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Last year in a trial in Rapid City, Arlo Looking Cloud was charged with the execution of AIM activist Anna Mae Pictou Aquash and found guilty. His appeal was rejected today. Exerpts:A federal appeals court on Friday upheld the murder...

Although I'd prefer to let the Cindy Sheehan dog lie, we did get this email that I thought worth sharing with the author's permission. The story that is being told by the left and the right is purely a media...

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.

Our Democratic colleagues in the regional blogsophere are being rather more generous in sharing the credit for today's good news than they were when Ellsworth was put on the BRAC list, which is probably what we at SDPolitics would have...

Ellsworth AFB, located just outside of Rapid City, SD, received 8 of 9 votes yesterday by the BRAC committee to be kept open. Here's an AP story on yesterday's happenings. Pending approval by Congress and the President, it looks like...

A letter to the editor from the Rapid City Journal:During his impeachment for perjury, President Clinton taught us that personal attacks never fed a hungry child. Our good friends on the left have obviously forgotten this lesson. Recently, there have...

Brian Maloney and Michelle Malkin have been publishing a multi-part series of "Inside Air America" pieces that will likely shed new light on some of Err America's past operations. It appears to be a very good bit of investigative blogging,...

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!

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