Biting the hand that feeds Hill AFB

"Government must create an environment where free enterprise can succeed and then get out of the way." — Utah Gov. Gary Herbert

	Join the Discussion
	Post a Comment

The governor may come to regret those words, part of his bellicosely anti-Washington State of the State address the other night, when the next federal Base Realignment and Closure Commission comes knocking on the door of Utah’s Hill Air Force Base.

Just two days after Herbert devoted a good chunk of this annual message to a screed against federal interference came word that the Pentagon plans $487 billion in spending cuts over the next decade. And that means another round of cutbacks in the number of American military installations.

The idea that the federal government has nothing to offer Utah and the state’s economy suddenly has a lot less currency. Even among Utah Republicans.

The news that Hill AFB might again have to defend its existence to federal budget-cutters immediately ratcheted Congressman Rob Bishop up to DefCon 2, demanding that the feds think twice before shrinking or closing a primary economic engine of northern Utah. Sen. Orrin Hatch, meanwhile, exposed himself less to easy charges of hypocrisy by stressing that Hill should be saved for reasons of national security, not for the benefit of the Utah economy.

Hill has dodged the BRAC bullet twice before. And, with all the investment in aircraft repair facilities at the base, there is significant hope that it could do so again. That it could do so based on real national security standards, not as an example of government economic stimulus — a.k.a. pork.

But politicians who claim to care about the federal deficit are being dishonest if they do not also see the need for huge cuts in defense spending. Even the Pentagon’s top brass have been heard to argue that imbalances in federal budgets are themselves a national security threat.

This is especially true of officials, including Utah Republicans, who clamor to protect the fiscally ruinous Bush tax cuts for the rich and deny the long-run savings promised by President Obama’s Affordable Care Act.

The argument that any particular program or facility should be preserved, lest its loss damage some area’s economy, will be hard to raise if those raising it are also attacking every other federal jobs, infrastructure and stimulus plan as outside the proper realm of government.

If Hill AFB can earn its survival, good. If not, then the government-doesn’t-create-jobs chorus of Utah Republicans may have some off-key explaining to do.