Swiss voters have shot down a government plan to procure nearly two dozen Saab-made Gripen jet fighters from Sweden…
The Swiss government said 53.4 percent of those voting on Sunday were against funding the procurement, which would have cost $3.5 billion…
The Swiss air Force currently flies the F/A-18, due for retirement in 2025. The Federal Council planned to replace the U.S.-built planes with 22 Gripens…
Swiss opponents to their government’s Gripen deal argued the money spent to procure the planes could better be spent on other things.
Here in the United States, we’re being asked to acquire 2,443 F-35 fighter aircraft at a cost of $125 million to $156 million a copy depending on options, radio, powered sub-woofers, Pandora, etc..
Good thing we have Congress to take care of unreasonable and outright stupid expenditures like this from falling on the shoulders of American taxpayers.
Oh.
The F-35 is an invulnerable plane — it has parts constructed in every Congressional district in the country.
Oh, you don’t mean it that way? Never mind.
(I’m kidding; I’m sure it doesn’t have parts made in every Congressional district, but that’s the tactic the arms manufacturers use to push their products on the Pentagon.)
Switzerland is under attack from all sides.
They need to control their airspace from invaders.
A strong defense is essential for a strong economy.
Who would argue that Switzerland does not need fighter jets?
It’s hard to tell if you’re being sarcastic, but if not you should know Switzerland is not under attack because they don’t bomb other countries to steal their resources unlike certain hypocritical countries with bloated military budgets.
Hey Luther…. of course Orchi is having fun.
But how much chocolate do you eat per day?….. cause…. the whole point about Switzerland is that they work with corrupt leaders of other countries that do the stealing and looting. They don’t get their hands dirty with the direct looting and pillaging, they just bank the proceeds, fund narco terrorism and Global Tax Fraud, and provide a nice steady return.
What percent cocoa do you prefer for desert chocolate?
Plus, they’ve got everybody’s money, which is nice…
“Saab would not comment directly Monday on the vote but noted that under an industrial participation program, over 500 contracts with 125 Swiss businesses had been arranged since 2011, when Switzerland’s government had selected the Gripen in an aircraft procurement competition.” /// American style corruption favoring Corporate Welfare and its VOTED ON by the PEOPLE???
Well, what else can you expect from an electorate of free, science accepting, educated people who enjoy SOCIALIZED!! (YES—you heard me correctly!) socialized medicine.
Legalized drugs too.
Whats wrong with those people? ….. and How is GOUSA going to BlackMail them next to not prosecute them for Bank Fraud?
NarcoBankers need to know!
They also voted down a minimum wage of $20 an hour.
They do not have to be as fearful of invasion because they give everyone a fully automatic machine gun. Hitler never even bothered.
On the other hand European elites hate the fact that the Swiss are not joining their beloved EU and the Euro. They celebrated when they got them to join the UN, but the Swiss just keep saying no to all these foreign entanglements.
Switzerland has an air force?!
Here I thought their pocket knives were all their ARMY ever needed. (Not really.)
Just goes to show that when the population knows their country is a joke that the last to learn of it is always the politicians and the soldiers who serve them — the same group of idiots who also think money grows on trees or somehow just materializes in the pockets of its citizenry.
Way to go Swiss! I sure wish we had a law like that. But if we did then it just might cause everyone else (who the USA protects) to come up with ways on their own to to support things like bomb toting planes that could travel border to border inside a MINUTE!
This is a political, not a military decision.
Oh? I thought it was an economical decision..
The Swiss have a private medical system. Everyone has insurance. The big difference is that the govenment regulates the insurers, the doctors, and the hospitals.
If a doctor prescribes a treatment, the insurer must cover it, and has no forum to argue.
I lived there for a few years and it is a great system.
In response to comments that the Swiss are war profiteers, it should be noted that the biggest benefactor of any war are the arms dealers and the US and Russia are the biggest arms dealers in the world by a long.
Also worth noting that the lender of choice for countries going to war is the US Federal Reserve.
Ask the Nazis, they borrowed $50 Billion from the Fed’ to fund their half of WWII. They lent $30 Billion to Britain with a clause in both loans that the winner had to pay back both loans.
In response to comments that the Swiss are war profiteers, it should be noted that the biggest benefactor of any war are the arms dealers and the US and Russia are the biggest arms dealers in the world by a long. /// So what? At best a very weak dodge. Where do the worlds criminals bank their dollars?…… Switzerland. Each issue stands/falls on its own merits.
Also worth noting that the lender of choice for countries going to war is the US Federal Reserve. /// BS. Name a few of those loans and what they were nominally supposed to be for…. or are you talking about our Allies and proxies?
Ask the Nazis, they borrowed $50 Billion from the Fed’ to fund their half of WWII. //// More BS. I assume you are lumping in Loans made to GERMANY before 1939? You know, before the crystal ball was invented?
They lent $30 Billion to Britain with a clause in both loans that the winner had to pay back both loans. /// What “both” loans? Aren’t loans supposed to be paid back? You really spout nonsense.
Links?
No links?????
Imagine that……. just as you do.
Your reading comprehension is failing you. It’s pretty obvious what ‘both loans’ means. Are you the guy that made the decision to drop reading comprehension and analogies from the SAT?
What do you think “both loans” means Mickey? My guess if its not a complete typo is that the author is referring to loans made to England and to Germany?
While I am sure that loans were issued from inside the USA or its gubment to inside Germany or its gubment, I don’t think that the Federal Reserve gave a loan to the Nazi Party for them to conduct WW2.
So…. if not Nazi Germany…. who else?
Here’s Wikipedia about Lend-Lease, a WWII program.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lend-Lease
Audio clip from one of my favorite movies.
http://actionmovieclips.com/index.php?option=com_jumi&fileid=3&Itemid=91&p=clips&movid=2872&limitstart=7
Play the first clip.
I voted against it.
In Switzerland the big difference is the people actually decide, not the politicians, so overall they make better decisions.
And we also don’t have a president that has all the powers in the world, but we have a 7 people counsel from all political parties.
The more the power is diluted the better it is,
In the US this would not work. Just look what the electorate has freely hired to run the country for the last 3 decades or so. This should so that they aren’t capable of deciding whether a jet should be purchased or not.
What do you mean by “freely hired?”
If Presnedents were elected by direct popular vote all sorts of things would change.
People are people. Hmmmm, well thats only generally true as the raw material before culture and history plays its role. The USA electorate does seem to be easily misled. If they thought their vote actually mattered, would that change anything?
I wonder what “better things” the Swiss will spend that money on?….. rather than keep it in their pockets?
Do the Swiss require voter IDs? Was this a simple majority vote?
If voter fraud (regardless how small) and honest tabulation could be assured, I’d love to see more immediate up/down votes in the United States.
Only Swiss people can vote not strangers , and if by voter ID you mean that they check everyone that votes, yes it’s the case.
To pass the law an object needs to have a double msjority, the majority of the people and also the majority of states voting for or against it.
Something tells me that in the not too distant future, the Swiss will be replacing their F/A-18’s with F-35’s and after a careful review of the “fine print”, the transaction will not be eligible for a public vote.
In that I agree with you. The only reason that the vote had to be made is because the army didn’t have enough money to buy all the aircrafts so they wanted to buy them with an extra budget.
I guess that about sums it all up!
Switzerland sounds like a great place to live. Where its citizens actually have a meaningful, that controls how much money its government squanders on things it may not need. Bet they don’t have a space program either. But then Switzerland doesn’t have a media empire, like Hollywood, to explain and propagate why they can’t live without a multi-billion dollar a year, space program. And apparently their economy isn’t based largely on a tax payer funded job program, for a defense industry. That sells much of what it makes to overseas governments. Without its taxpayers ever seeing a penny of royalties in return for keeping those industries in the black.