Responding to a successful petition requesting the construction of a Death Star, the White House responds with "This Isn't the Petition Response You're Looking For", an explanation of the station's formidable construction costs and poor bang-for-the-buck: "Remember, the Death Star's power to destroy a planet, or even a whole star system, is insignificant next to the power of the Force."

  • Cornan

    I honestly loved this. Credit to Paul Shawcross (and/or his staff) for this response. I enjoy having at least one person in the Federal Government who acknowledges that the past 60 years of human history happened and isn’t afraid to not be super serious every once and a while.

    • EvilSpirit

       Oh, that’s Paul’s work all right, at least partly. Very funny guy.

  • franko

    SO MUCH to love here.

  • BDiamond

    That’s a quote from Obi-Wan, isn’t it? (“These aren’t the droids you’re looking for.”)

    • BDiamond

       Never mind. I get it now.

  • http://borborygmist.influxofdust.com/ Wayne Dyer

    The Vader quote is beyond the subject line, folks.  Reach out with your feelings.  And read to the end.

    • BDiamond

       Yeah, I jumped the gun. Duh.

  • rastronomicals

    Best. Administration.  EVAR.

    • retchdog

      this comment gives me the vertigo…

    • http://twitter.com/nastybutler77 JJ

      I’m sure Bradley Manning and all the other whistle blowers might disagree with you on that point.

      • retchdog

        not to mention the american drone strike victims… oh wait, they’re dead. never mind.

  • Mr. Winka

    A clever way to inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers. Bush would’ve just built the death star so he could blow up Iran.

    • http://thisisonlya.blogspot.com robcat2075

       Bush: Deaf Bar? Why do they need their own bar? Is this one of those crazy ADA law things? I don’t know why Dad signed that…

  • http://twitter.com/incarnedine_v Dan Hibiki

    Shame that the rest of the petitions are for opposing gun regulations.

  • jimh

    Love the agency:
    Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Office (C3PO)

  • tw1515tw

    I’ve he’d picked up on a parsec being a unit of distance, not time, it would have been perfect. It suggests Paul Shawcross isn’t a scientist or doesn’t watch American Dad (which is where I learnt about the error).

    Still a great response.

    • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_GVKHNINUD55NXFN4TRNHMBRDB4 Alexandros

       Hey, lets be fair. He just quoted Han Solo there, who got it wrong in the first place. And you just don´t correct Han Solo. You don´t do that. Just don´t.

      • Stooge

        IIRC, the backfill that stops Han looking like a doofus is that the Kessel Run is measured in distance rather than time as shorter distances indicate the taking of shortcuts through unspecified perils which other smaller-balled pilots in less manoeuvrable craft would not risk taking.

        • Michael Rosenbloom

          A different backfill, that may have (iirc) come from the original script, has Han just making it up as sales talk to fool Luke and Obi-Wan, and Alec Guinness wasn’t into the movie enough to give a suitably dubious expression.

          • skeptacally

             that’s it.  pocket protectors for the lot of you.

      • CH

        And who says the Kessel Run was about time, and not distance, anyway?

        • Antinous / Moderator

          For all we know, the Kessel Run was the name of a disco dance.

          • CH

            Well… it’s… possible. We don’t know what Millennium Falcon does in its off hours. Perhaps it dresses up in its slickest leasure suit and starts to bust out some groovy moves.

          • MurasakiMadness

            Or what happens when you get bad Cantina food

    • EvilSpirit

       He’s an MIT-trained aero/astro engineer. I’m sure he’s aware of the issue with Han’s script.

  • http://twitter.com/gths Ǥɍǡḩḁᶆ Ӻᴙᴇᴇᴍᴀᴎ

    Now, had this been Ronald Reagan’s administration…

    • MarcVader

      …they would have told you that all information pertaining to Death Stars is classified for national security reasons.

      • http://twitter.com/nastybutler77 JJ

        Kind of like how this administration tells us that even the most banal of information is classified for national security reasons?

        • MarcVader

           Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

    • Just_Ok

      Jelly beans at every desk

  • Just_Ok

    However, in Star Wars, Obi-Wan said this when they were, indeed, the droids they were looking for. So, the administration is trying to say that this WAS the response they were looking for, but to not look.

    • Bearpaw01

      Aaaannnnnnd there you see the beginnings of the Death Star Truther arguments,

  • http://twitter.com/rvitelli Romeo Vitelli

    The only thing that would make this perfect would be the GOP protesting this decision since it would mean that America’s enemies will get the jump on them.

    • http://boingboing.net/ The Life Of Bryan

      Do you deny that there is a Death Star gap?

  • Marc O’Cleirigh

    Quotes Vader..
    quotes Vader..
    quotes vader

    Nooooo!!

  • pharmavixen

    The Republican Party: never will you find a more retched hive of scum and villainy.

    • James Penrose

       ”Retched”?  Are they throwing up?  Wretched, perhaps? :)

      Problem is, they are running/ruining the country (both parties are doing the latter in truth) while you’re all making juvenile Death Star jokes.

  • mysterymoil

    If the US is going to go ahead and mint those platinum $1Trillion coins, then $850,000,000,000,000,000 becomes a payable balance, yes?

  • James Penrose

    Amusing as this is, it also gives ammunition to those who would want to ignore or silence the public voice.

    This will be trotted out and waved around as indicating how unseriously Americans really take the petition program and how much time and money the government must waste in “catering” to and answering foolish people.  Think about that the next time anyone tries to get laws passed to create national referendums for stuff we don’t trust to Congress?

    In many ways, they’d be right.  How much harder does it become to get a real signal through when the noise level is too high?

    “…and the people fiddled while the American Republic burned” may be taught in future history classes

  • http://amorphia-apparel.com/ Jeremy Kalgreen

    This was basically the perfect response to the petition, lets just hope the entire system doesn’t just get bogged down with endless imitators.  

  • min amisan

    There’s the reality of (earthling) government for you: prance about and throw power around like the Galactic Empire, but when it comes to the crunch, can’t actually build a Death Star.

    • TWX

       Is there even enough metal on the planet to build the Death Star?  And if there’s not enough metal on the planet to do it, is there enough metal in the mine-able part of the solar system to build one?