Seriously harper...give it up

Several clichés come to mind concerning the ridiculous efforts by harper & co. to justify and defend F-35 plans: not a leg to stand on; on shaky ground; ill advised; the wheels have fallen off the wagon; that dog won’t hunt...

But Fantino came up with the perfect word (emphasis mine) -

"We will purchase the F-35," Fantino asserted. "We're on record. We're part of the crusade. We're not backing down."

Crusade:  
1. often Crusade Any of the military expeditions undertaken by European Christians in the 11th, 12th,  and 13th centuries to recover the Holy Land from the Muslims.
2. A holy war undertaken with papal sanction.
3. A vigorous concerted movement for a cause or against an abuse.

Uh-huh....that’s how I want my government to decide how it’s going to spend billions of dollars and make decisions on military spending.  Sure.  And I really want those decisions to be mindlessly inflexible as well.  I mean, we’re on a crusade, after all.  Don’t question, just do it and never, ever back down.  Even if all evidence says you should -

If Washington pulls the plug on its own F-35 plans, it is unclear what will happen to the development timeline for the planes that Canada wants to replace its aging fleet of CF-18 Hornets...Original estimates suggested each plane would cost about $75 million. However, the parliamentary budget officer has suggested the price tag could double, and a report from the Pentagon earlier this year indicated that unforeseen production costs will likely push up the plane's price tag to an unknown sum.

and

Adam Chapnick, a defence studies professor at the Royal Military College of Canada, said a U.S. decision not to go ahead with the F-35 purchase would have a significant impact on Canada.
“The cost would increase dramatically,” he said. “If the United States wasn’t going to use the F-35, then it wouldn’t make as much sense for us to, because part of our goal is to be inter-operable with the United States. So if there’s nothing to be interoperable with, there’s much less incentive to go ahead.”

Maybe the stupidity of the talking points arguments is deliberate.  Really, when you hear something like this despite all logic -

 Fantino: “The only crusade is the crusade to malign a very important asset for our young men and women who actually use the equipment, and also to maintain our Canadian sovereignty as well as creating jobs. The member opposite is stuck in a time warp of useless rhetoric, misinformation and misrepresentation about the benefits to Canada of the F-35 program.”

-  don’t you just want to shake your head and walk away from debate because you just can’t find simple enough terms to explain reality to a party that is so obtuse?