I agree, if this turns out to be a historic announcement, this Q&A will definitely not make humanity look very intelligent to future viewers. I guess the reaso

I agree, if this turns out to be a historic announcement, this Q&A will definitely not make humanity look very intelligent to future viewers. I guess the reason for inviting non-technical press (and being so patient with their silly questions) is to get access to a non-technical audience. Like he said, part of the challenge is to get more people to want to go to Mars (maybe not personally, but as a species), so appealing to people of all sorts, not just people to who read science & engineering reporting, would contribute to that. My best guess, but still, wow, at those questions.