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>I think it's just a way to funnel taxpayer money

They only spent $22 million on the whole program. Accounting errors in the Pentagon literally amount to trillions of dollars. $22 million is about 20% of the cost of a single F-35. They have much better ways to funnel taxpayer money - $22 million isn't even pocket change for the Pentagon.

Yeah, and didn’t the Pentagon say they’d lost track of $6.5Tn in spending or something? This is nothing compared to that.

$22M could have meant a lot to Reid’s retirement plan.

"Most of the money went to an aerospace research company run by a billionaire and longtime friend of Mr Reid's"

This.

See Glomar Explorer for other examples.

Yep. Pretext is everything.

Why would the CIA use Howard Hughes and a barge large enough to house a stealth boat to recover a Soviet sub?