but that's what happens when years of bad management and cost over runs catch up with a program. The ISS has ran up multi-billion dollar overruns for years. Congress and the White House (both under Clinton and under Bush) are seemingly unwilling to significantly increase NASA's budget. The end result is that something had to give. Sadly, it was the X-38/CRV.

There's nothing to stop the ISS partners from picking up the CRV program themselves. While their offer to pay up to half the cost is good, if they're really so concerned then they should be willing to pay the full cost or come up with their own solution, such as a CRV derived from a "Big Soyuz" capsule. The US is still paying the lion's share of the ISS costs, only now the lion is on a diet.