Military Admits Billion-Dollar War Toy F-35 Is F**ked

[unhappycamper]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/03/17/military-admits-billion-dollar-war-toy-f-35-is-f-ked.html



Officials are finally admitting the F-35 fighter has turned into a nightmare—but it’s too late to stop the $400-billion program now.

Military Admits Billion-Dollar War Toy F-35 Is F**ked
David Axe
03.17.16 4:01 AM ET

Way back in the early 2000s, the U.S. military had a dream. To develop a new "universal" jet fighter that could do, well, pretty much everything that the military asks its different fighters to do.

But the dream of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter turned into a nightmare. The program is six years behind schedule and tens of billions of dollars over budget. And now, 16 years after the JSF prototypes took off for their first flights, top officials are finally owning up to the trauma the $400-billion fighter program has inflicted on America's finances and war readiness.

In a remarkable period, beginning in February and lasting several weeks, senior officers and high-ranking bureaucrats finally publicly copped to the warplane program's fundamental failures.

But the timing of the military's mea culpa is ... interesting. For at the same time as the admissions of guilt, the F-35 was passing several bureaucratic milestones that make it more or less impossible to cancel. Too much money's already been spent. Too many well-established jobs are at stake. Too many F-35s are already rolling out of the factory.

[eShirl]

1. This is just one example why we can't have nice things like other countries.

universal health care
etc

[-none]

2. This is another reason we need people like Bernie Sanders to pull the country back away from the

Right side cliff.
The paranoia of the conservative Right is destroying this country and killing too many people. We don't need any more war hawks trying to run the show. Let's give Peace a chance before it is too late.

[stopbush]

4. Bernie Sanders is a YUGE supporter of the F35. In fact, he's a

cheerleader for the project.

Do your research.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/02/09/bernie-sanders-loves-this-1-trillion-war-machine.html

[-none]

5. There is much more to Bernie than the F-35.

I know about that. It is the rest of his economics that you need to do your research on. That plus he has a long record of honesty and telling it as it is.
BTY, he is not "YUGE&quot sic) on it. It is because it supplies living wage jobs where too many have been shipped over seas for profits at the expense of the average working person.
I know Bernie is not perfect, unlike many on the other side, for their chosen candidate, but he has a better grasp of what the Democratic ideals should be, than any other candidate running.

[stopbush]

6. So, let me get this straight: you know that BS supports this program

but in your first response you say we need people like him elected so programs like this aren't supported.

Is that about it?

BTW - the fact that he supports this program because it meant jobs in VT - along with stationing a number of F35s in the state - is the kind of politics-as-usual I thought he was against. Where are your vaunted principles if you abandon them as soon as it means your state will benefit from boondoogle spending? Don't kid yourself, that's exactly what is happening here with St Bernard and the F35.

Q: did you bother reading the article I linked to? It lays it all out.

[UtahLib]

7. Stop, too many facts!

[-none]

9. It is called reality.

Learn to deal with it.
BTY, it is Bernie Sanders, not St Bernard. Name calling like that is so Right wing.

[stopbush]

10. So, let me get THIS straight:

Supporting boondoggle defense programs is a simple "reality" of politics if you're St Bernard (that's right, Saint, as he can apparently do no wrong) and it means jobs and money for VT, but it's corrupt and evil to support such programs if you're a Congressman from a state OTHER THAN VT and you support such programs for the exact same reason that BS supports them, i.e.: to bring jobs and money to YOUR state.

Did I get that right?

[-none]

11. Not really.

Shit happens we don't like and the F-35 is part of that.
I am not a one issue person. I prefer honesty and Democratic values over Republican values, so Bernie it is.

[stopbush]

12. Yep. St Bernard.

I hit that nail on its head.

[Hortensis]

13. But if Bernie's no better than many others -- in reality?

How about shipping Vermont's radioactive waste to poison poor people in Texas? What is happening in that poor corner of Texas is classic, textbook corporate-government corruption and betrayal of people too poor to stop it -- and they tried heroically.

Where is the story of Hillary's collusion in poisoning and sickening an entire county?

Bernie sponsored this bill and actively ushered it through to approval.

[NastyRiffraff]

15. I see you're getting crickets

in response to your point, Hortensis. The radioactive waste issue to me is even more egregious than Sanders' support for the F35. But both prove he's just another politician who puts his own and his state's interests before the country's.

[Hortensis]

16. Yup. IMO, BOTH he and Hillary are far better

politicians than many and both are concerned about the welfare of the people. Maybe Hillary somewhat, or a lot, more though, considering what this reveals about him.

Regardless, I am neither dishonest or indecent enough to put my favorite on a moral pedestal, and make up excuses to spit on the other.

Partisanship gone wrong is as corrupt as anything else in politics. It's just the person in the mirror who's corrupt as hell and needs to be kicked out.

[pnwmom]

14. How will people like Bernie -- who voted for the program -- help pull us away from it? n/t

[DetlefK]

3. It's essentially a $400 billion bail-out of the military-industrial-complex.

At this point, abandoning the F-35 is politically impossible. Producing the jet reportedly involves 1,300 suppliers supporting 133,000 jobs in 45 states.

...

Military officials can safely confess that the F-35 hasn't worked out as planned because, at this point, there's no way the military or Congress would kill the program. It's the air-power equivalent of having your cake ... and eating it, too.



Step 1: Fuck up.

Step 2: Keep the producers of a useless product nobody wants in business by buying their useless product with taxpayer-money.

Step 3: Declare that you learned your lesson.

Step 4: Continue with your career without suffering consequences.

[JayhawkSD]

8. That's $3,007,518 per job. Wow. nt