If I recall correctly, part of the way that NASA is setup is to be deliberately spread out across many congressional districts - making it hard to cut it's legs out from under it because it will effect jobs in too many congressman's districts.

The downside to this is that it's also a great way of bringing lots of bullshit jobs into a district, and makes things VERY expensive.

Not surprising that India can do this cheaply - hopefully some of our private sector space companies will learn from what they're doing and improve on it.