Some are saying that the W is punishing blue states by closing military bases!

Fact is, most all base closings are in blue states..............Comments......

There's a process for deciding which bases to close. This is just the beginning and there's more than likely to be some fancy shuffling like there has been in the past. I hope you're reading too much into the red v blue states. If you look at county-level maps what you see is a purple country with a few bright red and a few bright blue counties. Here's an interesting geographical study of the voter stats (http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/). I doubt any politician writes-off a state because of a presidential election. Instead, they spend their time trying to hold onto their own patch and see if they can snake-in some suckers from other folks' patches.

I wish they'd close all that need closing rather than dribbling them out over decades. It's wasting billions of dollars to keep them all open.

Now if we could only retire about half the existing carrier battle fleets and ballistic missle subs and 8,000-10,000 nukular warheads I'd be even happier.

No, I hadn't thought such until someone I know suggested such a scenario....then wondered is this possible!

So where else could I test such????

Most of you people here provide a good response, and so I try it here because people respond!

Many of my threads are controversial, and do generate response, and that is good. I almost never have an answer, but enjoy energizing thoughts for thinking.....whatever their outcome.............BB

I think this is just too ridiculous to believe. Bush may be a lot of things....but he's not going to sacrifice the jobs/safety of Americans due to a petty political revenge agenda.

Get outta here.

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The Democrats hate the military..........why are they complaining if they have their bases closed or are they trying to have their cake and eat it too?

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"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche

I wonder what the true proportion of all bases is? If the Blue sates have more bases to begin with then it's obvious that they are likely to have more closings.

Also with most bases near coastal area's which also happens to be mostly blue, it seems most likey that this is the case.

I wonder what the true proportion of all bases is? If the Blue sates have more bases to begin with then it's obvious that they are likely to have more closings.

Also since most bases are near coastal area's which also happens to be mostly blue states, it seems likey that this is the case. At least in the NE which was hit hard by closings.

Military cuts are sharpest in New England
Officials worry for security, culture

In-Depth Coverage

By Bryan Bender,

New England has experienced a greater decline in military presence since the end of the Cold War than any other region of the country and is now at risk of losing its only active-duty air and naval bases, according to data compiled by the Globe and government officials.

Thirty-five of 93 major bases shuttered across the nation since 1988, or a third of the total, were in Northeastern and Midwestern states, part of an exodus of large military installations from Northern states over the last decade and a half to the economically friendlier South and West.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2005/050410-military-cuts.htm

"This ending quote of Gary Hart (from a doc linked by MedMech) is pretty much how I believe. "''I believe the military should be free to determine where it wants to put its forces, free from political considerations," Gary Hart, a former Democratic senator from Colorado and a homeland security specialist, said in an interview. ''Base structuring, like weapons procurement, should not be political. There are two military structures in the Constitution: a standing Army and Navy to defend our borders and interests abroad, and the so-called militias that became the National Guard. They are tasked with protecting the homeland, not the standing Army or Navy."

I like ol' Hart most of the time, too bad about his 'Risky Business' episode. Had it been post-Clinton it wouldn't have been a big deal.

...uh, that's sarcasm, right?

Funny that the Military hating liberals are the ones are the first ones to be whining about losing the bases and the money they bring.

You can't ***** and moan about the Military spending then ***** and moan that they are cutting the spending in your state....

And whats really sick is they are blind to their own hypocricy.

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Proud owner of ....
1971 280SE W108
1979 300SD W116
1983 300D W123
1975 Ironhead Sportster chopper
1987 GMC 3/4 ton 4X4 Diesel
1989 Honda Civic (Heavily modified)
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Section 609 MVAC Certified
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"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche

My blue state faired quite well, and I don't think there's much to the blue/red base closing conspiracy theory. I wished they'd doubled, tripled or quadrupled the number of base closings, especially overseas...and halved the pentagon budget while they're at it.

CT is as usuall going to get hit hard by this. They had better not touch Groton or Electric boat.

Sikorsky is already in the process of oh, dieing. They make 1 military choper and they gave the presidential contract to Europe.

We miss the cold war, lots of people I know had very good jobs because of it.

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I think in the long run the local communities are going to find they like base closings. They just redid a military base and an old airport out here into a nice middle class mix use development. Change is good. People spend money, stuff gets built.

Look around a military base. The buisnesses are pretty low end. Pawn shops, check cashing stores, fast food. Military folk don't make a lot and don't spend a lot. It's no great loss.