[stoops]

Sounds like that person doesn't really understand that NASA is a political entity and the Public Relations of an ongoing successful mission is more valuable long term than more scientifically pragmatic experiments in the immediate.

[tomp]

Sounds like s/he perfectly understood that, but still didn't like it. Often (always?) politics get in the way of actually getting things done in a smart fast efficient manner.

[fixermark]

The thing is, you can substitute "politics" for "people" and get the same statement, which is why NASA's political work is at least as important to human space exploration (and, I would argue, long-term species survival) as the raw scientific work.

People have to be continually convinced that exploration of the solar system is a worthwhile expenditure of a lot of money that could be spent on other things. Seems obvious to those who are already thinking in the direction of where humanity is going, but most people do not.

[grumdan]

It's still possible to simultaneously acknowledge the fact that we need to repeatedly convince people of space exploration being important while also disliking that this is necessary.

[RobLach]

Politics also affords the collective resources to engage on such projects. It's more chicken-egg than most think.

Not to mention, science without proper PR has a disastrous level of near-term utility. See: climate science