No Pics, No Perks, and an F-16 a Long Way From Home...

The New York Post is reporting that the $328,835 photo op organized by the White House that terrified New Yorkers will not be released. Apparently an Administration willing to release classified interrogation photos that will be used for terrorist recruiting and inciting attacks against deployed soldiers can't bring itself to release photos of a public event for fear of causing President Obama some indirect personal embarrassment.

Ther is some good news, however, about the flight. Lt Col Tadd Sholtis, of the Air Force Office of Public Affairs, confirmed via email this morning that "the flight in question occurred as part of a scheduled training mission, so there were no passengers on board." Some of my fellow bloggers had wondered if perhaps President Obama's campaign contributors might have been about the VC-25A's strafing of Manhattan, but that was apparently not the case.

As for the F-16 that accompanied the VC-25-A, some people have noticed that the bright-red-tailed plane that accompanied the 747 as it banked above New York Harbor looked very much like the markings of the famed Tuskegee Airmen.

The plane in that photo certainly resembles the F-16s of the 100th Fighter Squadron attached to the 187th Alabama Air National Guard, which carry those distinctive colors as a tribute to the famed Tuskegee Airmen.

It is a long haul from Alabama to Washington to New York and back again, and there are other Regular Air Force units far closer to both DC and New York that could have flown escort for the President's plane if escort was their actual duty. Perhaps the plane from the 160th—if that is indeed what it was—was there as part of the photo op. Captain Cambarella, PAO of the of the 187th has so far declined a request for comment.

If the Alabama ANG fighter did participate, refueling fuel costs alone would seem to warrant nudging the $328,835 cost of the White House debacle further upward.