

Irony run wild - Air Force Can't Afford Bombers, Schools Can't Hold Bake Sales - Stronico
http://reason.com/blog/2010/12/05/finally-air-force-cant-afford

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daxelrod
The original cited article states:

 _The language is broad enough that a president's administration could even
ban bake sales, but Secretary Tom Vilsack signaled in a letter to House
Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller, D-Calif., this week that
he does not intend to do that._

So this is a matter of principle: whether the federal government _should_ be
able to do this.

Does anyone know if this would allow prohibition of these sorts of activities,
or simply withholding of funding? The destinction may not matter in practice
(see: the drinking age) but does in principle.

FWIW The obesity legislaton "wouldn't apply to after-hours events". Bake sales
at my high school were always held after hours. I infer that they were
successful because they often nearly sold out, and because they continued to
hold them. (I don't know if they'd do any better without that restriction.)

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jacques_chester
Offer to sell the B1-Bs to Australia. We've retired our FB-111s and have a
serious gap in our air power lineup.

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icegreentea
...replacing a tactical bomber with a strategic bomber is a bit of a leap. And
B1s are -expensive- to keep flying. That's one reason why they're first to be
considered to retire. B2s cost a lot too, but they're stealth and B52 are
just... well, remarkable is the only word.

Btw, I think you ended up replacing your FB-111s with Super Hornets.

On the side, I'm sad that you guys are retiring your F-111s. Once they're
gone, there'll be noone left to do dump and burns. Voosh!

~~~
jacques_chester
It is a leap, but at least it would be a leap _up_. Neither the Super Hornets
nor the JSFs which will replace them have the range and load that the FB-111
had.

For many mission profiles cruise missiles would do just as well -- better,
actually -- but sometimes you don't want precision, you want to bust up a
whole bunch of shit at the same time. That's the sweet spot for bombers.
During the Timor independence crisis the forward deployment of 6 FB-111s from
New South Wales to Darwin caused a buildup of troops and armor on the
Indonesian side of the border to disperse and return to base.

FB-111s were originally purchased to fill a strategic role. Australia has a
nuclear technology establishment. It's an open secret that we only have it to
keep some degree of potential bomb-making knowhow on hand. But we don't have a
rocketry organisation, so for that threat to remain credible you'd need a
bomber that could carry an unrefined, bulky warhead. That's gone.

It was, in the context of the times, a quite nuanced deterrence which avoided
prompting a regional arms race.

