Congressman Cox (R-CA) follows Kerry's proposal

[question everything]

In 1999 the Navy closed the Marines base at El Toro and all the units were moved to Miramar in San Diego County. Since then, the base has been standing fallows, while a ten years battle raged over its future reuse.

The housing units, meanwhile, just continued to deteriorate, being old, full of asbestos and lead paint anyway.

But, goaded by some, Kerry's campaign, last month, issued a statement, attacking Bush for not worrying about military families, calling on Bush to open the base housing. This, even though the Navy already decided that it would be too costly to repair and too inefficient to have Navy personnel living in Orange County while commuting to Camp Pendleton - where new housing units are being built.

Now comes Congressman Christopher Cox, an arch Conservative from Orange County who wants.. the same http://www.cox.house.gov/html/release.cfm?id=730

(and both are dead wrong)

[American Renaissance]

1. SNA

El Toro was supposed to be turned into a new international airport for Orange County and replace SNA.

Unfortunately NIMBY has frozen that proposal in its tracks,

I think NIMBY's who fight airport construction should be put on the terrorist "no fly" list.

[question everything]

3. Ever been there?

You don't put an airport in the middle of a densely populated area, and Orange County is the most populated county in SoCal.

The planned airport was against all the laws of physics; planes were going to takeoff with a tail wind, on an uphill against mountain range. Why? Because taking off with a head wind would have send them over residential areas. One of the worst military disaster occurred in 1965, when 65 marines died when an aircraft tried to follow that route.

There were no fuel lines. More than 800 trucks would have to carry fuel each day. And... there was no demand. This was going to be a while elephant sitting waiting for the millions of passengers that were supposedly going to come all the way from Ventura and Riverside counties, jamming the already clogged freeways. Not! Thus, Orange County, that in 1994 declared the largest municipal bankruptcy in the history of this nation, was going to end up, again, with revenue bonds with no revenue.

All the time, airports in Riverside and San Bernardino counties have been begging, still do, for passengers to come and use their new, vast facilities.

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. Given the shortage of military housing

ALL up and down the Southland, this is not as crazy as it seems

Now I suspect this is a short term solution for Kerry, but a long term (read pork) for the CONgressman.

My husband just retired from the Navy and let me tell you, Housing is a very serious problem all up and down the Southland (and Hawaii)

[question everything]

4. This is true, but would you really want to live in a dilapidated house?

The Navy is not going to spend $100 million to rehab these buildings, especially since there are no activity there. The Navy wants the people to be close to their bases. Especially now.

Just recently I heard that a person in Mission Viejo was renting her condo to a young Marine couple but she said they had to move because he's stationed at Pendleton and he was told that because of the situation in Iraq, he couldn't live north of the base.

There are other ways to assist in military housing then trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.

Frankly, I think that neither Kerry nor Cox are interested in putting any one in the dilapidated buildings of El Toro. After all, MCAS Tustin, just a few miles away, closed recently and it has many, newer units there, but no one is interested in them.