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O'Guvnah has announced that he somehow found $33.6 million to purchase 3 brand-spanking new Dauphin helicopters to replace some aging craft in the state police fleet. It sounds so nice, O'Guvnah working hard to keep our state trauma system on the cutting edge with new equipment so that we can fly seriously injured victims all around the state to get them the best care possible.
It's also a questionable expenditure designed not to serve the citizens of Maryland, but to prop up O'Guvnah's sinking poll numbers. Standing in front of a State Police Dauphin makes one hell of a photo opp, as the Calvert Street Communist Party Newsletter proved on Friday.
Can you say "staged event" boys and girls?
Let me first stipulate a couple of things. First, our trauma system in the State of Maryland is among the best in the nation. In fact, it is the standard by which most other states are judged. Second, some of those birds are getting long in the tooth. And third, our state helicopter fleet is an important link in that system.
But let me also stipulate several other things.
First, "long in the tooth" is not an accurate measurement of age in an airframe. Numer of hours is. And I would be interested to know the number of hours on those craft slated to be replaced. We have B-52 bombers still flying -- with hundreds of thousands of hours -- that were built in the late 50s. We have Marine Supra Cobras and UH-1Gs (Hueys) still flying that were built in the sixties.
Second, the helicopter fleet has this predilection to fly MORE medevac missions during the General Assembly session than outside that session. In fact, if you go back through the years, you will see a lot of victims that were flown to shock trauma, only to later be released. Hmmm...
Third, the Dauphin is one of the most advanced rotary wing aircraft in the world, capable of all-weather flight. The Coast Guard regularly flies the Dauphin on SAR missions in horrific weather (especially in the Bering Straight during the King Crab and Opie fishing seasons). Unfortunately, our State Police aren't willing to train our Maryland pilots in this type of flying. So our highly-advanced Dauphins stay grounded in all but good weather.
Finally, our helicopter fleet is not supposed to be solely for medevac use. That huge bulb that hangs off one side is an infra-red device to aid in searching large areas from the air. Guess how many times that has been used in 18 years? Once, when a scout was lost on a hike at Henson Scout Reservation.
So, we have highly advanced aircraft that top out around $11 million a piece that stay grounded frequently (except when the General Assembly is in session) and are really only used in a single-mission role. And O'Guvnah just needs to spend MORE money. In fact, I hear that O'Guvnah wants to change the state motto to "mo money, mo money, mo money".
And now O'Guvnah searches out for a high-profile program to boost his miserable poll numbers, and what does he find? Our medevac choppers.
This is no different than the typical maneuver of employing budget cuts on the highest-visible programs in order to avert any budget cuts.
No matter that O'Guvnah and his bastard buddies in the General Assembly -- with the acquiesence of Step-N-Fetch-It County Execs -- just passed huge tax increases and gambled the future of the state budget on a constitutionally questionable gambling initiative.
We can always spend another $33 million, $33 million there, because when you are a liberal Democrat, you can always get blood from a stone. Especially when the stone is a taxpayer.