Senate votes to kill F-22 Fighter program
President Obama scored a major victory in his push to reform the Pentagon when the Senate voted to halt production of the Air Force’s top fighter jet, the F-22 Raptor - a rare setback for the nation’s powerful defense industry. Danielle Brian of the Ploughshares-funded Project on Government Oversight called it a “landmark vote’’ that “marks the end of business as usual, and the beginning of real reform in Washington.’’ Taxpayers for Common Sense, another Ploughshares grantee agreed, calling it a “giant step for fiscal sanity,’’ saying the F-22 vote “affirms the government’s ability to stop unneeded weapons programs even when they are firmly entrenched in the American industrial and congressional base.’’ However, warns John Isaacs of the Council for a Livable World, “The F-22 battle is a long way from over.’’