Base closings ?

[MORTARDUDE]

http://federalnewsradio.com/index.php?nid=22&sid=57824

Mythed It By That Much
by Mike Causey
Updated: Thursday, Oct. 30, 2003


What do the Army's Carlisle Barracks in Pennsylvania, Fort Monmouth in New Jersey, and the Redstone Arsenal in Alabama have in common with Altus, Columbus and Grand Forks Air Forces Bases? Or the Navy Supply Corps School in Georgia? Or the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego?
All of the above may or may not be on the BRAC list. BRAC, if you are outside the Defense establishment, is not the name of an chocolate or a brand of sausage. It stands for the Base Realignment And Closure list, which is just what it says. A list that will come out after the November 2004 elections, consisting of military facilities slated to be shutdown, or realigned.

Being on the BRAC list isn't good for the communities that lose the facilities and the jobs, or for the workers in those jobs. Or the people who sell them food, houses and cars. That's why BRAC is like the firing squad where one member is given a blank so that no one can be sure they took part in the execution.

BRAC turns the job of cutting bases over to a blue ribbon panel. IT then makes recommendations which are released after elections, whenever possible. The politicians can approach hometown voters without too much guilt about losing a facility. They can say they didn't vote for closure and cannot stop it from happening.

Billions of dollars ride on the names the BRAC list contains, so it's only natural that a variety of bogus BRAC lists, purporting to be the real thing, are making the rounds on the internet. And they're scaring some employees to death. And turning some newspaper and TV reporters into monkeys when they breathlessly report a hometown shutdown that isn't going to happen.