The U.S. Air Force’s stunning decision to award a $40 billion refueling tanker contract to a foreign company is a bitter blow to Boeing Co. — and to Wichita, which stood to gain hundreds of jobs here from the project.
If this decision is truly in the best interests of the country, Kansans can live with it. But the Air Force has some explaining to do.
The decision flies in the face of Boeing’s five decades of dominance and proven excellence in building military tankers.
The Boeing proposal would have sustained more than 44,000 stateside jobs, including more than 1,000 jobs at Boeing Wichita and its area subcontractors. The EADS/Northrop Grumman Corp. proposal would create only about half that many U.S. jobs.
One industry analyst said the Air Force judged the EADS/Northrop KC-30 proposal to be superior on four out of five criteria. One key factor: The KC-30 design was able to carry 23 percent more fuel or cargo, giving it a clear advantage in refueling missions.
It may not have been George W. Bush’s supermarket-scanner moment, but it was remarkable: Near the end of Thursday’s news conference, the president reacted to a question about soaring pump prices with apparent cluelessness:
“Wait, what did you just say?†Bush interrupted. “You’re predicting $4-a-gallon gasoline?â€
“A number of analysts are predicting $4-a-gallon gasoline,†responded CBS New Radio’s Peter Maer.
“Oh, yeah?†Bush said. “That’s interesting. I hadn’t heard that.†(Never mind that the forecast had been all over the media in recent days and his press secretary had been questioned about it a week earlier.)
He added: “You just said the price of gasoline may be up to $4 a gallon — or some expert told you that. That creates a lot of uncertainty.†At least Bush recovered quickly, seizing the opportunity to call for his tax cuts to be made permanent and for more oil drilling.
As a former Wichita school board member, House Assistant Minority Leader Jim Ward (in photo), D-Wichita, should have known his vote against a bill to provide Wichita schools with an extra $1.1 million would raise eyebrows and even ire — especially because the bill failed by one vote. But he was thinking about “big picture stuff,†he told The Eagle editorial board today. “The policy’s absolutely right†— to put more dollars into high-poverty urban districts, as a state audit urged. But the bill would have yanked hundreds of thousands of dollars from rural districts, rather than cushion the loss. That isn’t how school-finance formula changes usually are made, he said. “It just wasn’t fair. Plus, we need those folks that were getting hurt to help us on some other stuff†— Wichita funding needs of as much as $50 million in state money related to medical education, airfares, aviation training and research.
The divide on the debate about access to abortion records was on display on Thursday’s Opinion pages.
On one side, Cheryl Sullenger of Operation Rescue, noting that all patient-identifying information is redacted from the records, argued: “The stall tactic of filing with the Supreme Court on privacy issues that is being employed by Tiller’s lawyers, and now by the attorney general, is only meant to manipulate and scare the public with falsehoods, while attempting to block important evidence from a legally convened grand jury that could prove Tiller has been doing illegal abortions for years.â€
On the other side, Vickie Sandell Stangl said that the court must decide whether patients “deserve to have their personal medical information rifled through by strangers, always with the threat that anti-abortion extremists could also get their hands on this information.†And as to whether these concerns are phony, she said: “Last time a grand jury investigated Tiller, details of the evidence were leaked to Operation Rescue, one of the groups behind this latest grand jury investigation. Furthermore, during former Attorney General Phill Kline’s investigation, details of women’s abortions ended up being discussed on the Fox News program ‘The O’Reilly Factor.’â€
Most lawmakers wouldn’t want to be caught appearing to vote against God, especially in an election year. That’s surely why a bill creating an “In God We Trust†specialty license plate attracted a whopping 117 votes in the House this week. But give state Rep. Nile Dillmore (in photo), D-Wichita, one of only two “no†votes, credit for having the courage to use the bill to make a point: Nearly halfway into the session, he said Monday, “we have not talked about health care, minimum wage, immigration or tax relief for fixed-income seniors. Instead, we spend our time naming highways and issuing commemorative license plates. Someone needs to say enough is enough and demand we get down to business.â€
Let it also be said that the “In God We Trust†plate does not seem to fit the specialty plate program, which is designed to raise money for colleges and causes, or to honor Kansans such as veterans or, as in the case of another bill that passed the House this week, “gold star†mothers.
Gov. Kathleen Sebelius on Wednesday blasted a state lawmaker who has called for an investigation into a board game created by her college student son, John.
That’s right: Sen. Tim Huelskamp (in photo), R-Fowler, called on the Kansas attorney general to investigate the prison-themed game, called Don’t Drop the Soap, which Huelskamp called obscene. Oh, please.
At a news conference, Sebelius said the controversy was much ado about nothing. She added, “I find it extraordinary that this becomes a topic of a Legislature that can’t seem to move on any of the issues before them.â€
Maybe her son could come up with a Legislature-themed game, called Don’t Get Anything Done.
The U.S. Air Force’s stunning decision to award a $40 billion refueling tanker contract to a foreign company is a bitter blow to Boeing Co. — and to Wichita, which stood to gain hundreds of jobs here from the project.
