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Quentin mentions just below the Daily Kos and some comments on Ellsworth posted Tuesday. KOS's comment on today's news is priceless. Someone took pity on poor Sen. Thune and spared SD's base from closure. The commission is voting on which...

Defaced Poster Boy

Never one to pull his punches, Robert Novak does a thorough political analysis of the situation with Sen. Thune, the Pres., the BRAC process, and South Dakota's Ellsworth Air Force Base. It ain't a pretty picture.

The real acid test will be when the final BRAC recommendation is out later this week.

Captain's Quarters has about the most thorough and detailed treatment of the Able Danger situation where advance information about BinLaden and el Qaida was discovered, but then not passed to law enforcement because of an administrative wall of separation between DoD and the FBI.

As a result, 9-11 took place, and later, the 9-11 Commission was caught with their facts down, to what will be their ultimate shame, and loss of credibility due to 5 or 65 different versions of response in the week and a half the story has been out.

The inside-the-beltway media/political axis has circled the wagons big-time on this one. As it is developing, every time they have come up with some objection, it has been met, with first one, then three named sources corroborating the event(s).

Check it out for the whole run down. This one has legs.

I know this seems like news to the MSM - but really, it's essentially the same thing that Dubya said right after 9-11 when he warned that the terror war would be lengthy, difficult, and non-traditional.

To the Chief's way of thinking the war against Islamofascism is WW-IV. (defacto WW-III was the Cold War.) The sooner that we really recognize this, the better off we will be.

With the decision this morning by an 8-1 vote, South dakota's Ellsworth Air Force Base was removed from the list of recommended closures by the BRAC Commissioners.

Some coverage on the facts of the decision in the Rapid City Journal...
Ellsworth saved

Like the phoenix from the ashes, the status of Ellsworth Air Force base rose from expendable to essential in a matter of seconds when the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission, or BRAC, voted Friday to save the base.

South Dakota's top lawmakers and the head of the Ellsworth Task Force were at the edge of their seats in the suburban Washington, D.C., hearing room when BRAC commissioner Samuel Skinner made a motion to reject the Pentagon's recommendation to close Ellsworth and move its 29 B-1B Lancer bombers to Dyess Air Force Base.

Looking for at least five commissioners to raise their hands in support of Skinner's motion, the South Dakotans instead saw all but one of the nine-member panel vote to save Ellsworth.

...and in the Sioux Falls Argus Leader:

ELLSWORTH SPARED

Ellsworth Air Force Base was taken off the Pentagon?s recommended list of closures this morning, a decision that sent jubilant Rapid City residents leaping to their feet as they watched the proceedings on live TV.

The nine-member independent commission voted 8 to 1 to reject the Pentagon?s recommendation to close the base as part of the Defense Department?s plan to restructure the military.

Meanwhile, some of the politics of the situation which provide a boost to Sen. Thune's position were not lost on others:

Base Closing Choices Impact Politics

When the Pentagon announced that it wanted to shut down Ellsworth Air Force Base, it was an enormous setback for Sen. John Thune. The Republican got elected in part by repeatedly telling voters he could save the base because of his close ties to President Bush.

Thune responded to the Ellsworth news by going on the offensive: He and fellow South Dakota leaders from both parties launched an intense lobbying effort. He also stopped fund-raising for the Republican Party and opposed the Bush administration on a few important Senate votes.

On Friday, Thune's political future got a big boost when a federal commission decided to save Ellsworth, home to B-1B bombers and a major player in the Cold War. He and other South Dakota politicians hailed the decision as the result of an extraordinary bipartisan campaign that convinced the commission that the military and nation need Ellsworth.

All in all, a very good day for South Dakota!

GOP hopefuls breaking from Bush

This is illustrative of why the Chief is not very excited about most of these GOP thus far noted as possibles for the top of the ticket in '08.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee staked out his own ground on the issue of stem-cell research.

Supporting federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research (prior to last week's announcement by Harvard that they could convert skin cells to embryonic type stem cells) constitutes a Federally established demand for fetally derived embryonic stem cells, which in turn converts abortion into an even more commercial proposition to meet that demand.

Sen. George Allen of Virginia publicly disagreed with Mr. Bush's refusal to meet a second time with anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan.

Yech! Why would anyone want to meet with that whiney left-wing frump and give her the platform and added attention (Film at 11!) she craves.

Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska compared the war in Iraq to the Vietnam War, an analogy that is anathema to Mr. Bush. Sen. John McCain of Arizona has long disagreed with the president's tax cuts and confidence in Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

In the case of both Hegel and McCain, having an excellent and heroic war record in Viet-nam is apparently gives no guarantee of having a cogent and rational capacity for political thought 35 years later.
'nuff said.

Yet none of these senators has positioned himself as more conservative than the president, a move that might appeal to disaffected sectors of the Republican base. "It's a real dilemma for these Republican senators," said Democratic strategist Mary Anne Marsh. "They're trying to differentiate themselves from Bush on certain issues. And yet the Republican activists who dominate the nominating process are sticking with Bush on those issues."

HAH! This Donk has figured it out, on this at least.

Analysts from both parties said Republicans would do well to tap into the biggest sources of discontent among conservative Republicans -- lax immigration laws and excessive federal spending. Although no candidate has taken a prominent stance against the expansion of government under Mr. Bush, a dark horse is strongly challenging the administration on immigration. Rep. Tom Tancredo, Colorado Republican, adamantly opposes Mr. Bush's plan to grant legal status to millions of Mexicans who illegally entered the U.S. Although Mr. Tancredo's White House prospects are considered remote, his candidacy could pull the Republican field rightward in the way former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean pulled the Democratic field leftward in last year's primaries.

Congressman Tom Tancredo (R-CO) is far and away ahead of the pack as far as the Chief is personally concerned!

I'd like to think that I've stayed as far away from the "It was Clinton's fault!" or "It was Bush's fault!" arugments as I can. This is because I'm confident making the following assertion: America has not spent the last...

Liberals expand scope of attack on Roberts

Liberals have broadened their attack on federal Judge John G. Roberts Jr. beyond just his position on abortion to include accusations of a more general hostility toward women and privacy.

Surprise, surprise, surprise! Who would have ever expected such a thing! Shocking, simply shocking - unless of course one remembers that libDonks will be libDonks - it's just what they DO!

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