SLS has always been the most industry desirable aerospace pork/waste project. The Exploration Upper Stage (the canceled one from this article) was just another example of that.
Other examples include:
- Restarting RS-25 rocket engine production (under the E variant) by Aerodyne
- BOLE to create new SRBs allowing Northrop to recovery its money invested in the failed OmegA rocket
- Building a second Mobile Launcher Platform from Bechtel for a rocket we've only launched once 4 years ago.
Before any of the above was done we had everything to launch 4 SLS rockets. If we only end up ever launching a total of 4 SLS rockets 100% of the above is complete waste which will serve zero purpose.
These are just the more recent pork examples in a long line stretching back to Orion, and Constellation development.