OTTAWA — The federal budget is where a government explains its most ambitious long-term plans, with high-flown rhetoric and huge dollar figures.

This year, it’s also where we find out about the government’s desire for the country to join an internationally beloved song-writing contest and to conduct space launches on Canadian turf.

The annual budget is always a strange mix of big news and small-but-captivating ideas — never forget the year former prime minister Stephen Harper abolished the penny — so we dug into Tuesday’s federal budget and found some of the deepest cuts from the government’s spending plan.

Details are slim — literally one sentence in the 400-page budget document — but Canada looks to be joining the space race.

The budget announced funding of $182 million over thre

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