they go after NASA.. However, a GOP is President, they support NASA (since Nixon)..
If I were republican president I would support funding NASA but only if they get back to exploration. I would also ditch the outer space treaty to put a possibility of profit into space.
Eisenhower created NASA, not Kennedy. So to be frank Republicans started supporting NASA with Eisenhower not Nixon.
Io answer your question I think its rather obvious that Democrats are much more interested in spending Federal Money on domestic matters then foreign matters.
Space exploration and colonization is indisputably a foreign matter, therefore Liberals would rather not spend Federal money on it.
Liberal plans for NASA are primarily using it as a tool to advance their political interest specifically right now that is advancing the myth of man made global warming as to justify aggressive domestic power grabs.
To be honest upon looking at the whole situation, including:
A: The Federal Constitution(which does not authorize NASA).
B: The inability of NASA to get anything done due to having its missions changed by president elected for other reasons.
C: The need to draw funds from other lands.
I think we might be better off if we simply took NASA out of the Federal goverment and instead made it into a compact type organization under the direct control and financing of the several States.
Perhaps to be controlled by the electors. We might even change the Acronym into the North American Space Agency and run it a bit like the European Space Agency, with Canadian Provence’s being allowed to contribute financially and participate as if they were U.S. States.
After reading Deke Slayton's career autobiography (DEKE!), I was left with the impression that he believed Democrats like Kennedy and Johnson got us to the moon and Republicans like Nixon and Reagan killed the dream of spaceflight beyond low earth orbit over budget-cutting. He also left me with the impression that a lot of astronauts and NASA staff of the 60's and 70's and early 80's felt that way.
I could live with that impression, since it was just his opinion though he was quite close to the action and so in a position to know. But he was also a federal government "double-dipper" and it just tickled him over what a great deal that was. Especially after he quit the Air Force after 19 years while able to work with NASA and bumming on that move. Even after his nominal CO in the USAF basically told him he could ride out his commission to retirement, he simply had to observe restrictions over his flight status.
Yeah, drawing a pension from and still working for the Federal government is a darn good deal. Especially after learning you coulda been a triple-dipper! I lost some esteem for him over reading that.