The Wild Blue Yonder!

Regular readers know that I really do try to check stuff before I comment because I am very protective of my reputation. This one took a while but now I believe it to be legit.

In a way, I wish I did not, both as a taxpayer and as a patriotic American. It’s also odd that the verification I sought came on the same day that I cited this in my last post.

The source is a retired US Air Force Colonel and the subject is a Date.

"First let me say that I've moved three presidents up to now and sometimes I've seen incredible waste. But, the "new" guy really takes the cake. I don't have an issue with the President promising his wife dinner and a show or that he even takes his wife out.

But, when I saw the news say that the date cost $24,000, here's what you DON'T know. Three days before "dinner" a C-17 flew Marines and the helicopter maintenance equipment to JFK Airport .

The day before "dinner" I flew the US Secret Service (USSS) and the motorcade to JFK. That crew of 5 spent two days and nights at the Hilton in Times Square . My hotel bill: $621.66 plus $64 a day in per diem. The USSS guys were at a different Hilton in NYC, so figure that cost another $14,000 (or so) plus per diem. The Marines had to have cost as much and were there four days, so figure another $55,000 plus per diem (for 44 Marines).

We were supposed to fly the motorcade back and go home, but the Air Force was so short of C-17's that we were re-tasked to take the motorcade back, return to JFK and take the helicopter back to Quantico .

After shutting down I walked over to the hangar and to my surprise I find FIVE helicopters, not ONE. We're obviously not transporting five big helicopters. I went and talked to the Marines guarding the "fleet" and found that they were flying all five helicopters home and we were only transporting the Marines and the maintenance equipment.

After talking to the Marine(s) in charge, I was told that the White House requested FIVE helicopters. The Marines told me that they spent all morning trying to figure out how much it cost them to come and said they figured it cost them $140,000 to stay there (I don't know where they came up with that)and the trip's total had to be about $1,000,000.

We heard that the President didn't use Air Force One (the 747) so I asked if he came in on one of the 757's. I was told that he came in on three Air Force Lear jets.

So, date night consisted of:
2 C-17's flying three missions,
3 Lear jets,
5 Helicopters,
Presidential Motorcade,
44 Marines,
more than 20 USSS personnel on our plane.

Who knows what it cost the NYPD and NY Port Authority (at the airport) in overtime."


Make up your own punch line.

Mine is, I wonder which base he got to?

And how much did it cost me.