Giving Compass' Take:

· As The Atlantic reports, NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has been delayed yet again–this time to spring 2021 with another $800 million needed for funding.

· Lawmakers are not thrilled knowing the spacecraft will take another $800 million in taxpayer money. Should the manufacturer be required to pay the difference due to the mistakes they caused? 

· Read more about NASA and space exploration.

If everything had gone according to plan, the most powerful space telescope would be in orbit right now, perched about 1 million miles from Earth, peering deep into the universe, and returning home mesmerizing photos of glittering stars and galaxies.

Instead, it’s still in a factory in California, waiting to receive more money so engineers can finish building it.

The James Webb Space Telescope, nasa’s next big astronomy mission, has been in the works for two decades. When the concept was first proposed in 1996 as the successor to the famed Hubble Space Telescope, scientists estimated it would cost $500 million and fly by 2007. But as scientists worked on the telescope’s design, the world around them began to change. Astronomers were making exhilarating discoveries about the cosmos, and engineers were inventing the technology needed to study them. Webb’s stewards believed the telescope could do more than originally envisioned, so they expanded its parameters.

Read the full article on NASA's mistakes by Marina Koren at The Atlantic.