I fully agree. But only because an American colony on Mars would be aesthetically preferable to a SpaceX corporate colony on Mars, where colonists'd predictably

I fully agree. But only because an American colony on Mars would be aesthetically preferable to a SpaceX corporate colony on Mars, where colonists'd predictably work fifteen year sentences as indentured servant miners to pay off their voyage. I prefer that we look at those colonies as societies of their own, not an extension of some country into outer space. Otherwise, the inevitable will happen, and we will have an ugly civil war 200 years into the future. It's better that we look at this as an altruistic enterprise that will eventually yield a shitload of benefit to mankind 200 years down the road.