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For a start...

* Operating their current missions http://www.nasa.gov/missions/current/index.html

* Designing and building future missions http://www.nasa.gov/missions/future/index.html

* Public outreach/education

Thanks, that's a good list. However, one would be hard pressed to convince people to voluntarily fund this to the tune of 20 billion dollars a year.

But we have no problem spending trillions of dollars on wars and on bailouts. Awesome. Stu_pid meets mor_on.

http://www.nasa.gov/news/budget/index.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_NASA

It costs a lot to engineer and operate things that work in space.

I watched a talk by Peter Diamandis where he said that around 90% of the costs (for a NASA rocket) is in labor. By 2020, we should be sending people, not another robot.