Generally I'm not sure you'd be considered a nerd if you weren't too honest for your own good. Not that this covers all types of virtuous behavior - there do exist nasty scientists. (And there is some level of fraud/dishonesty in academia, too).
I have the feeling it probably teaches you something, or at least it should. Something not too unlike epistemic humility, maybe.
Most of the scientists I know can spend years of their life pursuing a hypothesis that turns out to be wrong, shrug their shoulders, and dive back into it. Technologists are all about output. If it's not outputting, you have to give up and seek a different avenue. Scientists (except the very famous and successful ones) tend to be humble and curious. Technologists less so.
But then you see people with very questionable morals having made a key discovery or having produced a fundamental technology. Reality is complicated
Yet he's also a sociopathic fascist arsehole. It turns out these traits are not all on the same axis.
The government also legitimately needs space launch capacity, they're a customer for that. Look at how commercial companies invest in the buildout of supplier infrastructure, or offer framework contracts to help suppliers to make necessary investments.