Base Closing Dims Republican Star (Novacula)

[northzax]

Base-closing dims Republican star

August 22, 2005

BY ROBERT NOVAK SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST

The Base Realignment and Closure Commission will have finished its work by week's end, and Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota probably will be closed forever. That also will close Sen. John Thune's tenure as national Republican poster boy following his victory last year over Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle. This is a cautionary tale of what happens when politicians forget politics.

President Bill Clinton saved Ellsworth for Daschle during the last BRAC process in 1995, but President Bush was detached in 2005. The resulting closure demolishes Thune's home-state prestige and threatens Republican domination of western South Dakota (where Ellsworth is located) by eliminating 6,000 civilian jobs. Local political setbacks may be reversed, but damage to Thune as a national fund-raiser and candidate-recruiter seems irrevocable. He has been transformed from regular to maverick. Bush might ask himself: Is closing one air base worth this?

read on at: http://www.suntimes.com/output/novak/cst-edt-novak22.html

Sorry, Sen. Thune, you were'nt handpicked to have influence you were handpicked to be a yes man, no matter what. didn't you read the memo?

[wakeme2008]

1. Even Novacula knows Clinton saved it last time

but Bush and Thune could care less.

[northzax]

2. I think Thune actually believed the Bushies

when they said they'd save it. It's going to be interesting seeing how he acts over the next 5 years, now that he's no longer tied to his master as a vassal- Thune has, in essence, become a ronin accountable to no one in the Party, we'll see if he takes the opportunity.