[anigbrowl]

Some, I'm willing to believe, already feel very adamantly that mankind is a pestilence and should be prevented from spreading.

Oh rubbish. It's basic lab protocol that you don't contaminate your samples, and we're at the very early stages of sample-gathering. We're just at the stage of figuring out whether Mars has ever had liquid water or not, so your worries about budget interplanetary travel being held up by interfering bureaucrats are almost comically premature.