So much for keeping ideology and politics out of our science:

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a recent interview that his "foremost" mission as the head of America's space exploration agency is to improve relations with the Muslim world.

Though international diplomacy would seem well outside NASA's orbit, Bolden said in an interview with Al Jazeera that strengthening those ties was among the top tasks President Obama assigned him. He said better interaction with the Muslim world would ultimately advance space travel.

"When I became the NASA administrator -- or before I became the NASA administrator -- he charged me with three things. One was he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math, he wanted me to expand our international relationships, and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science ... and math and engineering," Bolden said in the interview.  (FOX News)

Worse still, Mr. Bolden appears blind to the fact that the priorities he is pushing on NASA are well outside of its proper parameters:

However, Bolden denied the suggestion that he was on a diplomatic mission -- in a distinctly non-diplomatic role.
"Not at all. It's not a diplomatic anything," he said.

If it's not diplomatic - is Mr. Bolden seriously claiming that NASA's new priorities are scientifically motivated and focus on best utilizing taxpayer dollars?!