> my belief that it is intended to be little more than a quick, dirty, and vainglorious Apollo repeat by a failing government.

If the USA successfully sends people to the Moon, achieves all of NASA's technical goals, and the astronauts make it back in one piece, isn't that literally the opposite of failure?

It might be expensive and you can argue that it's wasteful. But even to that point, the $11B cost of SLS is nothing for the US Gov. For example the F35 is a >$1T government program. That doesn't seem a lot to explore a new frontier and expand the scope of humanity.