Posted on 10/06/2004 3:30:28 AM PDT by Elkiejg
The latest fear factor being injected into the presidential election equation is a ghost from our past - the military draft.
For the past several weeks, moms of the soccer and security persuasion, as well as the demographic known as The Youth Vote, have been targeted by an e-mail campaign promising reinstitution of the military draft should President George W. Bush be re-elected.
One e-mail that's been circulating and posted on the Internet says, for example, that there's pending legislation in the House and Senate, (HR 163 and S 89) to reinstate mandatory draft for men and women (ages 18-26) starting June 15, 2005.
Portentously, the e-mailer writes: "The Bush administration is quietly trying to get these bills passed now, while the public's attention is on the elections. The Bush administration plans to begin mandatory draft in the spring of 2005, just after the 2004 presidential election."
Those chilling bullets of doom, though untrue, have gained traction with the help of former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and former Georgia Sen. Max Cleland. Both recently have told college audiences that another Bush presidency will mean the draft for young Americans.
"America will reinstate the military draft" if Bush is re-elected, Cleland told an audience at Colorado College in Colorado Springs.
"I think that George Bush is certainly going to have a draft if he goes into a second term, and any young person who doesn't want to go to Iraq might think twice about voting for him," Dean said in a speech at Brown University in Providence, R.I.
Get the picture? Now that the draft meme is loose in the land and everyone is nearly hysterical, let's all take a deep breath. No draft. It ain't gonna happen for at least two reasons: Americans don't want it, and the military doesn't need it.
Talk of the draft was born - like most bad rumors these days - of a political liaison. Indeed, the two pieces of legislation mentioned in the scary e-mail both were introduced by Democrats almost two years ago (January 2003) as part of a strategy to discourage support for the Iraq war.
The House version was sponsored by Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., and the Senate version by Sen. Ernest Hollings, D-S.C. Neither bill has much support in the Congress, which authorizes a draft, nor is that fact expected to change. Not even Rangel is pushing the bill, according to FactCheck.org, a political fact-checking project of the nonpartisan Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania.
Nearly everyone agrees that we need more troops both in Iraq and to meet future challenges, but Rangel's primary arguments for fairness and equality in the military arena are easily refuted. Contrary to some of Rangel's earlier claims, today's military front lines are not filled disproportionately with minorities.
Defense Department figures show that though there are more blacks in the armed services as a whole (22 percent, compared with 13 percent of all 18-to-44-year-old civilians), the difference is because blacks re-enlist at a higher rate than whites. In a report last year, military analysts found that 36 percent of African American soldiers held support and administrative jobs; 27 percent of workers in the medical and dental fields are black.
"These young men and women are high-school graduates with above average aptitude," the report said, "They are not the 'poor and uneducated.'"
The best arguments against a draft are common-sensical: (1) people who don't want to serve don't serve well; (2) a draft by lottery, which is necessary in order to ensure random selection, would cull the dregs as well as the cream of the nation's youth crop, thus reducing quality; and (3) today's military, on average better educated than the U.S. civilian population (96 percent of enlistees have high school diplomas compared with 75 percent of all in their age group), requires well-trained, professional soldiers.
The question isn't whether to draft, but how to encourage quality individuals to volunteer for military service during wartime. The answer should be obvious to any self-respecting capitalist: money. If we want a professional military - and the Department of Defense and the American people seem to - then we should offer professional wages.
I'm betting most Americans gladly would pay a little extra in taxes (read my lips: no more tax cuts) to ensure our military men and women are justly compensated for a job few of us could or would willingly do.
Don't agree with Kathleen on "no more tax cuts" to pay our military professional wages. There are many more ways to find this money.....one I can think of right off the bat is disband the Civil Rights Commission and Mary Francis Berry - that would instantly put over 5 MILLION into the military budget.
I started my military career when the draft was still in vogue and am serving now in the all volunteer military. You don't want to go back to the draft. The men and women serving now do it because they want to. Not because they have to.
It actually came up for a vote the other day in the house - rejected 402-2.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1236539/posts
"Rep. John P. Murtha, Pennsylvania Democrat, and Rep. Pete Stark, California Democrat, voted for the measure."
None of the 17 co-sponsors (all 'Rats, of course) voted for it.
What the dems did in starting that rumor was dispicable and Rangle and Hollings should be hung out to dry.
Yea, they push the DEMOCRAT SPONSORED draft bill issue, and try to imply that Bush will impose the draft.
I wrote a story on this a couple weeks ago in relation to dnCBS' fraudulent reporting.
http://www.nodnc.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=14&mode=nested&order=1&thold=0
For MANY other stories and proof of DNC vote fraud and corruption, please see,
http://www.noDNC.com
As a side note, the thought just occurred to me to wonder how the democRats can both extol a draft dodger with NO military history and loath an individual who still served, albeit in the National Guard.
| Yeas | Nays | PRES | NV | |
| Republican | 215 | 12 | ||
| Democratic | 2 | 186 | 17 | |
| Independent | 1 | |||
| TOTALS | 2 | 402 | 29 |
| Murtha |
Stark |
| Abercrombie Ackerman Aderholt Akin Alexander Allen Andrews Baca Bachus Baird Baker Baldwin Ballenger Barrett (SC) Bartlett (MD) Barton (TX) Bass Beauprez Becerra Bell Berkley Berman Berry Biggert Bilirakis Bishop (GA) Bishop (NY) Bishop (UT) Blackburn Blumenauer Blunt Boehner Bonilla Bonner Bono Boozman Boswell Boucher Boyd Bradley (NH) Brady (PA) Brady (TX) Brown (SC) Brown-Waite, Ginny Burgess Burns Burr Burton (IN) Butterfield Buyer Calvert Camp Cantor Capito Capps Capuano Cardin Cardoza Carson (IN) Carson (OK) Carter Case Castle Chabot Chandler Chocola Clay Clyburn Coble Cole Collins Conyers Cooper Costello Cramer Crane Crenshaw Crowley Cubin Culberson Cummings Cunningham Davis (AL) Davis (CA) Davis (FL) Davis (IL) Davis (TN) Davis, Jo Ann Davis, Tom Deal (GA) DeFazio DeGette Delahunt DeLauro DeLay Deutsch Diaz-Balart, L. Diaz-Balart, M. Dicks Dingell Doggett Doolittle Doyle Dreier Duncan Dunn Edwards Ehlers Emanuel Emerson Engel English Eshoo Etheridge Evans Everett Farr Fattah Feeney Ferguson Filner Flake Foley Ford Fossella Frank (MA) Franks (AZ) Frelinghuysen Frost Gallegly Garrett (NJ) Gerlach Gibbons Gilchrest |
Gillmor Gingrey Gonzalez Goode Goodlatte Gordon Granger Graves Green (TX) Green (WI) Grijalva Gutierrez Gutknecht Hall Harman Harris Hart Hastert Hastings (FL) Hastings (WA) Hayes Hayworth Hefley Hensarling Herger Herseth Hill Hinchey Hinojosa Hobson Hoekstra Holden Holt Honda Hooley (OR) Hostettler Houghton Hoyer Hulshof Hunter Hyde Inslee Isakson Israel Issa Istook Jackson (IL) Jackson-Lee (TX) Jefferson Jenkins Johnson (CT) Johnson (IL) Johnson, E. B. Johnson, Sam Jones (NC) Kanjorski Keller Kelly Kennedy (MN) Kennedy (RI) Kildee Kilpatrick Kind King (IA) King (NY) Kingston Kirk Kline Knollenberg Kolbe LaHood Langevin Lantos Larsen (WA) Larson (CT) Latham LaTourette Leach Lee Levin Lewis (CA) Lewis (GA) Lewis (KY) Linder Lipinski LoBiondo Lofgren Lowey Lucas (KY) Lucas (OK) Lynch Maloney Manzullo Markey Marshall Matheson Matsui McCarthy (MO) McCarthy (NY) McCollum McCotter McCrery McDermott McGovern McHugh McInnis McKeon McNulty Meehan Meek (FL) Menendez Mica Michaud Miller (FL) Miller (MI) Miller (NC) Miller, Gary Miller, George Mollohan Moore Moran (KS) Moran (VA) Murphy Musgrave Myrick Nadler Napolitano Neal (MA) Neugebauer Ney Northup Nunes Nussle Oberstar |
Obey Olver Ortiz Osborne Ose Otter Owens Oxley Pallone Pascrell Pastor Paul Payne Pearce Pelosi Pence Peterson (MN) Peterson (PA) Petri Pickering Pitts Platts Pombo Pomeroy Porter Price (NC) Putnam Quinn Radanovich Rahall Ramstad Rangel Regula Rehberg Renzi Reyes Reynolds Rodriguez Rogers (AL) Rogers (KY) Rogers (MI) Rohrabacher Ros-Lehtinen Ross Rothman Roybal-Allard Royce Ruppersberger Rush Ryan (OH) Ryan (WI) Ryun (KS) Sabo Sánchez, Linda T. Sanchez, Loretta Sanders Saxton Schakowsky Schiff Schrock Scott (GA) Scott (VA) Sensenbrenner Serrano Sessions Shadegg Shaw Shays Sherman Sherwood Shimkus Shuster Simmons Simpson Skelton Smith (MI) Smith (NJ) Smith (TX) Smith (WA) Snyder Solis Souder Spratt Stearns Stenholm Strickland Stupak Sullivan Sweeney Tancredo Tanner Tauscher Taylor (MS) Taylor (NC) Thomas Thompson (CA) Thompson (MS) Thornberry Tiahrt Tiberi Tierney Toomey Towns Turner (OH) Turner (TX) Udall (CO) Udall (NM) Upton Van Hollen Velázquez Visclosky Vitter Walden (OR) Walsh Wamp Waters Watson Watt Waxman Weiner Weldon (FL) Weldon (PA) Weller Wexler Whitfield Wicker Wilson (NM) Wilson (SC) Wolf Woolsey Wu Wynn Young (AK) Young (FL) |
| Boehlert Brown (OH) Brown, Corrine Cannon Cox DeMint Dooley (CA) Forbes Gephardt Greenwood |
Hoeffel John Jones (OH) Kaptur Kleczka Kucinich Lampson Majette McIntyre Meeks (NY) |
Millender-McDonald Nethercutt Norwood Portman Pryce (OH) Sandlin Slaughter Tauzin Terry |
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