> Just explain the client the situation, what's the risk and for what additional cost it can be lowered. And I have no doubt this is what was happening in NASA,

> Just explain the client the situation, what's the risk and for what additional cost it can be lowered. And I have no doubt this is what was happening in NASA, in other words this was no "underpromise and overdeliver", this was "explain the situation and agree on trade-offs leading to the best ratio of positive outcome for the price". That doesn't work well when communicating indirectly, through politicians and journalists, to the public at large. It may not work when communicating to elected politicians.