I am a little puzzled by the constant pissing contests on this subject, and when the pissing starts (haven't checked to see whether the composition is water or CO2) I start tuning out. Starts to sound a lot like you and me, except that politics tends to be lacking in solid objective argument-ending answers while the subject of liquid water on Mars awaits only another few years to get a firm answer one way or another.

There is nothing wrong with arguing one theory over another, but at some point you have to arrive at the end of the existing data that we have, and just say, "well, we don't know for sure, let's wait and see."

The way they talk, you'd think their lives were riding on the answer being one or another. If so, maybe they shouldn't tie themselves up so tightly to a theory that if it's proven wrong, they're up the creek. One risks looking like the crop-circle experts after the guys with the ropes and boards showed up.

Sure wish there was a single set of scientific experiments that would settle the deep political questions once and for all, like putting a socialist nation next to a culturally and physically identical capitalist nation and seeing what happens. Scientists are lucky.