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Why The Obama Administration Won't Build A Death Star

"The Administration does not support blowing up planets." That's just one of the many official reasons given in a tongue-in-cheek response for not building a Death Star.

The White House response came after 34,435 people signed a petition to "Secure resources and funding, and begin construction of a Death Star by 2016."

The petition argued that building and manning a Star Wars-type weapon system could "spur job creation in the fields of construction, engineering, space exploration and more, and strengthen our national defense."

But the White House disagrees, saying construction has been estimated to cost more than $850,000,000,000,000,000.

The official response went on to argue that a Death Star may not be in the picture, but the U.S. is already doing impressive work in space:

We don't have a Death Star, but we do have floating robot assistants on the Space Station, a President who knows his way around a light saber and advanced (marshmallow) cannon, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is supporting research on building Luke's arm, floating droids, and quadruped walkers.

Twitter, as could be expected, is abuzz with responses, both for and against the construction.

The official response was crafted by Paul Shawcross, chief of the Science and Space Branch at the White House Office of Management and Budget.

This program aired on January 12, 2013. The audio for this program is not available.

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