The budget of nasa is a fraction of what it is for the military.
Imagine what would be happening if america scaled down military investment and went full steam ahead with investment into science and technology for the public interest. I sincerely hope within my lifetime a reset happens and america gets back on track. Enough with the right wing bullshyt, enough with the privatization and monetization of everything.
I firmly believe if wealth is transferred back to the public and people are put to work, science, health and education are put front and center, we'll have robots on mars actively building things and performing experiments to help us learn about that planet.
With the right materials, we'll be able to design crafts and robots that can travel to other planets in our solar system and explore them. If humanity is able to collaborate and really use its collective intelligence, I don't have any doubt that within 300 years we will have figured out how to settle mars and would have terrariums that simulate earth gravity, plants, etc. or will have figured out how to terraform planets. If that sounds crazy, think about what the state of technology was 300 years ago. Nobody even had an inkling of the technology you're currently using to read this.