Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Up first on The Western Word (TWW) is the story about the long-awaited housing money for Malmstrom AFB.
The Great Falls Tribune is reporting today that “Malmstrom lands funds for housing” and will finally get their $140 million for housing.
Big thanks should go to Congressman Denny Rehberg, R-Mont., who along with former Senator Conrad Burns, R-Mont., guided the appropriations funding for Fiscal Year 2007 until it was stopped by the democratic takeover in Congress.
Of course, Senator Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Senator Jon Tester, D-Mont., were able to get some media attention out of this. TWW finds it hard to believe they actually care.
Additionally, it appears that due to the democrat majority take-over in congress and the delay of the appropriations bills getting votes, this will cost Malmstrom AFB a few houses due to the costs rising for building the units. That’s too bad along with all the other projects that lost money.
TWW believes Rehberg deserves all the credit here for getting the funding restored.

Up second today is the continuing story I am calling, “Where’s my Senator?”
I checked Senator Jon Tester’s schedule again today (Saturday, March 17) and his latest schedule only shows March 14.
I’ll bet he’s drinking some red beer in Butte USA today. Maybe he’s drinking green beer since it is St. Patrick’s Day. By the way, Jack the Blogger likes beer, too (red, green, dark, light).
If you’re wondering where Senator Tester has been in the past, you can go to this WEBSITE and see, since he does not archive his schedule on the senate website.
Hat tip to Andrew on this.
Has this campaign promise already been broken like the seat on the appropriations committee promise? We’ll give him a pass on this one for a few more days.
Jack the Blogger was raised by my union member father and he always told me to keep my word and actually do what I say I would do. Good advice.

The third STORY on the blog deals with veterans.
A pat on the back goes to Congressman Denny Rehberg, R-Mont., for taking time out of his schedule to tour Fort Harrison Veterans Hospital. I guess my next question is when will Max schedule a tour?

The fourth story on today’s TWW deals with music!
As many readers and friends know, TWW is a big REO Speedwagon fan and has been for years. REO has a new CD coming out on April 3. You can pre-order the CD at Walmart.com and Walmart claims it will be delivered by April 3. Best of all, it’s affordable!

And finally, my final story today is about the NCAA basketball tournament.
Jack the Blogger went 25-7 in the first round. We’ll see how the second round goes. Most of the games have not been that good.