I'm in favor of changing the destination of humans. There are a lot of manned missions that can be done, but not in the direction of the moon.

Exploring Mars is a far different venture from Apollo expeditions to the moon; it necessitates leaving our home planet on lengthy missions with a constrained return capability.

Upon stepping foot on the moon, Buzz remarked to Houston, 'Beautiful, beautiful. Magnificent desolation.'

To send humans back to the moon would not be advancing. It would be more than 50 years after the first moon landing when we got there, and we'd probably be welcomed by the Chinese. But we should return to the moon without astronauts and build, with robots, an international lunar base, so that we know how to build a base on Mars robotically.

The leader of an Earth organization who makes a commitment to history - of humans living on Earth, to begin permanent settlement/occupation of not the moon, but of another planet - this leader will have a legacy for history that will supersede Columbus, Genghis Khan or almost any recognized leader.

I feel we need to remind the world about the Apollo missions and that we can still do impossible things.