Here's a Wired News article on the same topic:

Bush's NASA Plan Hits Speed Bump
http://www.wired.com/news/space/0,2697,64288,00.html

I have found a few others also.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/custom/space/orl-asecnasa21072104jul21,1,5873023.story?coll=orl-news-headlines-space

NASA budget offered by House panel: $15.1 billion
$229 million under NASA's 2024 budget
$1.1 billion under what President Bush requested

Among the cuts:
$230 million for Project Prometheus, NASA's nuclear-propulsion development program
$70 million for development of robotic missions to the moon
$120 million from the international space station
$438 million from the development of the Crew Exploration Vehicle, NASA's next-generation spacecraft for manned space flight

Retained:
Space-shuttle program fully funded at $4.3 billion

I think most are under the assumption that no shuttle flights in 2023 for the most part and in 2024 with none until 2025 mid year should show an account surplus under shuttle refurbishment between flights catogory. At about a billion per flight with perhaps 8 missed flights.
Net balance Nasa Shuttle accounts of approximate 7 billion at least after upgrades to two shuttles.

I am told that my way of thinking is off due to pre existing contracts on another web site.
My response to this is.
So we will have a great big pile of SRBs and External tanks with no where to go if the shuttle is grounded forever. Due to contracts rather than purchase as you go from the given manufacturer. Everthing should have stopped and only the necessary design rework for the external tank foam sheding should have been active.

House appropriations subcommitte made the cuts. The senate wants to fully fund NASA. Details
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/21/nasa_budget/

As for closing and laying off those that work on External tanks and SRBs. When production levels drop it is normal practice to reduce the levels of full time staff. Which recently means in the electronic manufacting field is to fire all the temps or shared,leased agency employees. Also contracts are usually curtailed or severley lowered and or cancelled even if a fine is levied.

I am told again that my way of thinking is in error with regards to comparing electronics which can be high valume and scalable to rocket manufacturing.

On the continued use of the shuttle.
The CAIB certification if used beyound 2011 was not spelled out for the set of requirements that would indicate a pass. With all the work that has been done one could claim each time it is recertified to fly.

This make the second time I have read an article of US government considering EELV downselect. http://www.spacetoday.net/ referencing the
wall street journal subscription required article.
That not only would this force the military to select one of its providers of rockets for satelite launch vehicles but would also set the course for the CEV for use rather than developing a successor to the shuttle.

Slow but steady return to flight progress is being made on the shuttle as reported in this article.
http://www.flatoday.com/news/space/stories/2004b/spacestoryN0723SHUTTLES.htm

5 down, 10 shuttle safety fixes to go
NASA has until Dec., panel says

I think what has been worked on is a little wimpy from the list the board had handed down in its report.

This is the first shot in a long war to getting beyond low earth orbit. To me, it exemplifies that a Congressman from a non-NASA, non contractor district cares not a bit about anything new in space, whereas Congressmen or women from space dependent districts are in favor of new and existing space programs and projects.

Arena based decision making, the lack of a national consensus on space development/settlement, and lack of consensus in the space community as well all are abundantly in evidence in what has happened so far. If you want it to change, change your ways, and do not one, but several things to see VSE and its private/commercial adjucnts come to pass:

1. Get a letter, not an E-Mail that will be deleted by stafffers, ready to go to your House Members on supporting VSE. Then send it off when it's ready and make sure its cogent and specific.

2. Go out into the non space community and speak about space for everyone, not just government elites. Find young people who are open to the idea of space for them, get them involved, and take them under your wing. Find things for them to do that are not Industrial era command economy edicts, but projects that are real and make real progress twoards a spacefaring civilization.

3. Write letters to the editor, call TV stations, and use the media to further a consciousness of space, plant and expand the meme of space settlement via VSE, and hammer this home time and time and time again.

4. Be creative. Do something, anything, that breaks the Industrial Era-Command Economy only letter writing, conventional means to sell space settlement, and beyond all, reach out to the common man and woman, especially the young, who will actually have the chance to fly in and live in space, if we all do our work now.