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" Sadly, few of today's partisan pundits know anything about the environment of service in the Reserves in the 1970s. The image of a reservist at that time is of one who joined, went off for six months' basic training, then came back and drilled weekly or monthly at home, with two weeks of "summer camp." With the knowledge that Mr. Johnson and Mr. McNamara were not going to call out the Reserves, it did become a place of refuge for many wanting to avoid Vietnam."

This is not gold, unfortunately. When the writer repeatedly cites President Johnson and Robert McNamara as the architects of the reserves in the 1970s he is ignoring the fact that President Johnson did not seek re-election in 1968, and was replaced by President Nixon, after a dismal showing by George McGovern in that election. Don't get me wrong. I still believe President Nixon was a great president, and I knew him during that period 1970-1974, but a good case can be made weak with bad information.

I think you are parsing this a little too tight. Reservists in the 70's could have joined in the 60's on the Johnson / McNamara watch and if anyone was going to call out the reserves, it was them. By the time Nixon took office, it was clear he was going to end things one way or the other and escalation wasn't going to come from the guard but rather from active duty. The "safe refuge" designation did indeed come from Johnson's administration.

And flying high-performance interceptors is not a safe tour of duty.