I agree
The space shuttle should've been designed to be cargo carried aloft by a HLV (Energia, Buran), not as a launch sytem in itself.
I say build an Energia type heavy launcher to launch both heavy cargos as well as shuttle type vehicles for orbital construction, and use the boosters (Zenit) of such a system for launch of manned capsules and unmanned supply vehicles derived from such capsules. By using such a system, we could easily build up a manned infrastructure throughout the solar system.