You could pay less, but why?

I was informed the other day that I could get a plane ticket for myself and my wife from Dallas to Seattle, curtesy of the U.S. Air Force. On the other hand, if I drive to L.A., and then fly to Seattle, they won't pay for it, even though it would cost them less. So instead, they have to pay me for the whole trip to Seattle, when they could pay a few hundred dollars less just by buying me a ticket out of L.A. How's that for a waste of tax payers dollars. I know, a couple hundred dollars isn't much, but when you multiply that by the thousands of military members that get transferred from one base to another, you can see how fast that figure can add up. Kind of stupid, don't ya think?