Metafire

"You're the planner."

"I know. Anyway, where were we?" He stared into her eyes again.

"Well, we were talking about you and me getting off the planet together." She smiled back.

"And all we need is the President of the United States telling everybody that they will die if he doesn't set that up for us. This is pretty complicated stuff, but I like the idea of you and me stuck in a space ship on a long trip."

"Yea. We could worry about a lot then."

"Yea."

She thought back to where they really were in the conversation. "Look, the problem with the President fearing the Russians is that they pretty much figure it's OK just to put up robots with eyes and bombs and all that. Putting up people to very far off places means nothing. There is no fear. Putting a station on Mars has no value. What would happen? Would they bring back gold or something? Would they find new things to eat? Nobody cares. Once they found out that Mars is just a desert, and the minerals look like those on Earth, who cares?"