What EAS costs is pennies in comparison to what your company and the likes make year after year. Do we have to have companies like yours doing military contract work or should it go back in house? I am kinda messing with you but I am also not.
Are you back stateside?
You are confused, my friend. The exact reason why companies like mine exist is because it is cheaper than having the government do it in-house. There are also things that the government can't "do" themselves and need to have a contractor do it. See "plausible deniability." This is the same reason why it is cheaper for you to fly your "transition jet" around than it is for Delta to fly a mainline jet.
If you were able to hang up your shiny shoulder bars and handmade tailored black slacks for a week, and visit this scary place, you'd see that what you suggested is just not possible or more cost effective as you suggested.
EAS may cost "pennies" in the grand scheme but "pennies" in the grand scheme are not pennies at all, but millions of dollars.
So, the Constitution does specifically mention that it has a responsibility to "provide for the common defense." National defense is the only mandatory function of the US Government. So at least I can say that money being used for my company is at least used for something a little more substantial than flying empty planes around rural communities.
We both did a ton of EAS at Colgan, it was obviously a joke. Airports 24 miles apart in distance, each having government funded air service. Cant count how many times we flew empty or just with a few passengers on those legs.
Speaking of that airport that was 24 miles from another, it was Johnstown airport (JST) or better known as John Murtha Johnstown Airport, named after the congressman who helped ensure the funds to his namesake airport for years. Remember when JST airport was in the news after it was reported that it received over $150 million in government subsidies to help improve the airport for commercial travel? More of those "pennies" you speak of.
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/power-p...ort-brought-american-taxpayers-100702844.html
Oh, and I am not stateside, at work.