Label Both Projects As "Pork"

President Obama is not the only one in Washington opposed to two military aviation projects in the Senate Defense Authorization bill currently under consideration in DC ... but he likely has the most clout. That being said, Citizens Against Government Waste has released its preliminary analysis of the Senate version of the fiscal year 2010 National Defense Authorization Act. In this year’s version, there are 429 projects worth $8.6 billion. The group says Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI) who has 48 projects worth $231,250,000 and Senate Armed Services Committee member Roger Wicker (R-MS) with 20 projects worth $136,090,000, are the two most wasteful spenders on the Committee.

The group is particularly opposed to two projects that have been the subject of intense debate and negotiations on the Hill. They are:

• $1,814,000,000 by Senate Armed Services Committee members Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) and Susan Collins (R-ME), and Sens. Christopher Dodd (D-CT.) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME) for F-22 aircraft and program requirements. As Winslow T. Wheeler, director of the Straus Military Reform Project at the Center for Defense Information in Washington and defense industry analyst Pierre Sprey explain, “Not a single F-22 has flown in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It would be foolish to deploy them since there is no enemy air force to fight against. To send F-22s as a bomber – at three times the operating cost of F-16s that are already bombing over there – would be just another drag on the war effort.”
• $438,900,000 by Senate Armed Services Committee members Evan Bayh (D-IN) and Edward Kennedy (D-MA.), and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for the F136 Development Alternate Engine Program directed to Rolls-Royce GE in Indianapolis and General Electric in Lynn, Massachusetts, Evendale, Ohio, and Madisonville, Kentucky. Even though the White House has threatened to veto any defense bill with funding for the engine and the Pentagon has refused to request funding for it, the three senators still added the money. According to the Government Accountability Office, funding the unwanted, unnecessary alternate engine for the Joint Strike Fighter would cost at least $7.2 billion.

To make its point, the group launched a multi-media ad campaign Thursday to express its displeasure with spending on the F136 engine. The campaign will include print ads in major newspapers in the nation’s capital; billboards in major cities around the country, including San Francisco, Las Vegas, and Chicago; and a HillTube video. CAGW has been vigorously opposing the program since it first appeared as an earmark in the 2004 Congressional Pig Book. The organization will also launch a new page on its website which features the ads, reports on the alternate engine, congressional testimony, and other resources.

“Even though the alternate engine has been opposed by Presidents Bush and Obama and the Pentagon, members of Congress have kept it alive with earmarks. President Obama called for its termination during his May 6 press conference in which he promised to cut $17 billion in wasteful government spending, and threatened to veto defense spending bills that include funding for the engine,” said CAGW President Tom Schatz.

The first print ads ran Thursday in Politico and The Washington Post, and continue next week in CQ Daily, The Hill, and Roll Call. Billboards or equivalent signage will follow next week, and will be up for a period of three months.

Citizens Against Government Waste is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization whose stated mission is to eliminating waste, fraud, mismanagement and abuse in government.

FMI: www.cagw.org