Symmetry factor

The National Academy of Sciences' Committee on Elementary Particle Physics in the 21st Century (or EPP2010 for short) released a report today called "Revealing the Hidden Nature of Space and Time:Charting the Course for Elementary Particle Physics" (it is available for download here: http://www7.nationalacademies.org/bpa/EPP2010_Report_Prepub.pdf) .

This is a monstrous about-100-pages document that basically states that we need further investment (both financial and "moral&quot in the US particle physics or US will cease to be a leader in this field of science. It's an important and well-crafted document, which emphasises all the real and potential benefits that particle physics has for community. I recommend reading through it — and will certainly do it myself. However, a quick glance through the document reveals two things:

1. There is almost no mention of particle theory/computing, besides a nice blurp about quantum field theory. Perhaps it is done intentianally, as in general we have no idea what LHC/ILC will have in store for us. Yet, computational and theoretical efforts (at least partially) defined the direction of the experimemtal efforts (Standard Model and SLAC/LEP, lattice QCD and CLEO-c, etc.). Of course, computing is important in other fields of science, not only in particle physics, but computing in particle phyiscs helps to shape the whole field…

2. All of the future of US experimental particle phyiscs is based on next linear collider (ILC) (hopefully) built at Fermilab. With other subfileds dying at its expense. Of course, they mention neutrino phyiscs and even flavor physics as possible (international) efforts in which US physicists could participate. But all flavor phyiscs projects are not based in the US. So my question is: why not build a super-B factory based on a small-scale linear collider at Fermilab ! Like the one advocated by the Europeans as a testbed for ILC (see here). Could be useful to have some experience with linear collider technology right at FNAL…