Stop the Hogs!

F-35 Fiasco!!

SHIELDS: Good On You!!

----- Original Message -----
From: Stewart Shields
To: Prime ministre ; Peter - M.P. Julian ; Rae.B@parl.gc.ca
Cc: Alberta Activism ; Alberta NDP ; Alta ; Canada's Canada ; CommissionersOffice ; flaherty ; goodale ; Premier Graham ; premier@gov.nl.ca
Sent: Wednesday, April 04, 2012 12:04 PM

Subject: Good On You!!

I’m thankful for anyone who calls for Harper’s removal as Canada’s Prime Minister! Simply speaking out loud about the removal of Harper from his ill-gained post prior to the next election is pleasing to the thoughtful ear.

Canada can only allow Harper to dumb down Canada and it’s population so far without reacting to the crimes Harper has committed against the Canadian public. Opposition parties must react and keep reacting to the possibilities Harper was involved in suppressing Canadian democracy during the last election! Those tuned into the Calgary Rutherford Show on election day were made aware of the respect Harper himself holds for Canada’s election laws!!

Our election Commissioner must be encouraged to recommend a public inquiry into Robo-Calls to get to the bottom of Harper’s and his Tory parties involvement.

Canada’s economy cannot simply afford to allow these Harper Reform/Tories to manage our business direction much longer. The lazy attitude of standing back and allowing industry to manage our business direction while backing a terrorist like Netanyahu, is having a detrimental affect on Canada and our international trade ambitions.

Harper’s “starve the beast” and low corporate tax ideology is not working for the Canadian public when compared to the opposite mythology used in the Nordic counties, and the benefit gained by their public!! Getting this political black-eye out of Canadian politics should be job-one for all well intended Canadian citizens, who must support our politicians trying to do exactly that job!! Good On You Rae!!

Stewart Shields
Lacombe, Alberta
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Rae’s verdict on F-35 fiasco: ‘Harper should resign’

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/
raes-verdict-on-f-35-fiasco-harper-should-resign/article2391856/

Ottawa— The Canadian Press
Published Wednesday, Apr. 04, 2012 12:50PM EDT
Last updated Wednesday, Apr. 04, 2012 12:53PM EDT

Bob Rae is laying the blame for the stealth-fighter fiasco squarely on Stephen Harper – and he's demanding the Prime Minister's resignation.

The Interim Liberal Leader says Mr. Harper “lied” to Canadians during last May's election about having contractual protection against skyrocketing costs for the F-35 jets.

[b]More related to this story (Links are at URL above)

Tories’ economic reputation shot to pieces by fighter jets
‘Overly confident’ DND failed to properly assess F-35 costs: auditor
Tories boost oversight – but heads won't roll – on F-35 purchase
Conservatives scramble to save face over fighter-jet plan
Crash or burn? The Conservatives’ F-35 dilemma[/b]

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They Lied to Us about the F-35s . . . .

http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=10587

Please Help Us Spread the Message “No Stealth Fighters!”

This is an ongoing issue . . . . SIGN PETITION HERE:
http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=10587

Thanks for signing and sending your letter to Harper to tell him “No Stealth Fighters!”

Now, will you please help us to send Harper and other party leaders 5,000 letters by tomorrow?

Share this on Facebook, send a tweet on Twitter and forward this e-mail to your friends and family, asking them to send their letter to Harper to tell him “No Stealth Fighters!”

Here is the link: http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=10587

Just hours ago, the Auditor General released a report stating that the Department of National Defence failed to follow correct procedure in its efforts to purchase a fleet of F-35 stealth sighters, and even misled members of parliament as to the risks of the purchase. The report states that “National Defence knew the costs were likely to increase but did not so inform parliamentarians.”

Auditor General Michael Ferguson said that “the process was inefficient and not managed well. Key decisions were made without required approvals or supporting documentation.”

Even as the Auditor General criticizes the government’s plan to purchase the fleet, and the price tag continues to climb, the Harper government refuses to withdraw from their previous commitment to purchase a fleet of F-35s—despite the fact that they never signed a contract guaranteeing their purchase!

Share this email today, so we can tell Harper we do not want our tax dollars to pay for the F-35s.

Thanks for everything you do for peace.

Kathleen Walsh
Ceasefire.ca

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Auditor General condemns F-35 process
http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=11179

April 3, 2012

Auditor General Michael Ferguson issued a scathing indictment of the Harper government’s F-35 procurement process in his first report, released on April 3rd.

[REPORT: http://www.oag-bvg.gc.ca/internet/English/
parl_oag_201204_02_e_36466.html ]

2.80 National Defence did not exercise due diligence in managing the process to replace the CF-18 jets. National Defence did not appropriately consult Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) on the procurement implications of the 2006 MOU for the third phase of the JSF Program or develop an appropriate plan for managing the unique aspects of the acquisition. Problems relating to development of the F-35 were not fully communicated to decision makers, and risks presented to decision makers did not reflect the problems the JSF Program was experiencing at the time. Full life-cycle costs were understated in the estimates provided to support the government’s 2010 decision to buy the F-35. Some costs were not fully provided to parliamentarians. There was a lack of timely and complete documentation to support the procurement strategy decision.

2.81 PWGSC did not demonstrate due diligence in its role as the government’s procurement authority. Although it was not engaged by National Defence until late in the decision-making process, PWGSC relied almost exclusively on assertions by National Defence and endorsed the sole-source procurement strategy in the absence of required documentation and completed analysis.

MORE:
http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=11179

SHIELDS: What Economic Reputation?

----- Original Message -----
From: Stewart Shields
To: Prime ministre ; Peter - M.P. Julian ; Rae.B@parl.gc.ca
Cc: Alberta Activism ; Alberta NDP ; Canada's Canada ; dnd_mdn@forces.gc.ca ; flaherty ; Premier Graham ; premier@gov.nl.ca
Sent: Wednesday, April 04, 2012 9:06 AM
Subject: What Economic Reputation?

How in the world did these Tories gain a reputation on economic management in the first place?

The Tory history if it is studied seriously surely points out a party that has been completely hopeless with respect to economic management!! The short time period it took the Liberals to defeat Tory deficit budgets, that set Canadians records until we got Harper as Prime Minister, indicated just how poor the Tories where at managing public funds.

Harper was handed a degree in economics from the University of Calgary, but Harper has never held a real job, where his skills could be recognized or dismissed! The Canadian public are gaining the rewards of Harper’s lack of true experience.

The question of how long must Canadians allow this Harper thing to misdirect the economic path Canada is to follow is the great question??

Defeated from government for misleading and showing a definite disrespect for Canada’s parliamentary rules taught this slow learner nothing. Appearances indicate he immediately involved his party in trying to suppress our Canadian democracy---right here on Canadian soil.

Many Canadians shutter when Aircraft and the Tory party are mentioned in the same sentence.

We still have a leading Tory Prime Minister able to walk among us, even though the Oliphant inquiry has many asking why that is allowed, and why David Johnson awarded as Governor General, disallowed the Airbus scandal from the scope of the Oliphant inquiry?

Canadians now must pay the fiddler for being so stupid to vote for a known scary politician with a history with the “wild-eyed” Reform party!!

Stewart Shields
Lacombe, Alberta

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Tories’ economic reputation shot to pieces by fighter jets

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/
john-ibbitson/tories-economic-reputation-shot-to-pieces-by-fighter-jets/article2391501/

JOHN IBBITSON |Columnist profile| E-mail OTTAWA— Globe and Mail Update Published Wednesday, Apr. 04, 2012 6:00AM EDT Last updated Wednesday, Apr. 04, 2012 7:35AM EDT

The Auditor-General’s damning indictment of deception and mismanagement over the F-35 fighter-jet program not only damages the Conservatives’ reputation for probity, it also discredits their extreme rhetoric against the opposition. Because the opposition was right.

Stephen Harper has now moved swiftly to place the procurement on a sounder footing. But the revelations of false estimates and suppressed information, coming only days after an austerity budget, could tarnish the Conservative brand like nothing that has come before. [ . . . ]

Canada's stealth government and the F-35 fiasco

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/04/04/
f-vp-stewart-f-35-secrecy.html?cmp=googleeditorspick

By Brian Stewart, special to CBC News Posted: Apr 4, 2012 7:42 PM ET Last Updated: Apr 4, 2012 9:18 PM ET

The who-knew-what about the real costs of the F-35 fighter jet Canada wants to purchase is worrisome enough. But at the heart of the fiasco is a far more serious concern about what public honesty means to this government.

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Related Stories (Links are on original URL above)

Auditor general stands by F-35 conclusions
F-35's exorbitant cost clouds its future

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It's a sad state that few Canadians appear surprised by the auditor general's findings that Parliament was kept in the dark over the real costs of this program and what looks to be a $10-billion overrun.

Many seem to assume that misleading and denying whenever it suits is a government's normal default position. After all, this government seems to have done it for years on Afghanistan and with its other problems in national defence.

In my own attempts to unravel the F-35's real costs I never once met a single soul outside government and knowledgeable about defence purchases who believed the prime minister's promise that the planes could be delivered for a bargain-rate $75 million each.

I never met anyone inside the Canadian military who thought so either.

I'm sure thousands in the aviation industry who follow these programs, especially in the U.S. and Europe, simply assumed Ottawa was dealing in fairy tales for public consumption, from which it refused to budge.

This is why we need to see if this current mess is part of a pattern of official "misstatements" on defence matters. If so, we've got a serious national problem.

MUCH MORE:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/04/04/
f-vp-stewart-f-35-secrecy.html?cmp=googleeditorspick

SHIELDS: The Jackel And The Jail-Cell

----- Original Message -----
From: Stewart Shields
To: Prime ministre ; Peter - M.P. Julian ; Rae.B@parl.gc.ca
Cc: Alberta Activism ; dnd_mdn@forces.gc.ca ; flaherty ; goodale ; Liberal Canada
Sent: Friday, April 06, 2012 12:41 PM
Subject: The Jackel And The Jail-Cell

With evidence that points to our Prime Minister purposely lying to the Canadian public during an election, and involved deeply in an effort to supress our Canadian democracy during that election, we must become far more familiar with methods of removing a Canadian Prime Minister from office. I have only recently realized that most Canadians are more familiar with the removal of a United States President than a Canadian Prime Minister from High-Office!! With the Liberals faced with a scandal [sponsorship Scandals] that Paul Martin had the courage to put to a public body to be resolved, it’s time for Canadians to be better educated on the removal process of our Prime Ministers, especially if they hold a majority position.

Unwilling to follow the Martin example of asking for a public inquiry with respect to the Robo-calls or F-35 scandals, Harper is open certainly to having himself removed as our Prime Minister!!

There is very little available history with indictments followed by the impeachment of a Canadian Prime Minister available. I never thought this would be an area of concern until the very dangerous Harper appeared on the scène and appeared to support torture and other acts completely off-side with Canadians, but supported by his buddy Israel’s Netanyahu. Moving from prisoner torture to suppressing Canadian democracy, to now found to possible be lying for self preservation, and refusing to answer straight foreword questions with respect to the F-35 tales means those “legal-beagles” with the proper answers should offer their expertise on how we can cut the “Cancer of Harper” from our Canadian government.

Canadians need not have another Tory Prime Minister guilty of crimes and unable to tell the truth when confronted with direct examples of their sinful behaviour walking freely among us. Harper’s behaviour in question period is a total disgrace to Canadian politics. Canadians must empower our “Speaker”with the authority to demand the Prime Minister to properly answer these straight-forward questions directed plainly to his attention!! I am very hopeful some press members or members of our government will enlighten us Canadians on the process of impeachment of a Canadian Prime Minister?

When queried about impeachment we get only information about that process in United states---Please help!!

Stewart Shields
Lacombe, Alberta

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'Executive' knew true cost of F-35

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/technology/
Executive+knew+true+cost/6420289/story.html

$25B 'known to government,' auditor general tells reporters
By Lee Berthiaume, Postmedia NewsApril 6, 2012

Canada's auditor general dropped a bombshell Thursday when he said the Conservative government knew before the last election that the F-35 fighter jet program would cost at least $10 billion more than what National Defence was telling Parliament and the public.

The government says it did nothing wrong as it was simply reporting the cost of buying the stealth fighters, not the price of operating them or associated salary costs, which would have been incurred no matter which plane replaced the CF-18s.

But while it has agreed to provide those full costs in the future, the revelation has thrown more fuel onto a raging fire that has already seen the opposition call for House Speaker Andrew Scheer to launch an investigation.

The issue goes back to March 2011, when Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page released a major report weeks before the last federal election that estimated the F-35 would cost taxpayers nearly $30 billion.

The Department of National Defence responded by telling Parliament - and Canadians - that the stealth fighter actually would cost even less than the $16 billion budgeted for the program, putting the figure at $14.7 billion.

But the military did not include a number of important costs in its response, and during the course of his own study, Ferguson found Defence actually had estimated as far back as June 2010 that the total cost would be at least $25 billion.

Most of the attention since Ferguson's report was released Tuesday has been on the bureaucrats responsible for the F-35 file.

But the auditor general told reporters Thursday that the Conservative government it-self knew about the $10- billion discrepancy when National Defence put forward the $14.7-billion figure in March 2011 because the cost estimates were essential for long-term budget planning. [ . . . ]

SHIELDS: Who's At The Root Of Canada's Problems?

----- Original Message -----

From: Stewart Shields
To: Prime ministre ; Peter - M.P. Julian ; Rae.B@parl.gc.ca
Cc: Alberta Activism ; dnd_mdn@forces.gc.ca ; flaherty ; goodale ; Liberal Canada ; New Democrats
Sent: Friday, April 06, 2012 4:20 PM

Subject: Who's At The Root Of Canada's Problems?

Although I believe Belinda Stronach is a very lucky Lady, I don’t think Peter Mackay should be the object thought able to correct this present Tory Government. The problems with the present Tories goes far deeper than Mackay, and as the cover comes off the dangerous Reform\Tory government appearances indicate our Prime Minister should be indicted or impeached!!

Starting with his knowledge of war-crimes, on to suppressing our Canadian democracy, to purposely hiding the true costs for the F-35 fighter jets, this is the most troubled Prime Minister Canada has experienced by far. Harper’s problems diminish totally the “sponsorship scandal” that gained Harper the reins of power, and his atrocious behaviour in Parliament along with his Caucus members leaves our opposition parties no room but to impeach and remove him from power. His refusal to learn from past obvious mistakes, and his refusal to place the Robo-call affair to a public inquiry surely indicates these affairs are above the responsibility of a single minister or the governments bureaucrats a favourite HARPER TARGET!!

Now what?

The Canadian voting public must question themselves for voting for the Reform/Conservative coalition after being warned of the danger of those with a Reform background. Now with hopefully that lesson well understood, we must ask the opposition parties to cooperate to remove the belligerent Harper from bringing us further harm. Harper’s propensity to treat all opponents and the press with secrecy and avoidance, certainly lead to these type of unavoidable horrid happenings, that shade even the Mulroney greed for both power and prestige. Harper’s history with respect to being a Canadian Prime Minister should be recorded no better than the object of the Oliphant inquiry.

Canada has fallen in it’s abilities to trade our resources for a profitable return under Harpers watch. Mulroney started the demise of natural gas prices in North America with deregulation and signing the off-side Free-Trade-Agreement. Harper allowed conditions to get much worse by ignoring warnings of just exactly what has happened! Alberta`s government actually added to the demise of natural gas prices by propping up the developers income with public funds. This only allowed the producers to sell natural gas at even lower returns. Allowing industry developers to design the path to be followed with petroleum resources has played havoc for a normal profit for the owning public, however getting involved means work----something Harper would sooner not experience.

This inability to get involved, is the major difference between Norway who have amassed a staggering $610 billion for their public from petroleum sales starting only in the 1990`s!! Canada where the owning public are not allowed a voice on major decisions by industry controlling the funding for political ambitions, cannot increase or gain funding although we have exported far more product than Norway. Tories express satisfaction with industry indicating the direction publicly owned petroleum products are produced and exported. Harper extended his bountiful nose into how Alberta`s bitumen would export by blind support for Keystone, and holding hearings on the Gateway pipeline, without first gaining the approval of the Alberta owning public. Tory parties in both Edmonton and Ottawa has been a blessing for energy companies, but a disaster for the owning Alberta public who find themselves with deficit budgets—but still called a rich province by the squirrely Reform-Conservative movement, both federally and provincially!!

I have seen all I need, to call for change long before Harper`s full term, and I ask opposition parties to work diligently and cooperatively to bring back some degree of respect to the Canadian political system, by ending the career of those bound in ending our democracy!!

Stewart Shields
Lacombe, Alberta

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The missing accountability of the political masters

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opi ... ditorials/
the-missing-accountability-of-the-political-masters/article2393888/

Globe and Mail Update Published Thursday, Apr. 05, 2012 10:20PM EDT Last updated Thursday, Apr. 05, 2012 11:05PM EDT

The Auditor-General’s scathing censure of a badly mismanaged F-35 fighter jet procurement process is necessarily focused on the manifold failures of bureaucrats. That is what the Auditor-General does – audit the actions of public servants. But where is the accountability for their political masters, the ministers who presided over this fiasco? [ . . . ]

Pundits on the F-35 fiasco

http://www.ceasefire.ca/
?p=11289&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ceasefire%2FycPl+%28Ceasefire.ca%29
April 7, 2012

PHOTO: Who's in charge of this thing? Conservative ministers search for the culprit in the F-35 boondoggle.

Prominent media commentators and pundits weigh in on the F-35 procurement fiasco:

David Akin, “Fighter jet fiasco now boondoggle,” Ottawa Sun, 3 April 2012:

There’s no question, Harper, MacKay, et al. fouled up when it came to playing politics with the F-35. And in the sense that the buck stops with the defence minister and ultimately the prime minister, they must wear a good deal of the blame for this boondoggle.

As [Auditor General Michael] Ferguson said Tuesday on Sun News Network, “Throughout a whole process like this it’s incumbent on anybody involved, whether they be a bureaucrat or they be a minister, to make sure that they are asking the right questions and they are part of that whole due diligence process.”

Tim Harper, “F-35 fighter jet planning a game of fun with figures,” Toronto Star, 3 April 2012:

As Auditor General Michael Ferguson laid out details of how the country’s largest military purchase had become a fantasy featuring rejigged requirements, buried costs and bureaucratic smoke-and-mirrors, one question kept recurring.

Where was Peter MacKay?

It was clear that the brass at national defence didn’t bother to keep their minister in the loop, so blinded were they to that shiny object in the showroom.

But there is nothing in the cabinet minister handbook preventing a few questions being asked, or some assurances sought.

How about poking your head in the door to check from time to time on the biggest expenditure of taxpayers dollars you have ever overseen?

Instead, MacKay looked like a tourist on a magic bus of broken rules and financial sleight-of-hand, getting off just in time to announce the government’s decision to buy the F-35s in July 2010 — before anyone had even formally bothered to make up a phony rationale for sole-sourcing the contract.

MacKay wasn’t alone. Where was his predecessor, Gordon O’Connor, the public works minister, Rona Ambrose and, more recently, MacKay’s sidekick at defence, the daily, droning face of the project, Julian Fantino? [ . . . . . . ]

QUOTE: "Perhaps David Orchard should be consulted for clues as to how Peter MacKay defines good faith."[/b]

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[b]Stench of DND’s cooked books is making its way to PMO

http://paper.li/politicopinion/
1301091269?utm_source=subscription&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=paper_sub

Posted on Wed, Apr 11, 2012, 5:08 am by Michael Harris

First, they didn’t know shag all about shag all.
Then they said it was some Machiavelli over at DND reincarnated as a sneaky bureaucrat who was to blame.

Now the story is that no one was misled and that things have always been done this way.

Peter MacKay’s latest explanation of the F-35 boondoggle is the death march of chutzpah.

The man who now admits that he knew in 2010 that the public number the Harper government was using for the cost of new fighter aircraft was at least $10 billion shy of reality ($25 billion if the estimable Andrew Coyne has it right) has drawn a strange conclusion. He declared that he has nothing to apologize for and that he operated in good faith. Really, Peter? Honest to God? Hope to die if you tell a lie? Pinky swears? Perhaps David Orchard should be consulted for clues as to how Peter MacKay defines good faith.

Judged by the facts, MacKay is dead-man-walking. As interim Liberal leader Bob Rae said: “The whole basis of our parliamentary system is that people tell the truth and it’s unimaginable to me that there would be no consequences to ministers not telling the truth, the prime minister not telling the truth.”

MacKay’s self-justification is oleaginous. Is there anyone who believes that the best way to equip our forces is to abandon a professional procurement process? MacKay’s latest attempt to reduce bald-faced lying by government and DND to an “accounting” issue is an argument for robotically loyal dolts and near relatives. The minister of defense may be in an Enron state of mind but nobody else is. The books have been cooked and the stench is making its way to the Langevin Block.

Does MacKay really believe that it is the public’s job to find the facts buried in the bowels of the system after the government chooses to mislead – in this case, throughout an entire federal election? Does he really think that the Harper government is above Contracting Policy 2006 as laid out by Treasury Board that requires full disclosure of true costs? Does he honestly believe character assassination politics is in order when the other guys have it right?

Peter MacKay’s bizarre metamorphosis into the Arrow Shirt Man of cabinet, a politician who believes that image is everything and words are nothing, pales beside the real story developing here. It appears that the government is about to follow the same path it did when Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson recently found Christian Paradis in conflict-of-interest. In that case, the Prime Minister pronounced from Thailand that he had reviewed the commissioner’s finding and decided there was no wrongdoing. The Emperor simply trumped the magistrate. It is the tell-tale impulse of the politician who has no place in a democracy – the instinct to be judge in your own cause and operate outside due process.

Having been caught with their costs down, the bottom line appears to be this: Canada is going to get the F-35 without a competition and without the slightest sign of remorse for misleading the public and parliament. We will also get a doomed attempt at better public relations optics – doomed because it will not address the issue building here – a Star Chamber inside DND aided and abetted by an increasingly belligerent government making enormous financial and policy decisions outside the boundaries of accountable governance. Even marketing has its limitations.

Absent the commitment to a real competition to find the best fighter jet to replace the F-18, no one should have any faith in those promised, impartial, technical briefings about the F-35 program from DND. The fix will still be in. The department already decided back in 2006 that it wanted this particular aircraft and wired the specs to get it. All of the good things the military have said publicly about this “flying piano” (American defense expert Winslow Wheeler’s words) came from Lockheed-Martin. So far, the word of the weapons manufacturer has been as reliable as Pinocchio on a bad day.

Nor is the scandal here confined to fifth generation flying boondoggles. Word is now coming from DND auditors that the same guys who ran the out-of-bounds F-35 acquisition have been mismanaging other big ticket equipment programs with little or no accountability. Upgrades to maritime patrol planes and the navy’s frigates are facing expensive delays because of inadequate risk management and control processes. And the strange part? DND has thrown away its only means of encouraging contractors to finish their work on time – the withholding of money. With these hugely expensive programs falling behind schedule, who in their right mind would reduce the holdback by two-thirds? Who is DND working for, the Canadian people or the arms manufacturers?

MORE . . . . .

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Readers can reach the author at michaelharris@ipolitics.ca. Click here to view other columns by Michael Harris.

Michael Harris is a writer, journalist, and documentary filmmaker. He was awarded a Doctor of Laws for his “unceasing pursuit of justice for the less fortunate among us.” His eight books include Justice Denied, Unholy Orders, Rare ambition, Lament for an Ocean, and Con Game. His work has sparked four commissions of inquiry, and three of his books have been made into movies.

WATCH: MacKay mixes up costing figures in AG’s report; CBC notices

http://paper.li/politicopinion/
1301091269?utm_source=subscription&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=paper_sub

Posted on Wed, Apr 11, 2012, 8:51 am by Colin Horgan

During a press conference Tuesday in Halifax, defence minister Peter MacKay seemed to confuse the columns on figure 2.6 of last week’s auditor general’s report. That table is the source of most of the recent hubbub, as it shows both the estimates National Defence used in 2010 when it decided to go with the F-35 fighter to replace Canada’s aging CF-18s, and the response DND gave to the Parliamentary Budget Officer in 2011 after the PBO submitted a costing report on planes.

However, as Terry Milewski of the CBC reported last night (clip below), MacKay misrepresented the second of those columns as being numbers generated by the PBO, not those provided by DND. That’s incorrect.

MAY: F-35s

http://elizabethmaymp.ca/news/blogs/2012/04/06/f-35s/

April 6, 2012

In July 2010, I wrote a column for my local paper, Island Tides, on the decision to buy 65 F-35 fighter jets. Now that the Auditor General has confirmed what everyone knew, that the planes were wildly over-budget and that we were being misled (lied to?) at every turn, I decided to go back and look at my column.

On the costs I wrote:

Like many military contracts in the US, the costs of the F-35 have spiralled and are way over budget. In March 2010, U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates told the Congress that it was “unacceptable” that the F-35 is 50% over-budget. Costs of developing the new fighter jets is approaching $300 billion. With bureaucratic baffle-gab that takes your breath away, the Pentagon critique of the fighter jet programme concluded: “affordability is no longer embraced as a core pillar.”

On the question of whether the F35s met Canadian defence needs:

Peter MacKay enthused about the jets. Lockheed Martin’s F-35 jets are exciting new toys. They are so exciting that our government did not hold an open contracting process. We only wanted these planes. They can take off and land on aircraft carriers. They have stealth coating. They can engage in air to air combat and rely on mid-air re-fueling. …. We don’t have aircraft carriers. We have no plausible security scenario in which air to air combat is anticipated. (The Battle of Britain was a long time ago.) And stealth coating? Are we planning a surprise invasion?

True, our aging CF-18s need to be replaced. Our large geography has always led to a priority choice for two-engine planes, so if a plane is in a remote spot and loses an engine, the pilot can get to a safe place to land. The F-35s are single engine planes. Asked what will happen if the engine fails, Peter MacKay replied “it won’t.” We need planes for search and rescue. The F-35 is not appropriate for search and rescue.

My column concluded:

So, it seems Canada is spending money we don’t have for planes we don’t need. And it seems we are doing this to hold our place in some macho military solidarity with the Pentagon. The opportunity costs of $16 billion for fighter jets is enormous — in lost opportunities to reduce poverty, create jobs, protect health care and fight climate change. None of this has been debated or discussed in the House. And it was not in the 2010 budget. I will work with other parties to reverse this sale and direct priorities to those Canadians values.

MORE:

http://elizabethmaymp.ca/news/blogs/2012/04/06/f-35s/