[Overpaid Slacker]

I stopped reading industry stuff a few years back, but at the time it was the accepted common knowledge (and a friend was in the GC office at Boeing...) that Boeing bet on (1) the increasing importance/use of "smaller", regional airports... due to the near-saturation of the largest airports, and thus went the 777 and 787 route; (2) the elasticity of the 747 design, allowing them to revise/extend it once again, to fill the market demand for a long range, widebody aircraft; and (3) frankly, Airbus' inability to actually pull off the 380 at cost/passenger mile that made sense.

In retrospect, it seems that Boeing's skepticism about the innovative commercial capacity of a nanny-state joint venture between traditional rivals was correct.

It's almost a Cold War metaphor. Boeing pushed Airbus (because of its "gotta-have-the-biggest-balls-and-show-the-Americans-they're-not-the best" inadequacy complex) into spending and stretching itself to near-ruin.

Another (socialist) one bites the dust.

JP