None So Blind As Those Who Will Not See

Bush wants to blind us to beauty, mystery and understanding:

The White House has eliminated funding for a mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope from its 2006 budget request and directed NASA to focus solely on de-orbiting the popular spacecraft at the end of its life, according to government and industry sources.

Bush apparently wants to put this money into his "Mars, bitch" vision.  You know, if he really would pursue that notion with passion and some degree of credibility, I might be willing to trade Hubble for Mars.  However, I just can't take him seriously.  He's made no Kennedy-esque challenge to us and has been spending his time, energy and millions of dollars on convincing us there's a Social Security crisis.

When I think of Bush's whole time in office I realize killing Hubble is just par for the course.  He would rather cut one of the most successful space programs in history for a testosterone-laden, pie-in-the-sky mission of dubious value because that's just the way he thinks: taking pictures of stars and learning about the cosmos is boring; landing on an aircraft car...er, another planet is freaking fun!

So to chase a dream Bush hasn't even bothered trying to sell us, he pokes a stick in the far-gazing eye of Hubble.  Penny wise and pound foolish, as usual.

ntodd

[Update: DavidNYC over at dKos examines the politics of this news.]