Waste of Your Money??

[FarmerChick]

Here is an article I just read:

The fans inside Cowboys Stadium for Super Bowl XLV had as good a view of the flyover by four F-18 fighter jets as those watching at home. With the roof closed on Jerry Jones' $1.2 billion stadium, people in attendance were forced to watch the flyover on the massive high-def screens inside.

A Dallas TV reporter estimated that the flyover cost the Navy a total of $450,000. His total includes gas, operational costs and air time for the four F-18s, which traveled from Virginia to Texas for the event. The Navy told CNBC that their official records only tallies the amount spent on gas, which came out to $109,000 for the Super Bowl flights.

Even if we call it somewhere in between, the Navy still spent hundreds of thousands of dollars of taxpayer money for a few seconds of camera time. It's like an old riddle: If four planes fly over a stadium and nobody insides sees, is it worth the cost?


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UH? did the Navy send these planes over as a promotion to "join the Navy" kinda expensive I think for that camera time?


hmmm........and we paid for it LOL

 

[mrs.puff]

OH man. This is the kind of stuff that ticks me off. How is flying those jets over any different than what we call "propaganda" in other countries? Think of how many families could have used that money for food, healthcare, etc. Or how many SS families could divide up that money and use it to live on for a whole year? I'll tell you that when I was off the grid, our household of 2 lived on less than $10,000 a year.

 

[dacjohns]

Guess the pilots needed to get their hours in.

 

[k0xxx]

OH man. This is the kind of stuff that ticks me off. How is flying those jets over any different than what we call "propaganda" in other countries? Think of how many families could have used that money for food, healthcare, etc. Or how many SS families could divide up that money and use it to live on for a whole year? I'll tell you that when I was off the grid, our household of 2 lived on less than $10,000 a year.

OH man. This is the kind of stuff that ticks me off.
Excuse me. Propaganda? A waste of taxpayer's money maybe, but propaganda certainly not. Since when is a display of our military referred to as propaganda? If you follow that line of thinking, then let's see... Veteran's Day = Propaganda. Enjoying the freedoms secured by our military = propaganda.

Yes, the money could have been spent in a more wise manner, but equating a military flyover to propaganda strikes me as, let's just say... odd.

 

[dragonlaurel]

That flyover was a huge waste. They need a reality check from somebody that knows how to be more practical with money. If they wanted to spend lots of money for a good military use-
They were talking on tv the other day about the cost of putting armor on the personnel carrier trucks. Keeping our guys safer makes more sense to me.

edited to make sense. My emotions were in the way of my grammar.

 

[Dunkopf]

I love watching military hardware. Jets are just beyond cool.

They should have opened the dome and dropped some apple pie and baseballs.

 

[FarmerJamie]

We live under one of the routes used by the Ohio Air National Guard for training for low-level ops at the nearby old Army artillery arsenal. The C-130's fly so low some days you can see the sunglasses on the pilots. During our first month living in this house, a flight of four Apaches flew up the valley at treetop level. Mondo Sweeeeett!

It costs a lot to run this country, I sure a little digging could find equally disturbing examples of waste and fraud in a lot of other places

I have a lot of AF vets in the family. Those flyovers are a source of pride for them.

 

[mrs.puff]

Yes, I do think flyovers at sporting events are like propaganda.

Honoring military veterans who have served is different than showing off the military might of your country. When we thank a veteran for their service, we are honoring what they HAVE done for the nation. I think this is different than putting on military airshows and such. The message of flyovers is more like "look at what we CAN do! Look how great our country is because we have these neat jets!" It's glorifying the military, not showing what is really happening to our soldiers.

I also don't like it when the Army comes into my high school to try to recruit 17 year olds by having them play with nerf clubs, hitting each other in an inflatable boxing ring. How is that realistic? It's like selling guns with cartoons.

I guess it's just a difference of opinion. BTW- Every male member of my family was in the army or air force. And my female cousin was in the navy.

 

[Buster]

Yes, the money could have been spent in a more wise manner, but equating a military flyover to propaganda strikes me as, let's just say... odd.

"Propaganda is a form of communication aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position. As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience."

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda

 

[FarmerChick]

while we know the definition of propaganda----it is "usually" teamed with a negative association.

nothing wrong with influencing a crowd, but usually the "propaganda" word goes with negative influence.

I sure don't see how a flyover of our countries military can been seen as negative or propaganda.

I love and wish the military could fly over all of our events and celebrations in this country...but the darn cost just gets in the way LOL