Budget officer Kevin Page in Harper’s cross hair

The government is "hitting" back at Kevin Page and his pesky "numbers", denoting both detached arrogance, as well as complete and utter incompetence. The Prime Minister has said he’s "not going to get into a lengthy debate on numbers" relating to the F-35. What’s a few billion here and there, but more importantly the PM is right, he won’t get into a debate on numbers, because they DON’T REALLY HAVE ANY:

While Hawn trashed the budget officer’s methodology and the eye-popping price tag, he offered no concrete figures to rebut the assessment.

How can one question another’s numbers, when you have no idea yourself of the cost:

Hawn said commercial and international agreements limit what the government can say publicly about the program.

“There’s a mass of data,” he said. “There’s probably millions of pages out there. It’s not an unfair question to say: Where’s the information? And we’re going to work to get as much of that as we can.”

Page’s report said the Defence Department did not do its own independent analysis of the numbers and relied too much on estimates from the manufacturer, U.S. defence giant Lockheed Martin.

Here we have a situation, where a signature purchase, massive expenditure no matter how many billions, and YOU rely solely on the company trying to SELL you on the plane? You don’t do any analysis, you still need to get information on costs, you basically are using outdated information provided by the VENDER, and you actually have the temerity to question the PBO’s independent, internationally referenced figures? Harper, Hawn, zero credibility to question, because it appears they are still trying to secure information on cost.

In essence, you can toss aside the government claims, because they appear to be nothing more than unverifiable fantasy. Hawn’s attempt to discredit Page only HIGHLIGHTS the amateurish, go along, don’t ask any questions, mentality that is at the heart of this emerging fiasco. The government doesn’t agree with the PBO’s methodology, and yet they are so out to lunch they have NOTHING concrete to counter, despite months and months of debate, just smoke and mirrors.

What I find amazing, the government seems able to come up with hard figures related to industry investment, job potential, relating to the F-35 and yet NADA when it comes to cost of plane, Hawn is left with basically "we’ll get back to you on that". Hawn uses the term "illogical" to describe Page’s numbers, yet his presentation, or lack thereof in this case, is simply absurd. Page looks that much more formidable, now that we hear the government retorts. The Conservatives won’t get into a "lengthy debate on numbers" because they don’t have any, YET. A knife to a gunfight.

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