BRAC FLACK!

What does anyone think of today's Senate Filibuster attempt led by Texas Republican Kay Bailey Hutchinson? A few Senators are trying to tie up the hill about the new Senate dropping the 3.1 Billion Dollar earmark funding Don Rumsfeld's BRAC military base realignment plan, in the omnibus appropriations bill. While most of us were enjoying the holidays last year, several high-ranking military officers testified against Rumsfeld's plan saying it weakened our internal defense posture. Of course none of the politicians or public figures were tuned into c-span during their recess, nor were most of us... But I happened to catch a broadcast one nite and I was intrigued by these highly decorated commanders being very vocal in opposition to this strategy.

Why is it that Donald Rumsfeld and this administration can consistently be wrong about policy, strategy, the opposition's capability, intent and determination, yet some Senators continue to press for this policy?

BRAC is a dangerous policy of concentrating and aggregating our forces and assets into forward bases and only a few giant bases within the States. The Vice President, Rumsfeld and several other top Bush administration advisors belong to the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) thinktank who's global strategy outlined by them in 1998 essentially stated the global-conquest of the planet, securing their United States as the supreme superpower and ruler of the planet... thereby meaning that some US corporations would have global domination of the market backed by supreme military force. Even the most conservative citizens (both R&D) do not share this radical departure from our country's Constitution and basic principles.

The Generals agreed that moving all our military hardware from cities (like milwaukee) and locations round the country will seriously impede their effectiveness as a defense shield against both environmental as well as terror threats. Unless our intention is to aggregate the assets into an offensive posture, this policy made no sense.

Never-mind too, that all the bases chosen to be closed and realigned would cause serious hardships on the families and communities that grew to support these bases and that these communities would no doubt get angry at their local leadership for letting this happen, but coincidentally, all the bases chosen to close, were in blue states near population centers, and all the bases that were to get the no-bid Halliburton base construction contracts worth millions, happened to be in red states where those congressmen would surely gain great public support by the economic prosperity their action would shower on their voters.

The scariest thing that Rumsfeld's BRAC policy would unleash, beyond the United States confirming a global posture of aggression rather than defense, is that it leaves our nation without an infrastructure of defense or support. We no longer would have national guard troops with substantial machinery to secure an area after a calamity like New Orleans. And God forbid, there should ever come a time when we needed to stand up against a rogue takeover of our own government, whether militarily or economically. If the leadership went against our will, this policy effectively takes all our weapons away and leaves us just like the iraqis were, with only small caliber rifles and handguns.

It is also very interesting to watch the way the media has given so much airtime to the actions of these few Senators who beg for fair play from the new Democratic leadership after there was so little media coverage of the last six years of the GOP led lock-down of Congress the past six years. In reality, the petty claims of exclusion and fair-play that garner headlines today, pale in comparison to the exclusionary actions of the Republican majority that never got mass public coverage. The headlines today deplore actions that compared to the behavior of Bill Frist and Tom Delay are like like equating the actions bank robbers to a schoolboy stealing a candy bar. Both are wrong but there's a mighty big difference between the scale of crimes and oddly, the size of the headlines. 

But what's the real reason these Senators fight for Rumsfeld's BRAC policy making America into a world aggressor? Is it their genuine belief that it best serves their nation and its people, or their true constituents the corporate citizens? Hutchinson and the Kansas and Georgia Senators that were so vocal today, all stand to have millions of dollars spent in their States from this $3.1 Billion dollar earmark... has the money trumped the reality that Rumsfeld's policy has dubious underpinnings? Has the will of the people been dismissed by these GOP lapdogs who seem to have forgotten the results of the November Election? I guess only time will tell.