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House Kills F-35 Jet Engine

Shot Down

Pentagon had long said it was unneeded.

Who says bipartisanship is dead? On Wednesday 233 members of the House on both sides voted to kill a program to develop a second engine for the F-35 fighter jet. Even though President Obama, former President George W. Bush, and the Pentagon had opposed the program, Congress repeatedly funded it, which pumped millions into the districts of members, including Speaker John Boehner. But with lawmakers clamoring for budgets cuts, a coalition of Tea Party-backed Republican freshmen and Democrats banded together to defeat Boehner and end the engine program, a move that could save up to $3 billion in the next few years.

Read it at The New York Times