We don't go to the moon now because there is no purpose in going there.
Back then we (a) wanted to show the world that we could beat the Russians and (b) do some science. The first purpose no longer exists and today it is cheaper and better to do science with unmanned robot spacecraft. In fact, the Apollo program was abruptly cancelled in the middle of it. Three great ships were already constructed when the program was scrapped, but the people no longer cared. You can go tour one of them at Cape Canaveral, lying on its belly like a dead whale. You can. I won't.
Apollo was the finest technical achievement of the American nation. 400,000 people, including me, had a part in it. We will never see its like again. I also predict, despite NASA's wishes to preserve 30,000 bureaucratic jobs, that we will never make a human landfall on Mars, for the same reasons.
After Apollo, NASA squandered its funds and reputation on the Shuttle, one of the worst designed engineering projects in history. It failed to meet any of its objectives. As it ended up, the only purpose of the Shuttle was to go to the ISS. The only purpose of the ISS was to provide a destination for the Shuttle.
Very little useful science has come from the ISS. 90% of everything we know about the universe has been discovered during my short lifetime, and none of it has come from the ISS.
The shuttle put Hubble in orbit and subsequently made it possible to transport the new camera and other parts need to correct it. That’s just one of many things it did. I’m not a fan of the shuttle program but don't you think it’s a little disingenuous or harsh to say It didn’t meet
any of its objectives?
