For the third consecutive year, Bush administration officials are opening their discussions about the federal government’s proposed science and research budget by first talking about topics that have nothing to do with science: the need to support the ongoing war on terror and the mounting pressure caused by the growing deficit. This “context setting” is a sure sign that the budget numbers for civilian science and technology will not be good, and for fiscal year 2006, they aren’t.
Even John Marburger, director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, who has managed to find silver linings in the past two years of flat or declining funding, recently described the president’s budget proposal as “the tightest in nearly two decades.” Despite that, at a Senate hearing in February, Marburger managed to be upbeat about the science budget, noting that R&D money makes up 13.6% of total discretionary spending, “the...
