White House: Death Star isn’t on the horizon

The White House is responding to a petition on its “We the People” website that calls for the administration to “secure resources and funding, and begin construction of a Death Star by 2016."

Paul Shawcross, chief of the White House Office of Management and Budget’s science and space branch, writes that the administration shares petition supporters' "desire for job creation and a strong national defense," but cites costs in a response titled “This Isn’t the Petition Response You’re Looking For.”

“The construction of the Death Star has been estimated to cost more than $850,000,000,000,000,000. We're working hard to reduce the deficit, not expand it,” Shawcross writes.

Shawcross writes that the administration “does not support blowing up planets” and asks why officials would spend “countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw that can be exploited by a one-man starship?”

“We don't have a Death Star, but we do have floating robot assistants on the Space Station, a President who knows his way around a light saber and advanced (marshmallow) cannon, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is supporting research on building Luke's arm, floating droids, and quadruped walkers,” he writes.

The petition had more than 34,000 signatures on Friday. 

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