The APS is not mentioning how in the Vision, robotic exploration of the solar system will *double* leading up to the human exploration of Mars. It's in the plan -- double the robots going to Mars, and a new robotic exploration program for the Moon. Near Earth Asteroids are also targets; and the Jupiter Icey Moon Missions is bearing the torch for Project Prometheus. The plan is about humans and robotos working together -- not in competition.

This silly statement by the APS shows they've haven't done their homework.

If people like these guys had had their way, we'd still think the world was flat.

It's time for the robot boys--a bunch of people with narrow esoteric scientific interests interested only in using the space program as a means to satisfy their own curiosity--to get the hell out of the wayand let the REAL exploration of the cosmos begin.

Anyone who thinks NASA is currently 'highly successful' (given their budget)is not worth paying attention to. NASA is by (their own admission) not mission driven, and a NASA trip 'to space' costs half a billion. A SpaceshipOne trip to the edge of space costs $200,00 per seat. NASA uses heat tiles and people burn up. Rutan uses a shuttlecock approach and saves billions. Scaled Composites provides jobs to visionaries. NASA provides jobs to bureaucrats.
The federeal government should offer X-type prizes and get out of the way.

NASA has to exist to provide a diversity of momentums for space exploration. Nasa just needs to get fit. APS is on to something. But, if we do not establish a permanent base on another planet in the next 50 years, due to resource depletion and the costs of global climate change our civilisation may not get another chance. Without a permanent base the urgency we need to keep us in space will be lost. Because of gravitational problems the moon and even mars are not very good targets for our next push into space. They would be better colonised by robots. Large rotating space colonies are probably our best bet for a sustained presence in space.

Even if Mars was colonized by robotic explorers that sampled soil, polar-ice fields, areas conducive to extremophilic bacteria habitats, the slopes of Olympus Mons, or transversed the various canyons; actual human explorers (scientific or military interest)would eventually occur. When the Lousiania Purchase occurred, due to Thomas Jefferson, the interior of the country was open to discovery. It was through the Lewis and Clark expedition, that Thomas Jefferson gained some idea of the vastness of the resourses available. Even then, the idea of actually settling, farming, and living in those lands was projected to occur over the next 1000 years.
Even during that time in history, individuals expressed concerns over the cost associated with the Purchase. So those beauratic cost-prohibitive individuals--truely have no vision to lead society--yet are often elected officials of the people.
Mars or the Moon, are future destinations for all humanity--places where human differences or opinions will be replaced by the need of exploration, scientific discovery, working together to build a human presence on those worlds.
Nanotech robotics building the habitat structures and robotics with lasers drilling and moving water resources from the poles to the equatial regions of Mars for human exploration outposts.