As cavediver has pointed out, there are very very few people on the planet who can even come close to understanding what is going on in the search for extra universes and strings created only by the evidence of imagination. I believe the further we go towards this type of far out theoretical pondering, we are by definition more likely to be wrong then right. How much should we spend on such short odds? We have to spend billions based on the fantasies of 5 people?
The whole point of the proposed supercollider and the now operational LHC is to see if these theories are right or wrong. Like you said, imagination and math can only get us so far. At some point we have to test these ideas, and this is what the LHC is designed to do (or at least come as close as we pragmatically can). You also need to keep in mind that finding out that these theories are completely wrong is as important a find as discovering that they make accurate predictions. Finding the Higg's Boson would be amazing, but not seeing it when it should be seen could point to whole new avenues of research.
As to Hubble, I suspect that many are biased in favor of the telescope because they like the pictures. I would suggest that the WMAP and COBE satellites were just as important, and maybe more important, and yet they get much less press and public support.
IMHO, science projects like these are just as important as government endowments for the arts. They are things that we must do as humans because they are what define us. We are explorers. We are artists. Above all, we are curious. What if the answers to our questions are within our techonological grasp? Wouldn't it be a crime against our own humanity not to at least try?
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