For my understanding, how dumb the rich elites in America must be you can already see in those private space travel programs.
Adult men dreaming about discovering and talking to aliens in foreseeable time... Science knows how lonely this planet is in its wider environment that could reach out for it in an acceptable amount of time.
Definitely seen too many Hollywood movies and formed scientific belief (!) out of that. And also learned too many times that money can make anything possible - bullshit, it can't make ALL things possible. It can influence social relations, but it can't change features of materia by its mere existence.