[SEJeff]

The reliability standard they've set is indeed impressive, but they're simply milking the fat cow (USG) for cash. They were a perfect Rockefeller style monopoly with an utter lock on the military launch market until SpaceX sued the USAF to make it a normal bidding process.

Shaking that up a bit is a very good thing for overall use of tax dollars. I'll relent and agree entirely with you that there is a place for their extreme reliability. Then again, SpaceX is going to get there and they want to do 1 launch per week (40-50 launches total in 2018). If they don't develop the Vulcan engine and some sort of story for reliability, they're going to go the way of the dinosaurs. SpaceX is fighting for better (and cheaper) access to Space for everyone whereas ULA will soon be fighting to exist if they don't make serious changes soon.