Friday, 31 July 1992 Washington, DC

1. ATTEMPT TO KILL THE SPACE STATION IS EASILY DEFEATED IN HOUSE!
An amendment to scrap the space station, offered by Bob Traxler (D-MI), failed 237 to 181 Wednesday night. Little had changed in a year; only a handful of additional votes were cast against the orbiting budget eater, and the claims of its proponents were as fanciful as ever. My favorite: one Florida congressman solemnly explained that the station is the beginning of human exploration of the galaxies. But back on Earth, the House found itself a bit short of cash by the end of the evening, so it levied an across-the-board cut of 1% on VA/HUD/IA appropriations, except veterans' medical care. NSF--which was already flat funded--shared in the cut. The cut would have been worse, but $380M was stripped from the unneeded Advanced Solid Rocket Motor program, leaving just $100M. It was like sharks attacking a wounded whale; ASRM is in the district of Rep. Jaime Whitten (D-MS), the Appropriations Committee chair, but he was too sick and old to fight them off.

2. SPACE STATION FREEDOM SEEMS CERTAIN TO SURVIVE IN THE SENATE.
The full appropriations committee will take up the VA/HUD/IA bill today. Yesterday, the subcommittee called for the full $2.1B for the space station--$400M more than the House version. Where will the money come from? The National Aerospace Plane was zeroed and the Advanced X-Ray Astrophysics Facility was stretched out. NSF would actually get a $162M increase, but most of that would go to education. Research, which does not seem to rank near the top of Sen. Mikulski's priority list, would actually take a $20M cut.

3. SENATE SCHEDULES VOTE ON THE SUPERCOLLIDER MONDAY AT 6:30 PM!
The Energy and Water Appropriations Bill is being debated on the floor of the Senate even as WHAT'S NEW is being composed. Dale Bumpers (D-AR) will introduce an amendment to terminate the SSC, but even he seems to believe the SSC will survive. If the SSC does make it through the Senate, the House is expected to recon-sider after the August break. In a visit to the SSC yesterday, President Bush said, "this place attracts scientific genius the way the Dream Team attracts autograph seekers." But basketball is not very popular in Japan. According to an article in Nature, an overwhelming majority of Japanese high-energy physicists are strongly opposed to Japan's participation in the Supercollider.

4. ITER AGREEMENT IS FINALLY SIGNED 18 MONTHS BEHIND SCHEDULE.
Is this what international cooperation on mega- science projects is going to be like? This is not what you call a bold agreement. The US, the European Community, Japan and Russia agreed only to put off a decision on the really tough stuff, like where to locate the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor. Instead they decided to build three coequal design centers in San Diego, USA; Garching, Germany; and Naka, Japan. The location of ITER will not be decided for another four years, and it will not operate before 2005. The cost is expected to be on the SSC scale.



Bob Park can be reached via email at whatsnew@bobpark.org
THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND
Opinions are the author's and are not necessarily shared by the University, but they should be.