"So far," he began, omitting even to begin his remarks with the traditional salutation to the President and the group as a whole, "I have heard ten recommendations for procedure in the present crisis, and each one has been about as jelly-kneed as the one before it! There's one solution to this thing and only one. If we don't want this planet to be scattered to the four corners of Space within the next 72 hours we must get Project AA underway and damn quick! I've been informed that there is a Tinker ship within thirty hours' flight of this system. If we act now, and call them in as we should've, on an ESR, five years ago, we still might be able to get out of this one with whole skins. Some of us, anyway. Gentlemen, the casualty lists as of an hour ago weren't very encouraging." "Will the Senator from Penn-York yield for a question?" Stine's cold blue eyes snapped. "Yield for one minute to the Senator from Texamerica." "The ITA effected a Project AA for this system about eleven years ago, did they not? And have answered exactly seven Emergency Service Requests in the last one hundred twenty years, have they not? In view of such frequent assistance, it would seem--" "What the Senator from Texamerica really means is that if the ITA had to do a double-A for the second time in eleven years, the reflection on their prestige would make things a little gummy in some quarters--isn't it?" A gavel rapped sharply. Stine threw a quick glance at the section reserved for native Earth political representatives of the ITA, and he saw that one was already on his feet demanding recognition. "I yield for all the time you need! Go ahead!" Stine sat down, his youthful looking face mottled with tension. "I may remind the Senator from Penn-York that the ITA has some one hundred twelve other worlds in addition to this planet to look after! And as far as it is concerned, nuisance planets are better off dead! If our torsion screens were inoperable; if there were no other way to hold the planet together until the next scheduled visit nine years from now, then perhaps an ESR would be in order. But since it is obvious that this system's Gravity-Justifier is only in temporary disorder, and was designed to be self repairing, an ESR for a double-A is simply out of the question. I repeat. As far as the ITA is concerned, a nuisance planet--"