NavAir.....nay laddy I spent my time digging thru NavSea's dirty linen less one small foray into the Cruise Missile Program. I completely agree with you about the needless bureaucracy and cost the DOD and in particular the NAVY procurement system plays in getting things done. The Army of late has been horning in on that bit of glory it seems.
I worked for a separate command tasked with ferreting out culpable individuals and corporations involved in fraud and the like. You would have loved the reception a Naval Officer got at Athens, Geogia when he tried to convince us hammers for the F-18 program were not overpriced.
I happened to have a GSA Catalogue in my mitts when he made the famous statement ".....so you see there was no effort to hide the item or disguise it in any way!" He was referring to the "Device, impact, manually operated" that was billed to the government a bit over Four Hundred Dollars.
In all of that catalogue.....I found about a thousand different hammers....and not one of them was a "Device, impact, manually operated" and not one of them exceeded a hundred dollars no matter how esoteric in design or application.
Go Army....Beat Navy!
As to being a "Liberal".....I am on your Department of Homeland Security list of potential Right Wing Radical Rascists....due to my membership in a Racial Hate Group as identified by some in the current government as the American Legion.