Military hardware at Oshkosh

Oshkosh is a great place to see the might and cleverness of the U.S. military on display. Our cargo planes were represented from the C-47 (DC-3), celebrating its 75th anniversary, right through the modern C-130, C-17, and C-5. Fights from World War II, such as the P-51 Mustang, were heavily represented. The crowd was shocked, awed, deafened, and shaken by heavy modern jet fighters. Our ground operations were represented by an MRAP, a made-in-Oshkosh $500,000 replacement for the Hummer (at least $5 billion in taxpayer funds will be spent on this program). The one guy who does not seem to be impressed by our fancy technology, i.e., Osama bin Laden, was nowhere to be found among the crowd.

The quasi-military branches of government were showing off as well. The TSA had a booth where they explained all of the great new stuff that they’re doing. Customs was there to show off its new reporting requirements for arriving and departing the U.S. Technically these guys have grown the GDP by making the procedures so difficult and time-consuming. The companies that formerly assisted aviators in dealing with Third World bureaucracies, such as Sudan’s, are now making money helping people travel between the U.S. and Canada in Cessna 172s. The Border Patrol had a booth trying to recruit 3000 new agents to work on the southern border. I asked how hard that could be, with 15 million Americans being unemployed. The agent responded “It just opened up last week; we haven’t hired anyone for about a year.” The Border Patrol brought in an Astar. Apparently the Department of Homeland Security keeps Americans safe from Mexican workers by sending $2 million over to France for a helicopter and some spare parts and then sending additional funds to Hugo Chavez to buy jet fuel to keep the machine flying in circles.