I'm all for it. The F-22 has several major problems, and has proven itself to be ineffective in a modern war-fighting environment. It was in the mid-eighties (the year I was born, actually, 1986) when the F-22 was first drawn up from proposals, as the YF-22 by Lockheed Martin. Of course, in twenty-three years, the requirements of a dynamic air force change drastically. At the time of conception, the United States was in need of an air superiority fighter that could easily take on Russia's top of the line dogfighters. Obviously, this type of war was never fought; in fact, the United States has not taken on a nontrivial air force for decades.
Anyway, the fact that it lacks utility in a modern age takes a back seat to the fact that it doesn't work. It would be much more acceptable if it were adaptable to more situations; after upwards of twenty-five years in development, it has not flown a single combat mission. It is unable to operate as a ground-attack craft in anything more than a basic capacity - actually, they're fitting the currently-built fighters with a special radar and weaponry to do so just now.
The F-22 Raptor features a revolutionary stealth coating which helps to reduce its radar cross-section to that of a small steel marble. The one catch is that it is damaged by rain. Yep, the plane can't fly reliably in rain without corroding its paint and outer shell. Click here if you don't believe me.
The cost of the planes themselves as well as the maintenance is also exorbitantly high. Each plane costs $350 million, and the operating cost on average is $44,000 per hour of flight time. Keep in mind that the yearly salary of a high school teacher is overshadowed by this figure by about $1,000 annually. The F-22 needs about thirty hours of maintenance for every hour of flight time, in the best-case scenario; the figure may be as high as sixty.
Additionally, the International Dateline is enough to foil the mighty Raptor:
When the group of Raptors crossed over the IDL, multiple computer systems crashed on the planes. Everything from fuel subsystems, to navigation and partial communications were completely taken offline. Numerous attempts were made to "reboot" the systems to no avail.source
With so many problems and issues, I'm glad they're putting this bloated program to rest. Several Senators (including Feinstein and Boxer) voted against the defense bill for the purposes of saving the Raptor. Why exactly would they do this? Well, Lockheed has sprinkled its production plants throughout the country, and districts that would lose a significant number of jobs would of course be quite angry with a representative who would put the ax to such a program.
But for the cost of one $350 million F-22, you could employ over 5,500 people for a year with salaries of 25% higher than the median salary of the United States: about $63,000.
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