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Base-closure panel finds overestimation of savings

The final Base Re-alignment and Closing Commission report has been sent to the President. The final version notably maintains Ellsworth AFB of South Dakota as a going concern. Hopefully, the report is accepted.

The Pentagon overestimated savings from base closings by $30 billion and some of its plans for streamlining the Army, Navy and Air Force might have made the services less efficient, a federal commission that reviewed the process said yesterday.

With its five months of work complete, the Base Realignment and Closure Commission voiced its concerns even as it approved roughly 86 percent of what Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld recommended as he sought to save money by getting rid of extra space in the domestic military network. That's on par with previous years, when commissions changed only about 15 percent of what the Pentagon proposed.

A Hurricane Exposes the Man-Made Disaster of the Welfare State

H/T to a former Navy shipmate for this article e-mailed to me. He offered it without comment, and if you check it out, you'll see that it speaks for itself. (by the way, he's in the Houston area, a lot closer to the action than the Chief is up in South Dakota.)

If this is just a natural disaster, the response for public officials is obvious: you bring in food, water, and doctors; you send transportation to evacuate refugees to temporary shelters; you send engineers to stop the flooding and rebuild the city's infrastructure. For journalists, natural disasters also have a familiar pattern: the heroism of ordinary people pulling together to survive; the hard work and dedication of doctors, nurses, and rescue workers; the steps being taken to clean up and rebuild.

Public officials did not expect that the first thing they would have to do is to send thousands of armed troops in armored vehicle, as if they are suppressing an enemy insurgency. And journalists?myself included?did not expect that the story would not be about rain, wind, and flooding, but about rape, murder, and looting.

But this is not a natural disaster. It is a man-made disaster.

The man-made disaster is not an inadequate or incompetent response by federal relief agencies, and it was not directly caused by Hurricane Katrina. This is where just about every newspaper and television channel has gotten the story wrong.

The man-made disaster we are now witnessing in New Orleans did not happen over four days last week. It happened over the past four decades. Hurricane Katrina merely exposed it to public view.

Former Representative Tim Roemer is suggesting Jimmy Carter take over the New Orleans rebuilding effort. Judging by how ol' President Goofy Tooth operated as president, I am not so sure this is a good idea, unless this is a clever...

Chad at CCK has a post on the Roberts nomination to be Chief Justice (I checked, Professor Schaff and it really was Chad). The CCK position is perfectly reasonable.I don?t claim to be any expert on the nomination process. But...

FEMA Dumps Brown As Katrina Relief Chief

Call a spade a spade: Pres. Bush appointing this guy as head of FEMA was NOT a positive move. Pulling him out of the Katrina situation into a role of "overall supervision" is effectively kicking him upstairs to get him out of the way.

This is a necessary move, and frankly, the Chief hopes that he is gracefully moved out altogether after some period of time, to complete the process of error correction.

His replacement, Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen has HIS ducks in a row, and will be a major improvement.

Yesterday, Tim Russert took it to Democrat New Orleans Mayor, Ray Nagin:New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin is defending his actions in connection with Hurricane Katrina, as he was grilled yesterday about why hundreds of public buses were not used to...

As Bush nominated Judge Roberts to be the next Chief Justice, the Washington Post says that Democrats from conservative states are supportive of Roberts because of Daschle's defeat:Sen. Kent Conrad, a Democrat from North Dakota, sounds like a swooning Republican...

Bob Denver, aka Gilligan, has died. He's finally off the island. Happy trails little buddy....

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