Posted on 01/04/2006 12:32:10 PM PST by Mark Felton
WASHINGTON — A defense bill approved by Congress would allow open competition for a multibillion-dollar contract to supply refueling tankers for the Air Force.
President Bush is expected to sign the measure, squelching an earlier House-approved bill that would have helped Boeing by keeping the Pentagon from buying military equipment from the parent company of European jet maker Airbus.
"I have come to a resolution myself as I hope every good citizen will, never again to purchase any article of foreign manufacture which can be had of American make, be the difference of price what it may." --Thomas Jefferson to B. S. Barton, 1815. ME 19:223
"Experience has taught me that manufactures are now as necessary to our independence as to our comfort; and if... [we will purchase] nothing foreign where an equivalent of domestic fabric can be obtained without regard to a difference of price, it will not be our fault if we do not soon have a supply at home equal to our demand, and wrest that weapon of distress from the hand which has wielded it." --Thomas Jefferson to Benjamin Austin, 1816. ME 14:392
"The prohibiting duties we lay on all articles of foreign manufacture which prudence requires us to establish at home, with the patriotic determination of every good citizen to use no foreign article which can be made within ourselves without regard to difference of price, secures us against a relapse into foreign dependency." --Thomas Jefferson to Jean Baptiste Say, 1815.
“He, therefore, who is now against domestic manufacture, must be fore reducing us either to dependence on that foreign nation, or to be clothed in skins, and to live like beasts in dens and caverns. I am not one of these.” ~Thomas Jefferson President
"Merchants have no country. The mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains." --Thomas Jefferson to Horatio G. Spafford, 1814. ME 14:119
"My idea is that we should encourage home manufactures to the extent of our own consumption of everything of which we raise the raw materials." --Thomas Jefferson to David Humphreys, 1809.
"Shall we suppress the impost and give that advantage to foreign over domestic manufactures?" --Thomas Jefferson: 6th Annual Message, 1806. ME 3:423
EADS is going to produce the tanker at a plant in Alabama, last time I checked, that was America.
Buy the plane that will perform best for our troops.
Amen, brother.
There's patriotism and then there's the globalist new world order's agenda...
Competition is a good thing, and Boeing will still kick Airbus' a@@. I'm sure Thomas Jefferson never had to buy a plasma screen TV, but maybe I'm wrong.
I'd like to restate the following quote from Jefferson
"Merchants have no country. The mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains." --Thomas Jefferson to Horatio G. Spafford, 1814. ME 14:119
Yet, merchants dominate our government. They write our laws. The Fortune 500 have sold out our small to mid-size manufacturing in exchange for partnerships with foreign governments, such as China.
It is sheer hubris for you to belittle Jefferson. There is little different today than in Jeffersons day except technology.
The nature of men remains the same.
Heads-up. Somehow I get the feeling that Boeing will still hand Airbus' tail to them right between the wing roots.
Competition makes the world go round.
And in the case of Boeing, broke them so egregiously that they might well lose this contract.
But if Jefferson had his way, we wouldn't have any industry -- we would be a nation of family farms. Jefferson was a brilliant man, but I don't accept his quotes as infallible.
Big difference.
One of our greatest limitations was the lack of tanker support. Tankers are extremely expensive and are usually low on the priority list for purchase until a DESERT STORM kicks off and everyone needs tankers to get to the war.
There are good points for and against buying American. On one hand, it really limits the number of companies bidding and that usually means higher prices. This ends up as fewer planes purchased.
On the other hand - counting on foreign countries for critical parts during wartime can be risky. It also sends jobs overseas.
Great, now we are allowing the US Military to outsource. Why on earth would we want to allow the US Military to become dependent on foreign manufacturers???
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