" if we cannot establish a permanent base on Luna, we cannot do it anywhere."
True. But that does not mean that if we CAN establish a permanent base on Luna we WILL be able to establish another somewhere else.
My major objection to a Lunar Base is the tremendous amount of resources it will consume that can be better employed in other space travel destinations. Especially those that don't lie at the bottom of gravity wells.
As for Lunar Time. Why not just use Greenwich Mean Time? It is already familiar to everyone, is objectionable to no one and is politically neutral. Yes, there is a light-travel time delay, but we're going to have to deal with that no matter what time convention we adopt.