During the presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised that once elected, he would revive a disbanded, interdepartmental body that once guided space policy. The council spanned the worlds of civilian, military and, eventually, commercial space policy and helped coordinate among the realms. 

However, on June 28, 2010, when the administration released a document titled, "National Space Policy of the United States of America," there was no sign that the interdepartmental body would be relaunched.

First, some background. The National Aeronautics and Space Council, later called the National Space Council, was established by statute in 1958. The original statute set its membership as: the president, the secretary of state, the defense secretary, the administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, plus another representative of a relevant federal department, as well as three members of the public with expertise in science, education or other related fields.

The council went through a number of incarnations, with a variety of Cabinet and White House officials as members. On several occasions it was reorganized, abolished and revived, but the most recent version was disbanded in 1993.

In making his promise, Obama said that such a body would have a sufficiently broad mandate to oversee a comprehensive and integrated strategy and policy dealing with all aspects of the government's space-related programs, including those being managed by NASA, the Department of Defense, the National Reconnaissance Office, the Commerce Department, the Transportation Department and other federal agencies. The council would "oversee and coordinate civilian, military, commercial and national security space activities. It will solicit public participation, engage the international community and work toward a 21st century vision of space that constantly pushes the envelope on new technologies as it pursues a balanced national portfolio that expands our reach into the heavens and improves life here on Earth."

The idea of a panel was not mentioned in the fall of 2009 when the U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee -- a panel more commonly known as the Augustine Committee, after its chairman, Norman Augustine, the former CEO of Lockheed Martin -- released its final report. Nor was it mentioned in the June 28, 2010, report.

Space experts we spoke to said that the absence of mention in either of the two landmark reports is a strong suggestion that nothing is happening with this idea. We can always modify our rating if the idea is revived. But for now, we're calling this a Promise Broken.