Webb, The Giant Money Sponge

Telescope Is Behind Schedule and Over Budget, Panel Says, NY Times
“The report raised fear that other projects would be hurt. “This is NASA’s Hurricane Katrina,” said Alan P. Boss, who leads the subcommittee that advises NASA’s astrophysics program. The telescope, he said, “will leave nothing but devastation in the astrophysics division budget.”
James Webb Telescope Project Project Reviewed and Reorganized In Wake of Massive Cost Overruns, Popsci
“JWST already consumes almost half of NASA’s Astrophysics Division budget, according to Boss, who was not involved in the report but chairs a different NASA committee on astronomy. Infusing it with even more cash could hurt remaining astronomy programs, such as the Wide-Field Infrared Space Telescope (WFIRST), a project that earned top priority in the Astro2010 astronomy decadal survey. If Webb fails, astronomy could be set back a generation.”
Latest $1.5B in JWST Cost Overruns Imperils Other High-priority Projects, Space News
“Alan Stern, a former associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, said the cost growth could ravage the agency’s $1.1 billion annual astrophysics budget, 40 percent of which is already consumed by JWST development. “Are we going to turn off all the many existing astrophysics satellites and kill the support to analyze the data from them and stop building anything else, just so JWST can continue to overrun?” Stern said. “That’s the question that the astrophysics community has to ask of itself, and that NASA should be asking.”
Hubble’s over-budget successor may be delayed for years, New Scientist
“I doubt we’re going to find $200 million [per year],” NASA Associate Administrator Chris Scolese told reporters on Wednesday. “We’re in a time of fiscal [conservatism] where we have to make every dollar count.” New management It is not yet clear whether NASA will try to funnel money from other projects to JWST to make the 2015 launch date or whether the mission will get delayed even further.”
Keith’s note: Let’s see: JWST needs $400 – $500 in the next two budgets. That money is not there. NASA already does not have the money for the Congressionally mandated STS-135 mission (a similar amount). Between ongoing CRs and expected budgeteering by the new Republican-led Congress NASA certainly does not stand to get more money. Indeed it will probably get less money. So … where does the money come from, Chris? Do you and Ed Weiler continue to erode the remainder of NASA’s astrophysics program or do you go after other things in SMD’s budget? Get in line – MSL already has its sights on that money. Do you therefore go outside of SMD to fix JWST? Good luck with that.