August 18, 2005

TIMES HUMOR: BOROWITZ REPORT

Mars must share financial burden of space exploration, NASA chief says

In what was widely seen as a belt-tightening measure, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said last week that it was scrapping all plans for a mission to Mars and would instead wait for Mars to plan a mission to Earth.

Speaking to reporters at Cape Canaveral, Fla. today, NASA Chief Michael Griffin said that with the current financial climate, “Rather than sending a rocket to Mars, it makes more sense just to sit and wait for the Martians to come to us.”

Griffin said that the space agency came to the conclusion that it would prefer to wait for such a Martian visit after the just-concluded mission of the space shuttle Discovery, which he called “a royal pain from beginning to end.

“I say, if the Martians want to deal with foam debris, missing tiles and all of those other headaches, they are more than welcome to them,” the administrator said.

He also offered harsh criticism for the Martians themselves, saying that they had “failed to pay their fair share of the cost of space exploration.”

But in an official statement later in the day, the emperor of Mars rebuffed Griffin’s demands, saying Mars had “no intention of doing NASA’s work for them.”

In a parting shot, the Emperor concluded, “And don’t expect Mars to fix Social Security, either, you tool.”

Elsewhere, after paying Microsoft a $7-million settlement for sending millions of SPAM e-mails, SPAM entrepreneur Scott Richter said he was only trying to be his own boss by working from home.

Andy Borowitz is a nationally syndicated humor columnist whose work can be found in Newsweek and other publications.