[PeteB570]

Bringing back the draft is just another way to get draft card burnings, sit ins, college protests, Canada border jumpers and all the 60s stuff to come back.

Yes, a draft could bring in numbers but also a whole lot more headaches.

[GSlob]

"Yes, a draft could bring in numbers but also a whole lot more headaches."
In the broader picture , a draft [without loopholes, or with very few of them] can also bring in increased social cohesion. This ought to be considered as a valuable societal benefit regardless of all the rest.

[DManA]

You miss his point entirely. He doesn't care about getting people into the military, he wants to grab all 18 year old citizens for two years of socialist indoctrination:

Instead, "young people (would) commit themselves to a couple of years in service to this great republic,

[oldironsides]

I served with draftees during Vietnam era. They were really very bright, angry, funny and loyal Americans. The MDs drafted were irreverent, bawdy and talented. They objected in a loud voice and swore often. They cared for the wounded like they were their own children. They gave, they cried and they spoke ill of Democrats, President Johnson and any visiting political big wig passing through our compound. The complained and moaned but were far superior to any of these liberal idiots serving in todays congress or senate. My hat is off to the draftees. Manure to the disloyal panty waist creeps in government today. I may mention that idiot Ted Kennedy visited and wore light wgt. fatigues. We had yet to be issued them and wondered how that creep got them ahead of the troops.

[justiceseeker93]

Bringing back the draft is just another way to get draft card burnings, sit ins, college protests, Canada border jumpers and all the 60s stuff to come back.

Exactly. Rangel is a con artist. His purpose in trying to bring back an active draft is not to strengthen the military in the WOT, but to undermine support for it at home.

Richard Nixon understood the flip side of Rangel's thinking during the Vietnam era. As his Administration phased out the draft then, the level of domestic protest and dissent against the war decreased, as was predicted. That in turn enabled him to buy more time to try to achieve his foreign policy objectives.

The ultimate sad ending to the Vietnam War was in large part the result of the Dem Congress' withdrawal of funding for it, not the end of the active draft.