So did we bring anything back from the moon other than rocks? What about Mars? I love the Mars rovers but please...we need to have a *financial* reason for pumping billions into the space program.
If I understand you correctly, it seems you have a rather provincial perspective on the way you look at the world. Retrieving 'moon rocks' was hardly the raison d'etre for landing on the moon. There were much bigger issues to why we made the effort, most of which can not be quantified by any *financial* justification you seem to think is the only point of it all.
We went to the Moon to hunt for the mysterious black monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey.
If you really believe that all we got out of the moon program was a bunch of rocks you are sadly mistaken. The Return on Investment was enormous.
What returns are we getting out of pumping BILLIONS into EBT cards?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o64Fz-KW1Dk
So you know where those dollars GO? They don’t stuff greenbacks up the engines and light them. The money is paid to smart and dedicated men and women who build infrastructure, research sciences, and improve the state of the art. And by maintaining leadership in space we assure that we will not wake up one day and find China or Iran threatening to drop a meteor on our heads. It is the ultimate highground. If we don’t hold it someone else will.