New legislation designed to fund the U.S. federal government for the last six months of 2013 provides a level of budgetary protection for civilian weather satellite and human spaceflight programs, and that's a good thing. But it's far from clear how critical military space programs would fare under the bill, which was passed March 6 by the House of Representatives in a largely party-line vote. Although the proposed bill gives the Defense Department an actual 2013 budget - most other agencies are kept to last year's funding levels as part of a broad continuing resolution - and provides some spending flexibility, it trims $1 billion from the Air Force's Missile Procurement account, which funds a substantial portion of the service's space program.
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