Venus is a much more desirable candidate for many reasons:
Mass- Mars isn't big enough to support an atmosphere fit for human
habitation. You could float habitats on Venus' atmosphere.
Productive Energy (thermal and non-ionizing radiation)- Mars' surface
is relatively devoid of non-destructive energy. Venus has too much,
even simple heat pumps would effectively convert atmospheric energy to
other forms.
Destructive Energy (ionizing radiation)- Mars is awash in it. Venus'
atmosphere has a magnetosphere that affords a level of shielding.
Chemistry- Mars has lower water, carbon, and nitrogen in any form on
its surface or in its atmosphere than Earth. Venus has more of all of
the above, typically boiled in acid and at 90 atm of pressure such
that they are unusable to biological systems.
Value- Fixing Venus teaches us lots about "fixing" Earth. Fixing Venus
will be all about collecting energy rather than just expending it.
IMO, put an outpost on the Moon, colonize Mars, terraform Venus.
Anything else is making a purse out of a pig's ear. On that note; the
human body is supremely adapted to this planet and for relatively
short periods of time at that. Bending atmospheres to fit our lungs,
putting chairs in spacecraft to fit our rear ends, and blasting
surgeons and/or medicine around the Solar System is, to me, somewhere
between naive fantasy and religion.
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