Why find a human habitable planet that cannot be reached from Earth in one person’s lifespan? Is that worth 50 Billion bucks when businesses are dying and people are begging for alms?
The same reason we bought the Lousiana Territory, claimed the Pacific NW, fought a war for the SW, and bought Alaska. Just because the President is wrecking the country doesn’t mean we should be near sighted.
Consider the effects here if we discover a number of planets both like Earth and others that aren’t. What if study of these other Earths, and Earth-sized but non-Earthlike planets shows that a planet like ours has a very stable climate under a far wider variety of conditions than we’ll ever experience under our Sun. Likewise the non-Earthlike planets show what it does take to really have a runaway freezing or frying effect. And that none of it is anything like what’s posited by climate extremists here and now.
No information exists “in a vacuum.” The Greenhouse Effect and a lot of other scaremongering about the climate comes from studies of Venus. Exactly why Earth and Venus are so different is to some degree a matter of conjecture. So long as we have only these two planets to weigh in on the matter the data are sparse enough to cast it as you wish it.
More data mean less support for lies about Earth’s conditions. We need all the information we can get to inform the political process here on Earth. The better that is done, the better we can do for ourselves here. And if we do well, space travel will take care of itself. ;)