When Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John McCain opens a hearing today [Wednesday] on an Air Force proposal to lease 100 Boeing 767 tanker aircraft, he will cast himself as a defender of the public interest against wasteful defense spending. It is, therefore, no small irony that this hearing – and the dilatory, many-months-long process it culminates, is the real waste of time and energy, to the detriment of the national security. After all, as members of the Commerce Committee surely know, most Americans understand full well the nature of leasing. Tens of millions of them have taken advantage of this...