Name game sets off new Piñon Canyon furor

Fort Carson officials thought renaming the Piñon Canyon Maneuver Site would help bury the hatchet with southern Colorado ranchers who opposed the post’s now-shelved expansion plans for the training area. Instead, the public relations move went horribly wrong this month when ranchers learned of it and decided it was part of an ongoing conspiracy to separate them from their beloved rangeland. “If their intention was to make friends and influence people, they read the wrong book,” said Lon Robertson, head of the Piñon Canyon Expansion Opposition Coalition and a firm adherent to the belief that renaming the place is part of a land-grabbing plot. Whether the 235,000-acre training site east of Trinidad will get the new moniker “Fort Carson South” remains up in the air. The post would have to get Army approval, which could take weeks or years. Fort Carson garrison commander Col. Robert McLaughlin said on Wednesday the new name came out of discussions with community leaders in southern Colorado about ways to ease tension between the Army and Piñon Canyon’s neighbors. “One of the discussions was ‘Why don’t we look at renaming Piñon Canyon and naming it for something people respect — Fort Carson',” McLaughlin said...more

You don't get respect by changing your name Col. McLaughlin.  If you want respect you've got to earn it.  You could start by having DOD remove the 2007 waiver  which is hanging over everybody's heads.  How about it Col.?