Ah, Pork...

Money earmarked to be used by NASA to send scientific probes to distant planets and return astronauts to the moon, may be used instead for projects closer to home that have little to nothing to do with exploring space.

In short, it's called pork... as in "pork barrel projects" that politicians have authorized for their districts, and that NASA will be footing the bill for.

USA Today reports that list includes construction or renovation of dozens of museums, planetariums and science labs for colleges... a website and laboratory for the Gulf of Maine Aquarium in Portland... and construction of the headquarters building for a West Virginia non-profit research group created by congressman Alan Mollohan, who is currently the subject of a congressional ethics probe.

Since 2001, Congress has directed NASA to spend more than $3 billion on special projects -- most of them sought by individual lawmakers, for the benefit of their home districts.

"There is a real consequence to this. It's not a victimless crime," said David Williams, a vice president of the independent watchdog group Citizens Against Government Waste.

And the cost to NASA? Fewer robotic space probes... a shortened shuttle program, and possibly an even longer delay between the last flight of the space shuttles in 2010 and the first manned CEV mission into orbit, currently slated for 2014.

NASA Administrator Michael Griffin has asked Congress to ease up on its pet projects... or else the United States may lag even further behind on its schedule to return to space.

"I am deeply concerned that the growth of these unrequested congressional directions is eroding NASA's ability to carry out its mission of space exploration and peer-reviewed scientific discovery," Griffin wrote earlier this year to the House Science Committee.

Which is a polite way of saying... it would be to NASA's benefit if Congress could wean itself from its high-pork diet.

FMI: www.nasa.gov