That is true but when you get to the point of deleting bits of kit from the cost-per-hour estimates then the customers are going to get nervous. It was these very same bits of kit that made the aircraft competitive and to adjust in this way smacks of spin. I'm sure if I deleted all the features the F-16 has over the Hawk from the costs-per-hour I could make it look pretty cheap too.
It is unwise to split-out the cost of the EOTS just because podded systems are costed separately on 'legacy' jets. Removing, repairing, modifying or upgrading a pod is relatively easy and does not necessarily ground a legacy aircraft; as an embedded and integrated system upgrading EOTS will not be as easy. If, as seems likely, the USMC add a pod in addition to the EOTS then the costs for both will have to be shown on balance sheet somewhere.
I'm not sure if that pod is confirmed and I thought that was for EW use. I think it's Terma that makes the 'stealthish' gun pod and that I believe that they are modifying it to be multi mission capable. All that said if the Israeli additional EW kit is shared with other variants depending on a) what it is and b) what it does then maybe that desire lessens.
I thought the F16 is $22K per hourish from what I saw on F16.net and the F18 in the ball park of $23K to $24K so the JSF being in around that including all the additional kit seems decent to me. I'm pretty sure the LM figures that Gen Bogdan has refered to previously as being a 'problem' for him and not the USAF calculation were $21K to $22K ish.