The chart refutes the idea that experts promised fusion power on a certain timespan, got the resources they requested as necessary, and then failed to deliver.

The chart refutes the idea that experts promised fusion power on a certain timespan, got the resources they requested as necessary, and then failed to deliver. That false narrative is the basis of the incorrect aphorism "fusion is 30 years away and always will be". The chart is not intended to be definitive proof that we would have had fusion power if we had spent the money (lv's last throwaway line notwithstanding.) No one knows what would have happened. To estimate that, we must use our prior based on how long/expensive other major tech developments have been. That's very different than pretending we know fusion's track record. Incidentally, NASA is currently spending huge amounts of money on computer simulations for the equipment that will return humans to the moon half a century after they were last there. That doesn't mean those simulations are necessary to get to the Moon, as indeed they weren't possible in 1969.