An outpost? I guess the astronomers want it.
There IS gold out in them thar planets...but it would take HUNDREDS of years just to GET there. With the pitiful fuels we have ... we'll just have to LOOK for now.
I seriously doubt it there is time travel or a "di-lithium" crystal that will take us anywhere very soon.
I may be wrong.
Star trek was based on “wave of the hand” technology. In others words, it would just be there when we needed it. Reality is not that simple and manned space travel, exploration, and especially colonization are far more difficult than the hand wavers in the 1950s thought it woul be.
There is gold on the moon. Helium 3 (He-3) is a light, non-radioactive isotope of helium with two protons and one neutron. It is abundant in the moon’s soil after being dumped there by solar winds. Two fully-loaded Space Shuttle cargo bays worth - about 40 tonnes worth - could power the United States for a year at the current rate of energy consumption - of fusion reactors become a real thing.