Nothing But Words

I have too many interests and not enough time.

If you do a Google News search for “base closings,” you’ll see that the new round of military base closures planned by the DoD is getting a lot of press attention. This round of closures follows previous rounds in 1988, 1991, 1993, and 1995. In 1994 I worked as an intern for Business Executives for National Security (BENS) where I did research on the base closing process. We learned that in many respects it was a shell game, with new federal or military missions often taking up shop on the “closed” bases, thus undercutting much of the expected cost savings. Leslie Stahl did a 60 Minutes piece based on BENS research.

For one of my research seminars while I was a graduate student, I attempted a statistical analysis to assess what factors determined whether closed bases would “re-open” with new defense or federal activities. My model was flawed but salvageable – I figured I’d return to it as a possible dissertation topic. But then I never went on to complete my PhD.

I want to improve on my original analysis, but there would be quite a lot of research to do, and I just don’t have the time (especially since it’s work that’s not exactly relevant to my career). Maria suggested I find a graduate student who might be interested, and let him or her take on the additional research. We could then see if we could get it published as a co-authored paper. I think it’d be a useful contribution to the discussions concerning the current round of base closings, and of course, it’d be nice to get a paper published

So I think I’ll make a few phone calls. I’m still friendly with a professor at Georgetown, someone at BENS might be interested, and between Maria and one of her colleagues at Penn, we can ask around among Villanova’s and Penn’s graduate students.