Last March President Obama announced that he wants the U.S. to be one of Brazil’s “best customers” for their oil, although the U.S. has eight times more petroleum resources than does Saudi Arabia if only we’d drill for it.
Now the Obama government is awarding a $1 billion contract to a Brazilian aircraft manufacturer—Embraer–instead of American Hawker Beechcraft Corp., which has two years and $100 million invested in a light attack aircraft’s development.
All the more remarkable is the Brazilian company, Embraer, is under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Justice Department for possible violations of the Corrupt Practices Act.
Hawker Beechcraft said in a press release Dec. 30, 2011, it had learned that the government had quietly announced the previous week that the award had been made to the Brazilian manufacturer Embraer, instead of Hawker Beechcraft.
This was called, in restrained language, an “example of the Air Force’s lack of transparency,” by Hawker Beechcraft CEO Bill Boisture. It “now seems even clearer that the Air Force intended to award the contract to Embraer from early in the process.”
The AT-6 is a “world-class light attack aircraft that has been evaluated and proven capable through a multi-year, congressionally-funded program” working closely with the Air Force and with an investment of $100 million to “meet the Air Force’s specific requirements… Every fixed-wing pilot in the United States military today is trained on this airplane,” Boisture added.
Last March, Obama on his Latin American trip pledged to work with his counterpart, Dilma Rousseff. He said:
We want to help you with the technology and support to develop these oil reserves safely. And when you’re ready to start selling, we want to be one of your best customers.
The Obama Administration gave its approval for a giant oil storage facility, movable in the event of a hurricane. The approval for using this facility was given to Petrobras, the huge nationally owned Brazilian oil company. Instead of giving equal competition to American oil companies, Obama stymied the U. S. industry with meritless moratoriums last spring. He gave special benefits to Petrobras for that company to drill in American oil reserves while American oil crews were sitting on their heels, unemployed because of the moratorium.
As for the Embraer contract, while outsourcing this to the Brazilian company would create only 50 jobs in the U.S., Hawker Beechcraft says its AT-6 plane would open up about 1,400 jobs at 181 companies in 39 states. The manufacturing parts and supply chains all would remain in the U. S. Rep. Barack fooled us into thinking that he wanted to create jobs in America. Justifiably, Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-Kan) blasted the Administration’s decision Dec. 27.
U.S. Rep. Mike Pompeo, R-Wichita, said how disappointed he was by the decision. “I have already demanded answers from the Pentagon on why they made this very unfortunate decision, and will continue to do so,” he wrote. “This contract is critical both to our nation’s security and to jobs….”
The exclusion decision leaves the A-29 Super Tucano built by Brazil’s Embraer as the lone contender for the initial contract to supply 35 planes, with the potential for 55 aircraft worth up to $950 million, not including foreign sales. Embraer has formed a partnership with Nevada-based Sierra Nevada Corp. and has said it would build the turboprop in Jacksonville, FL., where the company figured the 50 jobs may be created.
The Brazilian embrace doesn’t end there. A decision has been made to drop the 54 cents-per-gallon tariff on imported ethanol. This also could be a boon for Brazilian ethanol, which, unlike the domestic corn-based product, is produced mostly from sugar cane, which grows like weeds in that country.
One explanation for the favoritism toward Brazil is that Brazil is the fourth –largest U. S. creditor. It holds $198 billion in Treasury securities. American exports to Brazil have more than doubled over the past five years.
But what is the most important reason for all this boot-licking of Brazil? It seems more than coincidence that multi-billionaire ultra-leftist George Soros—Obama’s biggest campaign contributor– owns part of Brazil’s Petrobras oil giant and, as well, just happens to have connections with Embraer through Harbin-Embraer Aircraft, a Chinese-Brazilian joint venture, and Hainan Airlines, in which Soros owns a significant stake. Aha!
Could this, perchance, be just more steps toward President Obama’s only really important goal—reelection? Forget about creating jobs in America. Let our tax dollars go overseas at the expense of local jobs, for the benefit of investment in a foreign aircraft company and perhaps even the weakening of our national security.
It smells like Chicago-style pay-back time for Obama’s major political sponsor, George Soros, and his valuable Brazilian connections.
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