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And now, from Detroit...

• Published March 07, 2008

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“We are taking $40 billion taxpayer dollars and we are exporting it out of the country,” says Democratic Leader Lynn Kessler, railing against giving Airbus a contract with the Pentagon.

“We don’t know about the products we are buying from France. We think they may be good, but we don’t know," said Republican Leader Richard DeBolt.

“This ill-conceived contract undermines the very defense of our way of life. I believe the Department of Defense has outsourced the defense of our country," says Rep. Maralyn Chase.

“I am shocked, as a former officer of this country that the Pentagon has done this," says Rep. Tom Campbell.

So far, the fact that the planes would be assembled in Alabama has been dismissed. Also, no one has mentioned the scandal Boeing was involved in by trying to secure the contract through the Air Force. Nor that other countries buy American planes for their air fleets (including Boeing KC-135s for refueling French Mirage fighters). Or that the state's Department of General Administration has at this point purchased 190 Japanese-made hybrid cars since July.

Campbell says that's beside the point. He swung by to say it's fine if France bought some of our planes, but all American military aircraft should be made in the U.S. It's a matter of military readiness, he said.

And Rep. Sam Hunt champions the cause after the vote.

"God, Scoop Jackson, Warren Magnuson, those guys who built the country would be rolling in their graves," he said.