China going to mars?

Stories like this from last year, tell me we will focus on the future no matter how little interest policy makers have. China will go to mars because of India and light a fire under us to do the same.

But the same lack of reason is being expressed by...

[Mining the asteroid belt has] no gravity well to waste propellant on, just gobs of precious minerals hanging in the sky for the mining.

Typical lazy thinking. Did they invalidate the rocket equation? So propellant is still required. Along with that is the other false assumption that we have to export anything from that gravity well. The stuff is already where you need it to develop the colony!

BTW, I haven't read Zubrin's "Case for Mars" since it came out, but just got the revised copy. In it is my idea to sell mars real estate. He gives the example of $20 an acre (get with the metric system fella.) He's still hasn't gotten it right on whose going to do the selling (it can't be claimed by anyone a part of the OST or probably even be recognized if someone else did. Without claims you can't start a chain of title.) The martians IMHO may best agree to a charter that uses real estate income to pay for transportation to mars for anyone that wants to go. $100 trillion dollars will buy a lot of $100m tickets (and more as the price goes down.) The money is there (and the only real hurdle, others are much less of a challenge.) It's just attitude that keeps us from mars.