Photograph by NASA via Getty Images

Hurricane Irene is seen from space from the International Space Station, as it churns off the east coast of the United States in the Atlantic Ocean, in this file photo.

Count your weather forecasts among the possible victims of automatic federal budget cuts set to begin this week.

The cuts would hit two troubled government satellite programs and potentially exacerbate a coverage gap that’s already expected to leave forecasters with a blind spot in orbit by 2017.

Further setbacks to the satellite programs would mean less accurate forecasts of extreme weather events such as hurricanes and tornadoes, a panel put on by the Aerospace Industries Association said today at the Capitol.

“We’re in critical phases of both of the major programs,” said Eric Webster, vice president and director of weather programs and geospatial systems at Exelis Inc., a McLean, Virginia-based maker of satellite instruments. “Any reduction now basically just delays the programs from launch.”

The satellite programs are run by the Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

The cuts in discretionary spending known as sequestration scheduled March 1, unless Congress acts to avert them, would result in a two- to three-year launch delay for two so-called geo-stationary satellites, Rebecca Blank, deputy commerce secretary, said this month in a letter to the head of a congressional appropriations committee.

That delay would “increase the risk of a gap in satellite coverage and diminish the quality of weather forecasts and warnings,” she wrote.

Even without factoring in the across-the-board cuts, a polar-orbiting satellite is expected to reach the end of its life before a replacement is ready, leaving the forecasters with a gap as long as 4 ½ years.

With the start of the across-the-board cuts four days away, NASA and NOAA haven’t yet explained exactly how the satellite programs would be affected, Webster said.

“They really haven’t provided very specific guidance into that,” he said after the panel discussion. “So we’re all kind of waiting with bated breath to see what’s going to happen.”

Original post is Weather Report? Sequestered by Political Capital.

Photograph by Jewel Samad/AFP via Getty Images

President Barack Obama listens to Japan’s new conservative Prime Minister Shinzo Abe following their bilateral meeting in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington on Feb. 22, 2013.

Trade is at the top of the agenda when President Barack Obama meets with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at the White House today.

Aides said removing Japanese barriers for U.S. automakers is “an important pre- condition” to Japan’s potential entry into the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a
trade deal being negotiated between the U.S. and 10 other Pacific nations.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and other state chief executives will make their concerns about trade, the economy and sequestration known in appearances across Washington today as they gather for this weekend’s winter meetings of the National Governors Association. Obama and Vice President Joe Biden meet with Democratic governors this morning, and Walker will be interviewed tonight on Bloomberg Television at 9 p.m.

More than half of Americans surveyed in a Bloomberg News poll want
Congress to delay the steep spending cuts set to take effect from March 1,
backing a compromise that includes increased tax revenue and changes to
Medicare and Social Security.

Today is the deadline the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee set for the Justice Department to explain its use of exemptions to avoid releasing government records under the Freedom of Information Act.

Boeing officials will present their redesign of the 787 Dreamliner’s battery to FAA regulators that they believe will satisfy safety concerns and allow the jet back into service within weeks.

Former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin participates in a Brookings Institution forum on military budgeting.

And NASA holds a Google+ Hangout with astronauts aboard the International Space Station.

Original post is Washington Daybook: Governors Gathering by Political Capital.

Photograph by Commander DomInic Gorie/NASA

The International Space Station (ISS) over Miami, taken from the Space Shuttle Endeavour.

NASA plans to upload code developed by teens to control bowling ball-sized satellites aboard the International Space Station.

The off-the-wall experiment tomorrow is part of a contest sponsored by the elite Pentagon research unit known as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

The software code was developed by teams of U.S. high school students as part of the fourth annual student robotics challenge, according to a NASA press release today.

The top 45 teams had their code sent last week to the space station, where an astronaut plans to command the satellites to run the teams’ flight programs.

The best-performing code wins.

In return, the winning team of students will receive certificates and a flight patch that was flown aboard the space station, according to the release.

Original post is NASA: May the Best Kids’ Code Win by Political Capital.

Photograph by Bill Ingalls/NASA via Getty image

Space Shuttle Atlantis rolls down Kennedy Parkway on its way to its new home at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida.

With its shuttle fleet retired and on display at museums around the country, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration is looking to shed its shuttle facilities and equipment.

NASA is in talks with a handful of space companies and partnerships that may be interested in buying or leasing the buildings and gear, according to Amber Philman, an agency spokeswoman at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

“We hope to make a bunch of announcements over the next year,” she said in a telephone interview.

Boeing Co. already has taken up residence in one of the sites. In October 2011, three months after Atlantis completed the last shuttle mission, the agency announced an agreement with Space Florida, the state’s aerospace economic development agency, to reuse an orbiter processing facility at Kennedy.

Chicago-based Boeing announced it will build and test its new manned spacecraft there, creating as many as 550 jobs.

With the shuttle gone from Kennedy’s iconic Vehicle Assembly Building, the agency is looking for more companies to relocate to the complex, Philman said. The 525-foot-tall building was built in 1966 to assemble the Apollo-era Saturn V rocket.

“We have this unique infrastructure that’s been here for so many years,” Philman said. “We would love to bring space industry companies out here and grow the industry.”

Original post is NASA to Shed Old Shuttle Sites by Political Capital.

Photograph by Brian van der Brug-Pool/Getty Images

Colleagues celebrate a successful landing inside the Spaceflight Operations Facility for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity rover at Jet Propulsion Laboratory on Aug. 5, 2012 in Pasadena, California.

At NASA, they get to launch rockets.

Little wonder it tops the list of big federal agencies where employees are happiest — at the top of the Best Places to Work in the Federal Government in 2012, according to the survey of the Partnership for Public Service.

The Intelligence community and State Department rank pretty high — world travel.

Homeland Security, low — living in fear of threats.

Among mid-sized agencies, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation stacks up pretty high — all deposits insured, to a certain level.

Broadcasting Board of Governors, not so high — Big Bird is continually under threat.

Among small agencies: the Congressional Budget Office — even though the predict another recession if Congress goes over the fiscal cliff.

Low: Office of the U.S. Trade Representative — treaties are hard work.

Another really low-ranked place to work: Voice of America.

Everyone blames the bearer of bad news.

Original post is Best and Worst Workplaces: Government Plum-Jobs and Prunes by Political Capital.

Photograph by Chris Thompson/SpaceX via Bloomberg

Space Exploration Technologies Corp.'s (SpaceX) Falcon 9 rocket takes off in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Elon Musk, the Silicon Valley entrepreneur who splits his time between running the electric car-making Tesla Motors Inc. and rocket-making Space Exploration Technologies Corp., sees “good economic times ahead” for the U.S.

His Tesla, which received $465 million in federal loans in 2009 from the Obama administration to develop and build electric Model S sedans, had been cited as a “loser” company by Republican Mitt Romney in an Oct. 3 presidential debate — the same day Musk said the car-maker was making an “advance payment” for the federal loans.

SpaceX has a $1.6 billion contract with NASA for at least a dozen resupply flights to the International Space Station.

Post-election, Musk has shared his views about the economy going forward. He had declined to discuss Romney’s comments, didn’t publicly support either him or President Barack Obama and says he doesn’t expect “any significant impact” on either Tesla or SpaceX with the president’s re-election.

“The economy is improving quickly. This would happen no matter who is president,” Musk said. “I don’t think people appreciate that the president is like the captain of a huge boat with a tiny rudder.”

The slowly improving real estate market bodes well for continued economic recovery, he said.

“Now we’ve used up the housing stock and the housing industry is ramping up to normal employment levels. Housing, fully considered, is the biggest sector of the economy, so this will of course have a big positive effect on the economy,” he said. “Good times ahead!”

Balancing the budget must become Obama’s top priority, he said: “By this, I mean at least get the deficit under half a trillion. This needs to happen mostly through spending reductions, but will require some increase in taxes.”

It’s “obvious to everyone” that drastic cuts in government spending are necessary, he said, suggsting it wouldn’t be so bad if the automatic spending cuts that are part of the year end fiscal cliff took effect — given a choice between that and no cuts, he’d take the sequestration.

“The toughest challenge for the president will be cutting government spending,” Musk said. “Every special interest will lobby extremely hard to keep their funding, so fighting them will take incredible resolve.”

“This is the best thing about second-term presidents — they can afford to upset the system and not worry about re-election. President Obama cares about his legacy. He doesn’t want to leave office with the biggest deficit in history.”

Original post is Legacy-Conscious Obama Sure to Act on Deficit: Silicon Valley’s Musk by Political Capital.

Photograph by Joe Raedle/Getty Images

President Barack Obama and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney are seen at the Lavanderia coin laundry in Miami during their televised debate.

OK. The whole world wasn’t watching, though President Barack Obama can be forgiven for thinking it was. Some 67.2 million viewers tuned in Wednesday to watch his subdued — many say weak — debate performance, 28 percent more than watched the first presidential face-off four years ago.

Coverage on ABC drew 11.3 million viewers, the most of any network, while Fox News averaged 10.4 million viewers to lead cable networks, according to Nielsen data.

Obama campaigns in Virginia and Ohio today, seeking to regain his footing against his Republican challenger. Mitt Romney will try to maintain his momentum at rallies in Virginia and Florida today. Romney may benefit from a Labor Department report that is expected to show the U.S. jobless rate rose last month as employers limited hiring.

Also today, the Federal Communications Commission probably will continue to require cable companies such as Time Warner Cable Inc. to share regional sports networks with competitors such as DirecTV and Dish Network Corp. as a rule requiring such cooperation lapses at midnight.

The U.S. overseer of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, planning for the day when the companies are eliminated or have their role diminished, is seeking input on a system to standardize the packaging of home loans into securities.

And NASA holds a Google Plus Hangout to discuss the first contracted cargo resupply flight to the International Space Station, with SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.

Original post is Washington Daybook: The Whole World is Watching by Political Capital.