"When a private company's spaceship has an actual DESTINATION to achieve."

Why doesn't Space count as a DESTINATION

"I know a number of them claim to have actual destinations in mind - a private space station, the Moon - but I have also seen plenty of such companies make similar promises and then disappear. "

This company is called Virgin Galactic as in Virgin Airlines, Virgin Trains, Virgin Records, etc; by Richard Branson: "English entrepreneur, best known for his Virgin brand of over 360 companies... net worth is estimated at over... (US$7.8 billion)"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Branson
There have not many companies of this caliber involved in space related ventures.

"I'll settle for Earth orbit, even, but $120K for a brief suborbital flight? You can climb Mt. Everest for about $100K, but at least there is a real sense of accomplishment afterwards because you touched something tangible."

Mt. Everest is only 29,000' this going 5 times higher and you get gees and zero gees. And you get your astronaut wings- that's tangible, no?