A Political Engine
If there’s one good thing about ‘Puter, it’s that he’s fair enough to call out shenanigans on the Right.
If there’s two good things about ‘Puter, it would be news to us.
More to the first point, we want our readers to understand and appreciate that when Republicans do questionable things, we are indeed going to jump on them for it.
Dr. J., for example, brings up a good example. Remember a year ago when the Czar posted a letter from him regarding the F-35 Lightning II? You will recall that Pratt & Whitney developed a powerful, economical, and by all accounts ideal engine for it called the PW F135. General Electric, who produced a less effective engine, lost out on the bid and was set to lose millions of dollars in wasted development. So they went ahead, built their GE F136 enging anyway and insisted the US government pay for it. Call it a back up engine, or something.
President Bush said no thanks. As did the Department of Defense. They F135 is better, faster, and cheaper. And so President Obama came into office, and GE insisted that the government buy their engine again. President Obama said no thanks.
The Boston Herald reports that GE built the engine anyway, and is demanding that Congress fund the engine. Some congresspersons suddenly began to back the idea anew, and approved a bill that funds the construction, purchase, and storage of a large number of F136 engines that will never see the light of day. That’s right: they are going to sit unused in warehouses until some janitor finally throws them in the dumpster.
What is alarming is that a large number of Republican congresspersons are in agreement with this nonsense. Buck McKeon (R-CA), Scott Brown (R-CA), and Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD), among others are playing a number of angles: legislation to fund the $3 billion GE sank into their inferior engine; legislation to prohibit the destruction of the engines built; legislation to require the F-35 have two sources of engines, and so on. All basically agreeing to the same thing: we are going to pay GE to reiumburse, build, and store engines that will never be used. Hundreds of millions of dollars, each year, on top of that three billion. Little tricky bits of legislation, designed so that if one gets voted down, the others basically do the same job.
What do these Republicans (and Democrats, too, like John Kerry and others) have in common? They all represent states or districts with GE facilities in them. And receive campaign contributions from GE. Never mind that the engines themselves are expected to be built in the UK…this is all about earmarks.
Tom Rooney (R-FL) on the other hand plans to fight this one hard, and is watchdogging this effort. President Obama asserts he will veto the thing. In response, Buck McKeon has begun to modify the language to suggest that, if the Pentagon upgrades the engine, there will be a new design competition—we presume one intended to allow GE to recoup its loss, assuming its future engine is selected.
President Obama also receives a lot of money from GE, and has made numerous decisions that benefit the company in particular. Let us see if he remains true to his word about vetoing the measure; although, with a little tricky language in the next Defense Authorization bill, this could sneak through with nary a soul watching. Remember: even if you catch most of those legislative bits, the remainder will reward GE handsomely.
Except for Dr. J. He will watch.
Божію Поспѣшествующею Милостію Мы, Дима Грозный Императоръ и Самодержецъ Всероссiйскiй, цѣсарь Московскiй. The Czar was born in the steppes of Russia in 1267, and was cheated out of total control of all Russia upon the death of Boris Mikhailovich, who replaced Alexander Yaroslav Nevsky in 1263. However, in 1283, our Czar was passed over due to a clerical error and the rule of all Russia went to his second cousin Daniil (Даниил Александрович), whom Czar still resents. As a half-hearted apology, the Czar was awarded control over Muscovy, inconveniently located 5,000 miles away just outside Chicago. He now spends his time seething about this and writing about other stuff that bothers him.