
f-16adf wrote:XC,
I would also add, since the Democrats have great influence in our news media; If the GOP (Bush 43, or even the 2008 candidates) would have been in favor of more -22s or whatever. I could just have heard it now, the Dem control news media (CBS, NBC, ABC, NYT, WP, MSNBC, CNN, ...) would have said (circa mid 2008):
"Bush or candidate X is in favor of more gold plated overtly expensive jets that are not needed while people are losing their homes (to foreclosure), the stock market is in near free-fall, and people are losing their jobs. Hence, the GOP is out of touch and doesn't understand the middle class or the problems facing working families."
Fast forward to post Jan 20, 2009. It really doesn't matter if Gates or whomever want more -22's. Obama would never been if favor of it. And he wasn't. For 2 years his party controlled everything. That type of military procurement was never on his (Obama) and their (the Dem controlled House and Senate) radar.
2009 was a weird time. Had they chosen to keep the F-22s going, they could have gotten away with it. But they didn't and here we are. It really falls on Gates as he actually served both Presidents as I recall.
My point was simply that with the benefit of hindsight:
A. We should have bought more F-22s because yes they cost big bucks, but we were also going to spend a trillion bucks and have very little tangible things to show for it 5 years later, let alone 10.
B. The Stimulus was an expensive failure
c. The story about cutting F-22s to trade for a hypothetical Strategic bomber 10-20 years in the future is total horseshit, and like hindsight it seems like they are trying to tell us retroactively that was some brilliant forward thinking plan. In other words "Uhh We meant to do that!"
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