Argumentum ad lunam

Argumentum ad lunam (also appeal to the Moon ) is the argument that, "if we can put a man on the Moon", we must also be able to X (usually something really important).

The argument is almost always an informal fallacy and a false analogy.

Form
Bo Bennett raises the following examples:

While C1 might be stated differently (if it is stated), its ludicrosity is obvious. Just because you can do one thing, does not mean you can do another (usually) unrelated thing.

There is one (mostly) non-fallacious form of the fallacy:

P2 here seems much stronger &mdash; usually, people can do things in repetition. In this case, however, such an illusion falls away with a glance at NASA's budget.