Voyager Spacecraft and Richard Nixon

Outside the Apollo moon landing the Voyager Spacecraft may be NASA's signature program (argue the Mars rover if you like). The thing that often or always gets overlooked is the fact that the Voyager Spacecraft (Voyager I and Voyager II) would have never happened if it wasn't for Richard Nixon.

Yet Nixon never seems to get any credit.

Seriously. Can you find any mention of Nixon in the Wikipedia page on the Voyager program? Without Nixon granting NASA the money specifically for this project this never happens. Without Voyager there's no "pale blue dot". And without Carl Sagan's elegant words the appetite for space exploration probably is not close to what it is today.

Yet Nixon's name comes up less frequently when it comes to the Voyager program than Chuck Berry's.

And if you think I'm trying to give Nixon too much credit please remember that George McGovern stated in no uncertain terms that if he was elected President he was going to cut the space shuttle program and redirect those funds toward domestic programs. Do you think the Voyager science experiment would have got funding if it wasn't Nixon in office?

No chance. Yet Nixon never gets any credit.