Boeing Loses Out on Air Force Tanker Deal

[mbperrin]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21044-2004Oct9.html

Congress Approves Measure to Ban Program Reconfiguring Jets as Refueling Planes

By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 10, 2004; Page A04

Congress yesterday barred the Air Force from pursuing a $23 billion deal to lease and then buy tankers from Boeing Co. and raised the possibility that European rival Airbus SAS could compete to build the refueling planes.

The action ends a three-year-old defense program that spurred a federal investigation, the resignation of Boeing's chief executive and a nine-month prison sentence for a former Air Force official who admitted inflating the contract's price to help her job prospects at Boeing.

(more)

Gosh, imagine mere criminal activity as a reason to pull a sweetheart deal..............

[sundancekid]

1. was her name Halle Burton by any chance -- only 9 mos. for her?

[kodi]

2. outsourcing air force jets?

WTF?

[rsmith6621]

3. Thanks George

For sticking up for American LABOR........


I think Boeing ought to rename itself to Boeingoburton

[saigon68]

5. No Pesky US Labor Unions to deal with

Maybe the Russians or the Chinese will help Uncle Emmanuel's Aerial Farce out.

[fortyfeetunder]

4. The real deal--

Not only did Druyan admit to messing with the 767 tanker, she admitted to helping Boeing to several other contracts because they were so nice to hire her daughter and son in law.

Boeing was in enough hot water as it was with their other allegations (accused of stealing proprietary information from competitors) but the latest revelations from Druyan were the icing on the cake.

The joke in Seattle these days is that Boeing is now called Bong; they lost the "E" for ethics and "I" for integrity, and it's going up in smoke, just like a bong pipe...

[jmowreader]

6. That whole deal was fucked in the head anyway

The original plan was to lease the planes for ten years, then return them to Boeing. The Air Force is very good about maintenance, so unless someone starts a war and they get shot down, Boeing would receive some like-new planes back.

Then came the idea to lease the planes for ten years with an option to buy out the leases at the end.

Whatever happened to just buying the damn things outright?

[Deja Q]

7. Because rent-to-own stores help the economy?

(which is all about cheap and easy profits anyway)

[goforit]

8. And Missouri wants to vote for Bush?????............Ouch!!!.Bad move,W!!

[jeff5]

9. Someone With Some Time

could dig out the old stories about this and find all the Republicans who were vigorously defending this corrupt pig when it was first in trouble. I would but time doesn't permit...

[oly]

10. Isn't this an October surprise directed at the women senator

running in Washington state? I realize that this cotract has been kicked around for a long time, but this looks like the end of it(for a while) -- $23B worth of jobs in WA is a huge loss. Defense spending is a huge issue in WA(and SCAL) and the good folks vote repug because ANY contract, however dispicable, means jobs and they equate Repugs with more contracts. I can see how the folks in SCAL (OC where I lived for a while) would absolutely think this way. A repug senator wouldn't have let the contract get away. Elect a repug and the contract might just reappear.