re: What is needed for a spacefaring society
First of all, a way to send astronauts into space at a much lower cost than with the Shuttle or even lower cost than with the Soyuz launcher.
Maybe that should have been more a priority than the Vision for Space Exploration. But VSE is more attractive, indeed!
But it still is not demonstrating humans can go often, cheaply, reliably into low earth orbit.
I am also more interested in exploration rather than many humans out there, which means I'm not convinced by the priority of having a spacefaring society.