For most of January, science advocates in Washington, DC, were in a state of barely controlled panic as it became increasingly apparent that the much-ballyhooed science funding increases contained in the Bush administration's fiscal year 2007 budget proposal weren't going to happen. The FY 2007 budget, caught between the inaction of the Republican-controlled 109th Congress and the “it's not our budget” view of the 110th Democratic Congress, was dead.
Instead, the Democratic leadership was promising that the government would live out most of 2007 at 2006 funding levels through a continuing resolution. With the FY 2007 budget proposal shelved, Congress could focus its attention on the administration's FY 2008 budget proposal, which was released on 5 February. For science organizations—both inside and outside of government—the continuing resolution solution to the budget impasse was, in the words of American Physical Society (APS) public affairs director Michael Lubell, “a disaster.”
After years...