The Senate voted 58-40 to reject even more F-22 Raptors beyond 187 (including the 183 F-22s already built, plus the 4 included in the Obama Administration's budget). The vote margin was larger than expected, which is good news for upcoming fights, including the House battle (which may come today).
This is a significant victory for Secretary Gates and the Obama Administration, and for those reformers who believe, as I do, that our military budget is way out of whack. It also avoids a depressing defeat on this issue, which would have been spun as a bad turn of events for the Administration, with media spin no doubt extrapolating to health care & climate change.
More importantly, would have raised the question of whether or not we reformers could ever retire any weapons program, no matter how unnecessary, even when the DOD & the President were on our side (which, of course, is not normally the case).
So it's not the end of the Empire, or bringing the oil/military/industrial complex to its knees--but it is a win--and it's been a while since our side has slowed down the military juggernaut on any issue.
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