That's how I took it, though initially, it did read like you were saying that NASA had the equivalent of less money and yet still managed to design/develop everything needed to get to the moon. Which would say a lot about drive, motivation, etc. But, rather, this just underscores that this endeavor is extremely expensive, and all altruistic ideals aside, it ain't gonna happen again unless the purse strings are loosened. A lot. That all ties back to the points made earlier - it would be nice if NASA could do all these things and put more effort into deeper space exploration for the sheer science of it. But, as NASA is a public organization, funded by a fickle population that have a lot of other needs, those sort of expenditures are extremely tough to justify.
However - and this is not intended to be political in any way, so please don't make it so - President Trump just told the crew of the ISS that he wants to put Americans on Mars in first term, second at the latest. Odds of a 2nd term aside, I wonder if that hints at shift in spending priorities that might lead to bolstering NASA going forward. Perhaps he means that Musk will handle the logistics, or perhaps its just bluster. But hopefully, it means re-prioritizing NASA (though not holding my breath yet). Going back to the very original idea in this thread, in retrospect of the degree of accomplishment that brought NASA to the moon in less than a decade, it is somewhat disappointing that NASA's Mars timetable is out into the 2030s. However, people need to realize the herculean effort that NASA pulled off in the '60s was astounding, even by today's standards. It was driven by intense political pressure, a dedicated national will to achieve what hadn't been done before, and (just as importantly) the funding to back it up. A more reasonable / conventional engineering timeline would be much more like what NASA is proposing now, even what they did back then makes it seem mild.
