Laser Cannons, F-35s and Head Start

Dear Mr. President,
The latest waste of taxpayer dollars by the Pentagon comes right out of Star Wars—a laser cannon. The Congressional Research Service calls it a potential ‘game changer’ for the Navy, comparable to arming surface ships with missiles in the 1950s. Tests successfully burned through patrol boats and disabled surveillance drones. According to today’s NYT, a prototype costing $32 million is being deployed on a converted amphibious ship in the Persian Gulf, the intent apparently to warn Iran to stop their nuclear program and back off with those pesky high speed patrol boats buzzing around our warships or we’ll pull a Darth Vader on them. Of course, if the Iranians read the Times, they’ll get a laugh out of this bluster since the article also says “Among the limitations… is that lasers are not effective in bad weather because the beam can be disturbed or scattered by water vapor, as well as by smoke, sand and dust. It is also a ‘line of sight’ weapon, meaning that the target has to be visible, so it cannot handle threats over the horizon. And enemies can take countermeasures like coating vessels and drones with reflective surfaces. Navy officials acknowledge that the first prototype weapon to be deployed is not powerful enough to take on jet fighters or missiles on their approach. That capability is a goal of researchers.” Excuse me? The Navy builds a weapon that’s useless around water vapor? Really? This is the Navy’s version of the F-35, the plane that can fly only in clear weather during daylight and is incapable of its stated mission. But even if it doesn’t work, it’s cheap—a buck a pulse vs. $1.4 million per missile. Mr. President, this is nuts. We’re in sequester mode, the Pentagon is cutting benefits for veterans—no more education benefit—the VA is in shambles with a huge backlog of claims, we’re cutting school lunch programs, Head Start and child health care so we can give the merchants of death tens of billions of dollars to build death rays that don’t work and planes that don’t fly? And why is it that it’s okay for Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea, to have nuclear weapons but only Iran gets threatened with war IF they develop one? Who gave us the mandate to choose who does and who doesn’t? Do you see any hypocrisy in this? Do you see the insanity of spending hundreds of billions to kill and nothing to promote peace? You’re the guy with the Nobel Peace Prize, Mr. President. If it’s obvious to me, it should be obvious to you, too.