After this weekend, I must say that, between Senator Obama and Senator Clinton, I don't know which one's Emperor Palpatine and which one's Darth Vader. The junior Senator from Illinois' cowardice and shameless pandering on the Air Force tanker contract, a deal lauded as a good call by at least one insider, will not soon be forgotten. He had my support because I mistook him for a man of integrity and courage. I also mistook him for a man of wisdom and sound judgment, but apparently, I was wrong. I was DAMNED wrong. I was as wrong about him as I was when I voted for President Bush the first time. If he won't trust the experts on a procurement issue, what, exactly, will he trust them with? You can say that he was decrying the loss of "American jobs" just to have a better shot in Ohio and Texas, but that just proves he's a weasel. I should have voted for Romney. Of those still in the race, as much as it pains me to admit it, only McCain had the integrity to ask questions before condemning the deal. I read the following comment from the message board at the Seattle Times:
"My dad spent 26 years in the USAF. My daughter, two of her friends, and a nephew were going to make the USAF a career and join this summer. But, after the unprofessional decision yesterday by the USAF to buy foreign aircraft, I and the other parents have contacted our recruiter to cease all contact with us. Many of us are shocked and outraged at this decision. Where is the "buy American only " clause in our contracts? There''s no factory yet nor a technical base in Alabama. The trival amount of money that will stay in the US is nothing compared to what''s going to fill the pockets of those foreign executives. I ask everyone reading this comment to write their Representatives in Washington to complain about this. Boycot the USAF recruiting stations, prevent USAF recruiters from visiting our high schools and colleges, and request that the names of your children be removed from the high school lists that are provided free from our school districts to the recruiters. Also, write your Representatives to reduce the USAF''s portion of the defense budget. This decision is as STUPID as when the USAF bought blue camouflage tiger stripe uniforms for their personnel going to Iraq. This is a sad day for America when we allow the USAF to sell our country out to a foreign company. I wonder how much money the Secretary of the USAF and his generals made from this decision? I wonder how many of the generals involved in this decision have already coordinated a job with EADS after they retire!
"Sat, Mar 1, 2008 4:25 pm
visnovsky56
McChord AFB"
Yes, I see it all perfectly clearly now. It is professional for the USAF to deal with Boeing, a company that has, for years, displayed a kind of haughty arrogance reminiscent of medieval European royalty asserting the "divine right of kings" as they controlled their serfs. The USAF would have truly shown "professionalism" by selecting an inferior and untested craft made by a vendor with whom they have had an excessively cordial relationship in the past, rather than selecting a better plane at lower total cost of ownership made by two of their chief rivals, one of whom is Nortrop Grumman, a Los Angeles-based company. Instead, they "unprofessionally" chose a craft that would better serve the good men and women, above commenter excluded both as either a man or a woman and as a good person, who protect and defend, well, whatever the Commander in Chief tells them to.
Of course jobs are going overseas with this contract. After all, Mobile County, Baldwin County, and Washington and Choctaw Counties in Alabama, are actually part of fucking INDIA! Why, I remember during the Pongal festival a few years ago, my mother and aunt got into a huge argument over who made the best Puliyodarai. It was so fierce, in fact, that they didn't speak to each other until the following Deepavali. In fact, we've never heard of gumbo, fried chicken, POTATO SALAD, SHRIMP CREOLE, CRAWFISH ETOUFFE, COLLARD GREENS, KEY LIME PIE AND FUCKING GODDAMNED PEACH-BLACKBERRY CRISP WITH HOMEMADE VANILLA ICE CREAM!!! FUCK!!! Hilary Clinton, you're a cunt. Nancy Pelosi, you're a cunt. John McCain, you're a cunt, but not for this reason. And Barack Obama, I wonder how your mother feels about having raised a whore!
Now that I've said all that, I'll share what I really think...
Oh, and as a side-note, I read that Gary Gygax, one of the co-creators of Dungeons and Dragons, passed away at the age of 69. The cause of death was an inability to use his experience points to pay a wizard to increase his hit points. And I now need to take a shower to wash off the geekiness I incurred just reading that brief part of that Wikipedia article.
Enjoy the music.
4 comments:
And you Mandlebrot are a CUNT pretending to know anything about the military aviation industry, it's history or the companies involved.
Pretending that 60% and 85% American are mere trivial numbers and that strategic industries and relationships are "cozy".
Boeing has a bird that's been doing us good for 50+ years and comes to this nations aid without question, and often without advance demand for pay.
I'm not flag waver, fair weather patriot, to me this is serious stuff. To you it's Alabama pride and a petty paycheck.
There's something dirty in the way this contract was handled. We don't award life and death stuff aircraft stuff to folks like EADS. Never have and never should.
But there are Republicans in charge right now so Sh*t like this gets tried.
To me, it's also serious stuff. However, my greater concern is not about which corporate executives get a large bonus; it's about WHO WILL MAKE BETTER PLANES FASTER AND AT LOWER TOTAL COST! The Stratotankers, great planes that they've been for the last half-century, should have been retired a a decade or more ago. Sure, I'm happy that Alabama got the contract. I would be lying if I said otherwise. However, had Boeing earned the contract, I would have been disappointed, sure, but I would have accepted it and been glad that the best team won. I wouldn't have been screeching in front of the nearest microphone discussing how it's "bad for America" in spite of ample evidence to the contrary, like the aforementioned undistinguished members of Congress. In this case, Boeing wasn't the best. Get over it. They'll win other contracts in the future.
Fact is we will see if the contract was earned, Boeing has exercised it's RIGHT for an investigation.
There are certainly valid questions that go beyond your repetition of the EADS handout that hasn't been supported by facts or statistics.
I'll get over it when I'm actually wrong, not when a civilian tries to beat me up with EU handouts concerning USAF military contracts.
I knew what a tanker was before you could say airplane so I'm far more comfortable with my view than your OPINION and your calling honest Americans CUNTS and WHORES.
In a later post I gave you a link with test FACTS that the Boeing plane is more survivable - mission survivable. Fact.
Air Force rank and file, the people that do the job, not the corrupt procurement people, but people like me - people like my father are opposed to the EADS deal.
The serving dedicated Airman opposes EADS Grumman and you don't give a damn.
Screw you and if America won't listen, screw America because America will be screwing itself.
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