The Mars Society is focuse solely on Mars under the principle of first things first. The vast majority of Mars Society members are interested in many other space topics, but believe Mars is the logical first step to an interplanetary civilization. If you agree with that you should understand the value of focusing on the first step in a difficult task. Spending lots of effort on subsequent steps of secondary goals makes no sense when the first and primary step is a daunting task in and of itself.
Despite much commentary from others labeling him as tunnel visioned, I believe Zubrin looks upon Mars as simply the first step based on several books he has authored besides "The Case For Mars".

However, as the primary poster pointed out there are many synergistic elements between the programs favored by the different points of view on what should be the space programs top priority. It is a real shame when people claiming to be space advocates promote their cause by dissing another, especially through playing fast and loose with the facts. I think all space advocates should promote their programs as the best program not the only one that makes sense. Actively seeking to sink any specific program in the hopes of stealing its funding is more likely simply to lower opinion of the space program in general and decrease all funding IMO.

My overall take is

1) Mars is the best target for the next step of human exploration because it is central to answering some of the key questions about astrobiology and it is the best place to establish an off-planet colony.

2) Comercialization of space and reducing launch costs are key to most if not all potential space programs. The lower launch costs go the more the government can afford to do on a fixed budget and the more private groups and individuals can tackle. Commerializatrion will inevitably reduce costs, but reducing costs from current levels will probably be required to get the commmercial ball rolling well. I don't think there are enough space fan millionaires to get the space tourism ball rolling in something other than the piggyback fashion it ccurrently exists in. Colonization of any world beyond Earth should be a private venture IMO and will not happen without much lower launch costs.

3) Most space fans see space as a key part of humanities future, but there will be no future if we get whacked by a comet or asteroid (or for that matter ignore self destructive elements on Earth). The NEO search program should be given higher priority than it is including a large ground based scope. A few summary notes from the Spaceguard report and others:

a) The spaceguard program proposed to detect 90% of Near Earth Asteroids > 1 km within 10 years would have detected 40% of the objects from 1 km down to 300 m in size, but taken close to a century to detect 90 % of them. I assume the larger objects in the 0.3 to 1 km range would be disproportunately detected and the majority of that early 40%.

b) I would guess the program proposed to detect 90 % of objects > 300 m within 10 years using larger ground based telescopes would have a similar efficiency on objects a third smaller. Thus for an expenditure considerably less than even one low cost space probe we could detect 90 % of the NEAs > 100 m in a time frame similar to the normal impact interval between the smallest objects in that class. These are the smallest generally considered to be of potential catastrophic nature. It's not even considered a PHA if it is < 200 m. It is ridiculous in my opinion to pinch pennies by putting off these modest expenditures given the huge value of what would be insured by such a program.

c) None of the proposed programs provide significant protection from the threat of long period comets. These are likely to be detected with only short advance notice. These account for roughly 25% of the expected fatalities over time and an even larger portion of potential extinction level events. The best protection against those IMO is a spacefaring civilization which will vastly increase the number of potential detection sites and our technological capabilities with regard to dealing with any threatening objects. I don't believe we will ever spend the funds to develop the technology to divert an ELE impactor without an impending threat (which is unlikely to be detected far enough in advance for a crash program to succeed) except as a natural outgrowth of technological advance in a growing space based economy.

4) The Moon and LEO are the obvious choices for near term commercialization. I hope all the efforts to commericalize them are successful. I believe that anyone with a commercial space proposal should be given reasonable leeway by government regulators and not publicly badmouthed by any space official. However, from a government program standpoint the Moon does not make sense as a forward base for Martian colonization or as a commercial source of fantasy fusion fuel. I guess I do take exception to promotions that I consider nonsensical. We should all take care to make sure we promote our causes based on reasonable assumptions.

Regards,
Mark