And those billionaires did it with a fraction of the funds that the government could marshal... Did what? The billionaires haven't even put a single person in

And those billionaires did it with a fraction of the funds that the government could marshal... Did what? The billionaires haven't even put a single person in orbit yet, something the government did within a few years of starting a space program. The US government went on to put humans on the moon (a feat yet to be equaled even by any other government, much less a billionaire), operate a reusable spacecraft for 30 years, and build an enormous space station in orbit and operate that for 20 years. Free people do control government capital in a functioning democracy that has not been captured by billionaires.