“....a $50 million Super Hornet and nearly their lives because of financial shenanigans in Washington.”
See.......space shuttle......Challenger. Same deal.
Actually, No.
The primary cause of the Challenger disaster was . . . Sheer Bad Luck.
NO! Morton Thiokol’s Allan McDonald had refused to sign the launch recommendation over safety concerns. Prior to that launch, visual evidence had raised questions about the segment seals functioning in lowered temps. His professional judgement was overridden by a Thiokol corporate VP vote influenced by NASA bureaucratic pressure.
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/langley/news/researchernews/rn_Colloquium1012.html
http://articles.latimes.com/1986-02-26/news/mn-390_1_nasa-officials
Actually, yes. The whole space shuttle design that was implemented was a kludge forced on NASA by budget cuts.
The original shuttle concept had both stages recoverable and reusable. No disposable "solid rocket boosters" in that original design at all. All well-behaved, well-known liquid fuel rocket engines.
The Challenger astronauts went to their deaths PRECISELY because of budget cuts.