I don't see why it can't be both. If advanced space travel weren't a ludicrously expensive way of committing suicide, I'd support it more. But as best I can tel

I don't see why it can't be both. If advanced space travel weren't a ludicrously expensive way of committing suicide, I'd support it more. But as best I can tell, the engineering reality is that we aren't ready to start accomplishing anything meaningful off the earth, so pouring money into that before the foundational technology exists is like funding alchemy. We don't currently have people living in a sealed-off bubble at the bottom of the Southern Ocean or something like that, so why are we trying to market a Mars mission or something even more outlandish? In short, I think the problem is that the evident state of engineering makes the venture look somewhat unlikely to succeed. So no matter how awesome your marketing makes the cause sound, it has to be marked down in the final equation in proportion to the likelihood that it is just an expensive way to die.