Good arguments that there is a political element
Discussions of politics are explicitly encouraged by the Space Science board charter:
This board will include, with loose interpretation: Space Science & Technology, past, present and future; Fiction, History and Politics with regard to space as well as general aviation. Topics are set by mandate from the board and are subject to change by request of the board at any time.
What you outlined is the political side of the discussion. Some of the positions argued may have no scientific merit, but they'll be argued in the political arena nonetheless. The counterarguments you refine here can be used later in the broader public debate. Think of this as practice.
The full charter does allow for revision, and if there's a "mandate from the board" to prohibit political discussion, we could change it. But then we'd preclude discussions about things such as a return-to-space strategy for the manned programs, public versus private funding, and mission priorities. Those are all, in the end, political questions. I think that's too high a price to be rid of one set of annoyances, don't you?