It appears that the plans for America to return to the Moon by 2020 may be meeting up with financial and time constraints.

Congressional auditors on Thursday challenged NASA's readiness to move ahead with development of the Ares I rocket that will propel the new Orion moonship into Earth orbit with astronauts.

The $14.4 billion that NASA plans to spend on the craft's development may be inadequate based on the space agency's aggressive development schedule and technical risks, said a report by the General Accountability Office.

The agency's auditors urged the space agency to postpone plans for a key July 2008 design review of the rocket, if necessary, to remedy a list of 51 unknowns, including 31 issues considered high risk to the success of the program.

The milestone "preliminary design review" is intended to spur the project toward detailed planning.

This, of course, raises the question of whether or not we can meet the 2020 deadline for returning to Earth's nearest neighbor. And given the number of competitors out there, it also raises the question of whether or not the United States will be the first to return there. And with the space shuttle fleet less than thre years from retirement, this leaves the issue of manned space flight by the United States in question as well.

But then again, if Nancy Pelosi keeps holding up NASA funding legislation, we may not have a space program left.