President's Commission on Moon, Mars and Beyond

I agree with Claudio's last statement comparing the degree of impact that a
robot digging by the ton would have over an astronaut drilling rocks on
Mars. However, I see two things wrong with that vision. One, I think we
could expect far more out of a human visit to Mars than merely drilling a
hole in a rock. I am quite sure that a trained geoligist would see things
that no robot could by virtue of real time interaction with the sample and
making decisions on the spot. Surely anyone can extrapolate a bit and begin
to see a whole range of very important things an astronaut could accomplish
(key word here, over merely 'do'). Second, and more importantly, I think
that the time lines are quite different in length from now towards either
the robot or the astronaut. Simply, I believe it is possible right now to
mount a mission to Mars that would deliver astronauts and return them,
whereas the robotic industtrialization of the moon is certainly much further
off. Given the present distractions from space endeavours, like catching
people with barrels of enriched Uranium in the desert, which look like they
could easily get out of hand and delay our space dreams by centuries; I
would like to see us with a firm commitment to doing something substantial
that will engage the public in such a way as to gain strong support for
farther reacing projects, and so on, and before the world becomes to bogged
down or distracted...