I can see Zubrin's reasons for preferring Mars. Almost everything is
there, although nitrogen is kind of rare.
I'm afraid that's only as long as we've managed to deploy what has to
become a fully robotic trillion dollar nuclear power plant and all of
the machinery as for extracting and processing whatever Zubrin needs,
then another trillion as for their first class to/from travel package
that'll get a half dozen souls to Mars in a state of prematurely dying
off from excessive TBI dosage and, having those 6 body-bags for their
return flight.

I suppose that's worth a couple of trillion just to get rid of such
intellectual morons.

BTW; I totally agree with your;
One can make oxygen from moon rocks - and one can burn aluminum for
thrust, it is said.
I believe there's so much more that our moon has to contribute without
our ever setting foot upon it.
~

Life upon Venus, a township w/Bridge & ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-town.htm
The Russian/China LSE-CM/ISS (Lunar Space Elevator)
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/lunar-space-elevator.htm
Venus ETs, plus the updated sub-topics; Brad Guth / GASA-IEIS
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-topics.htm
War is war, thus "in war there are no rules" - In fact, war has been
the very reason of having to deal with the likes of others that haven't
been playing by whatever rules, such as GW Bush