ARTICLE: "The Plane That Won't Die: Boeing, Congress and the Air Force Thwart Budget Cutters," by Leslie Wayne, New York Times, 24 May 2006, p. C1.

No offense, but this is a badly written and badly cast piece. Putting it in terms of porkbarreling and special interests really misses the point, especially the horrific statement from some expert about how much body armor one could buy if we cut just one C-17.

The C-17s should be the future workhorse of the SysAdmin force, in addition to long-hauler for the Leviathan. They are a pure expression of global reach, and should play a huge role in non-kinetic global power. These things are built to land on crappy, short runways, and have proven that capacity in war zone after war zone and--more importantly--in disaster relief op after disaster relief op. It's track record is over two decades old and it's spectacular.

Meanwhile, we're spending $70B in R&D alone for some super-sexy steathy penetrating bomber jet that's really only useful way down the road against the Chinese.

Obviously, the Air Force is being squeezed by Iraq and the GWOT in general, and it's trying to do the usual trick of slimming down all categories rather equally, which is what the Pentagon has done going all the way back to Cheney's reign. It's a weird, non-analytical approach. Frankly, with the last USAF pilot to ever be involved in a dog fight currently deep into his first star, there are better arguments for cutting those sort of acquisition hogs than anything as connecting and utilitarian as the C-17s, and yet the production line is under serious budgetary attack.

Add on top of that Senator McCain's enduring and way-past-the-point-of-having-any-point feud with, and persecution of, Boeing, and we're watching an acquisition tragedy unfold.

But frankly, this story largely buries that obvious lead and casts the piece in the usual unimaginative manner.