Ms Dowd on DoD and DADT Going Away

Ms Maureen Dowd, over at The New York Times talked about a US House Committee grilling Pentagon officials on the implementation of the disestablishment of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell".

She focused in Representative Austin Scott (R-GA) asking about the cost and being told that $10,000 had been spent on training materials.  Ms Dowd nots that the Representative "harrumphed":

If something was done at D.O.D. for $10,000, I would like to know what it was.

I am with Representative Scott.

I am sure that allowing homosexuals to serve openly in the military will provide fodder for Columnists for the whole year.  There are going to be problems as this all settles out.  People will make mistakes and overstep what DoD thinks of as the rules of the game.  In the end, with or without the attention of the press, this will work out—or it won't.  My money is on it working out.  The attention of the MSM will have little impact on the outcome.  But, it will allow us, the Great American Public, to be voyeurs in this process.

There are many more important issues for Ms Dowd to pay attention to.  With regard to DADT going away, it is all going to work out swell.

Regards  —  Cliff

Whiggamor

This Opinion Piece by Jim Pinkerton raises an interesting question, about who Republicans really should be.  Mr Pinkerton tasks Republican Governor Mitch Daniels of Indiana as an example and suggests he might be a modern Whig.  (Not to be confused with the Modern Whig Party recently formed by veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan.)

Maybe he is.

Regards  —  Cliff

Academic Freedom

I believe in "Academic Freedom", but sometimes it gets passed over for what might seem like political reasons, as is the case with UCLA Professor James Enstrom.  The link is to a comment by Law Professor Glenn Reynolds (the Instapundit), who links to a posting by Blogger Ed Morrissey.

Being a Whistle Blower helps all of us, but is at great risk of getting in trouble due to retribution from the agency that was ripping off the rest of us.  We need to stand up for Whistle Blowers.  Although, I will admit that some of them can be a little difficult personality wise, but still, they are an important part of our process and help the rest of us when the promised transparency fails.

Here is the Instapundit's punch line:

A cynic might suggest, of course, that notions of academic freedom were developed in the first half of the 20th century largely in order to protect communists from being fired, and that since Enstrom isn’t a communist, academic freedom shouldn’t apply . . . .

Regards  —  Cliff

I'm Confused Here

From The Washington Post we have this late Friday night article by Reporters David Fahrenthold and Paul Kane.

It seems the budget situation, the need for both houses of Congress to pass a continuing resolution♠ by Friday night, and for the President to sign it, is all being put on the shoulders of House Speaker John Boehner.  I would have thought that the ball was in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's court, where Senator Rand Paul is putting forward troublesome riders.♥  That is to say, the House of Representatives have passed something and are waiting for a response from the Senate.

We all know that the problem is those 75 Freshman House Members.  They want to have the budget balanced and the Federal Debt reduced.  The idea that they would stand by what they ran on seems strange.

But, if those 75 chaps won't budge, what are their Democratic Party colleagues doing?  Sitting on their hands?  Are they not willing to compromise with the Republican Leadership in the House to get this Continuing Resolution passed?

Is this all about "optics"?

Regards  —  Cliff

♠ Here is the short version on Continuing Resolutions.  The situation is further complicated by the fact that the US Congress must pass both an Authorization to spend money and an Appropriation of that money and the President must sign both or the Congress must override the veto.
♥ The Senator has "attached an amendment to the small-business re-authorization bill" that has the Senate adopting then Senator Obama's words from the Senate Record in 2007 that the President does not have the "power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation."

City Life Continued

Continuing the discussions from City Life this morning, I would like to talk about two City Manager issues, domicile and contract.

First to domicile issues.  The argument advanced was that if the City Manager lives in the City (or town), then he or she knows what is happening and experiences the impact of decisions.  The example given was Dracut, where the Town Manager, who, upon being appointed, moved up from Maryland.  The contrast is Lowell City Manager, Bernie Lynch, who lives in—wait for it—Chelmsford.

My question is, does a person in Belvedere Village, or the Belvedere itself, have a better idea of what is going on in South Lowell or the Northwestern corner of Pawtucketville than someone living just across the line in Chelmsford?  Not only that, but we should ask ourselves if we ARE the City for all those suburbs, and if we are, does not a city employee living in one of our suburbs not feel the impact of decisions taken by our City Government?

But, if we are going to require someone to live in Lowell, rather than them deciding to live in Lowell as a convenience, shouldn't we have to pay for it?  I bet one of the nice things about hiring our Commissioner of Public Works, Mr Ralph Snow, is that his move here was FREE to us.  Everyone retiring from the military gets a free final move of his or her household goods.  Good deal for us.

But, for those senior managers we hire who are not retiring from the military, we should act like a big business and pick up the cost.  I would think that would include:

• Reasonable household goods moving expenses, to include insurance.
• Travel for spouse or SIGO for one house-hunting trip (travel and per diem at State or Federal rates, whichever is lower)
• Closing costs on a new home, plus incidental costs, if applicable
• Costs pursuant to selling previous dwelling
• Purchase of previous home at assessed value if it does not sell within 12 weeks.

With regard to the issue of a contract, I would say that I have never had a contract, so I am not sure of its value.  For those who say, but you were in the military, I would say that the "contract" was all for the protection of the Government's interests.  They could have instituted a RIF and I could have been gone in days.♠  The Courts have ruled that an occasional clearing out of personnel is quite acceptable.

But, as it applies to the City Manager, I think the question is, what does the City Council have the stomach for?  If the City Council is prepared to vote on any given Tuesday to buy up the City Manager's contract, it has nothing to worry about with regard to a contract.  On the other hand, a contract seems only reasonable for someone who is being asked to relocate his or her family to Lowell to meet some residency requirement.  I think the two go hand in hand.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Reduction in Force

Talk of the Town

Lynne and Mimi announced today that they are closing up shop.

Shocking, but not as shocking as the announcement at the US Army's very own DOT mil web site that the Army is going back to the old frontier Stetson as headgear for it's 1.1 million members.  Cav troops were immediately up in arms.

The best was when my son called home and asked if we were watching TV.  It seems a UFO was hovering over the Capitol.

Regards  —  Cliff

Libya Continues

As the City Life show wound down this morning Host George Anthes threw the War in Libya into the mix.♠

Because I haven't switched the channel we now have Rep Dennis Kucinich on "Democracy Now" saying that the President has no authority to take the US to war in Libya; that he has exceeded his authority and action needs to be taken.  He has assumed power that no President has assumed, not even President Bush.  Being Commander-in-Chief is not authority to take the nation to war.  If Congress is to mean anything at all we have a responsibility to call this Administration to account.  The Congressman dismisses the idea that just because it happened in the past mean that Congress can't now assert its powers under Article 1 of the Constitution.  He specifically states that the President has NOT met the requirements of the War Powers Act (or Resolution).  The current administration is on the same line as John Yoo.

So, IMHO, there is the question of if the Presidency continues to drift toward a place where, at least in the area of foreign affairs, the role of the Congress is reduced to ex post facto ratification of the actions of the President.  This is a long term issue and one that can only be resolved by the US Congress, collectively, asserting its righs and responsibilities under the Constitution.

But, back to City Life, the question was, why Libya and not some other place, like North Korea (I would throw in Cote d'Ivoire).  The answer is, we do what we can, where we can, when we can and ignore what we can't fixed.  Libya is a prime example.  There are air bases within range of Libya and the ships of several members of the coalition are always somewhere shore.  Nations which might provide support are on the borders of Libya.  Perhaps most important, Libya does not have a nuclear capability that could threaten others, as is the case with North Korea.♥

There is no doubt that there was, and is, a threat to the People of Libya and the fact that Colonel Qaddafi's military is to a large degree Mercs from other African nations makes threats of massacres more credible.  This is not Egypt, where the Army is from the People and thus might well side with the People.  In Libya the military is there for the money and will kill for that same money.

So, to answer George Anthes, we are consistent.  We do what we can do without imposing a high cost on ourselves.

The other thing I would note is that sending in Air and Naval Forces, due to their configurations and their ways of fighting, does not grab the attention of the American People.  Ships launch TLAMs from off shore and the risk to the crewmen is minimal.  Pilots and Weapons Systems Officers are graduates of college and a lengthy training program so are probably six years away from high school graduation.  In contrast, soldiers and Marines, with boots on the ground, are quite possibly only a year or two out of high school and thus their death or serious injury has a greater impact on local communities.  Further, the loss of a soldier or Marine, either wounded or killed, is likely not isolated, as the platoon, company or battalion consists of 50 or 200 or 800 people engaged in the fight.  Conversely, a "Flight of Four" aircraft puts at risk at most eight people.

The real danger in this contrast is that we will think that an "Air and Maritime" action is not a real war and we will engage in it without understanding the consequences.  As we have seen with Colonel Qaddafi in the past, he can hit back in indirect ways, such as by blowing up airliners (he has two to his credit).

There is no free lunch.  Every action has some consequences.  We should be working to make those good consequences; for us and for others.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Down to about seven minutes, so too late, IMHO, to call in.
♥  Thank you, President George W Bush.