[danielmryan]

It’s no apparent now, but given time it will destroy the moral of the armed forces and cause the need for a draft.

And a draft will do damage in ways that a professional soldier would be glad to tell you about. The more highly trained the forces, the more of a liability the "conscript syndrome" becomes. Yelling isn't a magic wand.

At the very least, shifting back to a conscript-fed military will cause the death toll to skyrocket. One of the reasons why the death toll for post-Vietnam wars has been so low, relative to Vietnam and before, has been a professional all-volunteer army.

[srmorton]

Another thing that is related to the military is Obama’s vain hope of winning NC in the upcoming election - hence the choice of Charlotte as the site of the Democratic Convention and his numerous visits to our state. I always thought that his chances of winning NC were slim to none anyway, but his announcement of cuts in the US Army and the USMC directly affect NC. I live in Jacksonville, the home of Camp Lejeune, the largest amphibious MCB in the world. The base and the city of Jacksonville have spent millions of dollars constructing on base and off base housing for the INCREASE in the forces that were ordered by President Bush. It takes time to prepare for such an increase in numbers. Now, Obama has made sure that the increase will not occur! He is definitely persona non-grata for most of the citizens of Eastern NC which is also the location of Fort Bragg Army base. These cuts will directly affect the economy of our part of the state!