Is Obama planing to gut the space program?

Still not gutting. It is a critical review of the Ares I program, which, honestly, should have been axed years ago, when it became clear that the first proposal by ATK will not work and heavy modifications are needed (mostly, because the payload additionally gained mass faster as anything else)

The only people, for which the Ares I is a constant and required component of the future NASA strategy, are NASA managers - external engineers and many NASA engineers have offered many alternatives in the past, which NASA ignored because they had been "not invented here".

Obama is NOT planning to gut the space program. My computer wouldn't display your link. Check the archives of Time magazine. There was an article in August or September, maybe October, where Obama's position on NASA and the Mars Mission was discussed. He's in favor of the Mar's Mission, but there are other things higher on his priority list right now, like the economy and security of the nation

Postponing the Mars thing isn't gutting the program. That would have been a HUGE waste of money that could be much better spent in other areas. Very few astronomers actually wanted to go to Mars - that was all Bush thinking he was the next Kennedy.

There's good reason to delay the "Man to Mars" program of the Bush Administration, and concentrate on cheaper, more useful space projects. I've always imagined that "Man to Mars" was a right-wing dodge to de-fund all really important NASA work and put all the funding into a single giant premature, ill-conceived, and therefore cancelable project, thereby killing off NASA without appearing to do so.

Science is always about reinventing and trying new ideas. If you ask me, relying on the space shuttle for so long has made NASA compacent. A little "change" might be good. We'll see.

no, but Bushie set him up to be the one to make the US wake up and smell the coffee... No Moon Base, No Mars Mission... ever.

it was just politics.