Remember those $600 toilet seats?

I bet that could be done for under 100 bucks.

the real waste is helping poor people buy food.

Good catch--each drip pan could fund a lot of prosthetic work for returning wounded.

come on tv talking about we need to cut the spending I always listen to hear if the host of the show will bring up this type of spending.

We're not paying six hundred dollars for toilet seats, or seventeen thousand for drip pans. What we are spending that money for is those black box CIANSAFBI projects that Congress isn't allowed to inspect, or know what they are, they just get to vote to fund them, essentially blind funding.

This is where the money for these "outrageously priced" products go.

It was done behind closed doors and never became part of the public debate. There was no "skimming" or "padding" going on--there was just a Big Chunk Of Money that was allocated with the door locked and the cameras turned off to cryptic-sounding programs or projects--not something as simple as a part on a piece of equipment that was part of the "public" budget.

I think this is what it is--plain old graft and corruption, a "kickback" to a major campaign bundler/contributor-- not a "cover story" for black ops. If it were a cover story for black ops, they'd come up with a better one, surely.

This is ancient history, but it provides a "sense" of the matter: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/3.11/patton_pr.html

When asked why Phoenix pans are so expensive, the owner said it would 'hurt national security' if he gave out the secret so STFU and trust me.

The guy is a major-league asshole.

Two years ago, I drove thru Kentucky. Got confused by the piss-poor highway signage, and wound up on "the Hal Rogers Parkway". There are only two good roads in the state--I-64, and the gold-plated Hal Rogers Parkway. (every other highway I was on was absolute shit.) The Hal Rogers Parkway is literally the Highway to Hell. No exits, and no signs telling you where you are. I think the man could teach Saddam Hussein things about self-aggrandizement.

In absolutely everything except defense spending.

USA! USA! USA!

Pure pork politics. Corporate welfare on a massive scale, weapons systems that don't work and the Generals don't want, and a procurement system that would make Al Capone blush, but the people in uniform get to go on food stamps...
K&R

That's according to the company's CEO.

Tom Wilson, who owns Phoenix Products, defended his company's pans as better-constructed and more durable than others on the market. Asked what made them so costly, he declined to discuss specifics, saying that disclosure of the company's custom design could help competitors or even aid America's enemies.

http://www.dallasnews.com/incoming/20120518-behind-army-s-17000-drip-pan-a-kentucky-lawmaker-s-earmark.ece

This one is aimed at a rep at least but most of the time they are made up to target dems.

And for that price, I could handcraft them with scrollwork and pinstriping.

I'll even throw in gold leaf gilding.

A drip pan is not a complex thing. I assume they bolt to the ceiling of the aircraft under the engines and transmission, to avoid dismantling the whole helicopter (and replacing the leaky seals while they're in there, but that's another issue).

I am going to further assume there's some reason why a couple of Leavenworth inmates (preferably the Leavenworth prison with the military inmates in it) with a sheet metal brake, a drill press and a MIG welder couldn't make one of these pans in a couple hours for less than $500--and Leavenworth should already have the tools needed to accomplish this.