In article .com,
"Z 1 Y 0 N 3 X" wrote:

(IMHO) The ISS is a huge waste of time. Yeah, it's the first of it's
kind and it was cool for a while, but if you think about it, what the
hell are we going to do with it?

Use it as a test bed for space technologies? Use its resupply as a
driver of commercial launch services?

Super, we have a lab in zero-g. We
would be much better off going to Mars right now.

What for? It's much too far away for any serious development, and even
a flags & footprints mission would be ridiculously expensive (and
dangerous).

Screw the moon, the
only plus about colonizing on the moon is that it is close to us.

Right, and that's a HUGE plus. If God had wanted us to colonize space,
He would have given us a large moon. Oh wait, He did...

Mars has far more minerals

Like what, exactly?

an atmosphere (for what it's worth)

....which is very little, though I'll admit it does have its uses.

and water to some extent.

So does the Moon, to some extent. Though it's easier to get to on Mars
-- it's just that Mars itself is ridiculously harder to get to.

Waiting until 2010 is a waste of time, and billions of
dollars spent on the ISS every flight is a waste of money as well.

"Waiting" until 2010? It's almost 2007 now. What's waiting?

As for ISS, it's got many problems, but it IS there and it has its uses.

I dunno, I guess we might need to rely on private enterprises to get us
to where we really need to be going.

This is the first sensible thing I've read in your whole message.

I'm rooting for the Space Elevator.

I'll root for it too, but I'm not holding my breath either.

Best,
- Joe