NEW YORK (AP) - In a dramatic press conference from the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in Manhattan today, veteran Star Wars cult favorite film producer/director, George Lucas, announced filing an unprecedented $6.6 Billion lawsuit, in Federal District court, against the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for misappropriation of concepts such as The Force, which he developed in Star Wars, promoted as the theory of Dark Energy by NASA and the scientific community.

Ever since Hubble confirmed that expansion of the universe is accelerating, NASA has scrambled to explain this phenomenon which contradicts their predictions of The Big Bang cosmology. Irrefutable evidence, recently brought to my attention, confirms that scientists have intentionally plagiarized The Force and specifically The Dark Side of Force, and repackaged it as Dark Energy.

Lucas cited a recent NASA item promoting Dark Energy on the agency's web site. "This photo caption explaining the theory comes short of having any basis in scientific observation and clearly shows NASA reverting to the realm of science-fiction and fantasy:"

Today, evidence is accumulating that most of the energy density in the universe is in an unknown form dubbed dark energy. The form and genesis of dark energy is almost completely unknown, but postulated as related to vacuum fluctuations similar to the Casimir Effect but generated somehow by space itself. This vast and mysterious dark energy appears to gravitationally repel all matter and hence will likely cause the universe to expand forever.

Lucas' attorney, famed civil rights activist Alan Dershowitz, stepped in to field a question on why Dark Energy infringes on concepts of The Force in Star Wars:

When considering that The Force in Star Wars is explained as the energy which holds the universe together, it follows that the Dark Side of the Force pushes everything apart. This is exactly the concept which NASA and the scientific community plagiarized with the theory of Dark Energy.

Asked to comment on the lawsuit, a NASA spokesman released a statement today defending the space agency's position:

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was served today with a 346 page complaint involving intellectual property rights infringement allegations. It will take some time to study the complaint and respond to it. The steering committee of the NASA scientific community maintains, however, that all of our cosmology theories are entirely fabricated from the imagination of our own researchers and have never relied on the use of copyrighted materials whatsoever. There will be no further public comment on this issue until we conduct the research necessary to manufacture a plausible theory to settle the dispute.

Jim Steranko, popular comics creator, pop-culture historian and long time friend of Lucas, also commented on the lawsuit. Steranko himself has been an advocate of universe expansion and promotes the idea with a New Model of the Universe web site, based on evidence collected by a Growing Earth Consortium he features there.

I've been telling George about this for years now and I'm glad he finally listened to me. Great minds such as Lucas, and other comics creators, have been taken advatage of for too long and it's high time that we stand up for our rights. You can imagine my pleasure at seeing truth and justice finally being put on the table with this lawsuit. Moreover, I believe this issue will ultimately help the scientific community realize that the essential universe they're exploring abounds with forces that comics creators have been talking about for years - and which scientists have ignored for far too long.

In a related incident, a Vatican spokesman also released a statement today, announcing that the Catholic institute is considering whether NASA's Dark Energy also infringes on concepts of Satan and The Anti-Christ from The Bible. The statement came short, however, of stating whether the Vatican would take any legal action against the government agency.