White House threatens veto on KC-45A curbs

The White House threatened to veto a House of Representatives bill that includes, among other provisions objected to by the White House, provisions that would undo the USAF KC-45A tanker award to Northrop Grumman, according to this Reuters report.

It’s a lengthy article and the references to the tanker controversy are minimal, but it’s significant that there appears to be White House support for Northrop’s contract. This may explain what is widely perceived to be a Boeing strategy to delay the contract through protests (and appeals, if its protest is denied by the GAO) and political tactics with Congress until after the next president takes office–on the assumption the next president will be a Democrat. Both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, the Democrats, have questioned the contract (though Obama is more temperate in his comments than Clinton). John McCain, the Republican, is no fan of Boeing and blocked the 2004 contract to Boeing after discovering improprieties.

Airbus worth “less than zero”

This Bloomberg report quotes Lehman Brothers’ aerospace analyst as concluding there is no value attributable to Airbus reflected in the share price of parent EADS. The value of EADS’ non-Airbus business make up all the share price. Morgan Stanley analysts come to essentially the same conclusion, according to Bloomberg.