On Wed, 14 Apr 2004 14:16:41 -0700, "Tarver Engineering"
wrote:


"Scott Ferrin" wrote in message
.. .

There are going to be politicians out there who are going to fight the
cancelation of ANY weapon system because it's being built in their
domain.

Non-sequitur.

No, brush up on your Latin. That's a truism, but it definitely is not
a non-sequitur.

The thing that makes a decison/system/whatver "pork barrel"
is when it's built mainly because the politicians want it to be so
they keep those jobs and get those votes.

All aviation is politics.

That would be called a baseless assertion. One could as easily say
that "all aviation is business". Or, maybe "all aviation is Freudian
penis-envy...." Nah, sometimes a cigar is just a smoke.

There are quite a few that
fit that description (V-22) but when it's the people who will be using
it who are clamoring for it it isn't "pork barrel". There is more to
the definition of "pork barrel" than simply "not loved by all". The
simplest test is who wants to buy it and who wants to cancel it.

I have to go with wether the aircraft woks, or not; but I can understand you
being confused.

Every airplane has to be built in someone's district. And, let's agree
that the US is better served by domestic production of our weapons
than international consortium.

If the military is an active participant in the development program
and they decide that it meets requirements, than it is hard to argue
"pork." As mentioned if the military is ambivalent or in opposition,
then you've got "political" and "pork". Maybe a better example is the
years of forcing F-111s on the USAF because John Tower was Speaker.

And, when the F-16 was bought, lo and behold--same builder, same
plant, same district---but no longer pork because now the production
out of Ft. Worth was something we wanted and needed.

The USAF doing everything in their power
to buy as many F-15s as they could was not pork even though the
politicians would have preferred more cheap F-16s and fewer F-15s.

Dude, the F-15 was built in Gephardt's District; pure pork. It is the same
as when Newt did it.

Dude, the F-15 went into production in that district before Gephardt
got elected to that seat. Ditto for the C-130 out of Marietta--except
that one predates Newt by about 25 years. Production started in the
'50s on the Herc line.

The C-130J is another example of pork. Is it good? Yep.

Define good?

High utility, relatively low cost, totally amortized development etc.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
Smithsonian Institution Press
ISBN #1-58834-103-8