New Earths.

Gleese 581b is an Earth size planet about 20 light years away.
Another is Kepler 22b about 600 light years away. Mean temp is 72 degrees, which translates to liquid water, the basis of life. It may be a world covered in water. Interesting.

Gee whiz. I wanna go~~~!    Only take a few million years at present speeds. Ad Astra! (to the stars!)

Moon first.  Build a "space station" torus on the ground and launch entire.
Serves as "space ship", "space station", "lunar habitat", "Martian habitat and artificial gravity transport to Mars".  Build more on the Moon. Use them to go to asteroids, Mars, all the other planets for exploration~!

Forget government involvement. This is or should be a do it yourself effort. Support from the government evaporates with every new election cycle because the populace forgets and 10 to 20 years is "too long" to remember a goal.  How do we do it?

Give "cash flow" to unemployed engineers to "live the dream" and create a "skunk works" to make that torus "gas tank" blast off into orbit. Structure IS the payload. I propose commercial real estate in the form of residential apartments is the way to get that cash flow going. I have several "on line" guru's in this area and at least ONE that I am impressed with.  Several good books in print (see Amazon). I really need several folks signed on to this idea to make it work. (rmoore@swoi.net) Let me know if your interested.