The reason that organizations like NASA have chiefs is so that they can make decisions about what to do next. For NASA it looks like they are running into some serious existential issues, so they are going to do what they need to do in order to survive.
Also, couple of things:
1. Congress doesn't owe NASA anything. The People appreciate their service, but NASA has made it clear that they support a particular paradigm of space exploration, and I happen to think it is time to do something different. We are not going to get much farther with the "Stuff a big metal cylinder with a bunch of fuel and ignite it" approach. There are much more elegant ways to explore space that we should be looking into.
2. No business cooperating with the Chinese? America is clearly all about cooperating with the Chinese. People like to gripe about currency manipulation and questionable manufacturing practices. Well, maybe if Americans stopped voting with their dollars to buy the cheapest thing on the shelf things would change. Keep in mind that there are innumerable American-owned companies manufacturing out of China. Go gripe at them and leave NASA to themselves.
