The jackass brays back: Rangel wrangles with National Youth Slavery

presenceofmind.net ^ | December 31, 2002 | Greg Swann

[Greg Swann]

The jackass brays back: Rangel wrangles with National Youth Slavery by Greg Swann

Yesterday I held a colloquy with a braying jackass over New York Democratic Representative Charles Rangel's plan to institute universal military conscription. Today Rangel is back, in an op-ed in the New York Times, insisting that he really means it, that he wasn't just braying at random on CNN. Fine with me. I'm clipping and snipping, so see the original to wrangle this jackass unedited. I believe that if we are going to send our children to war, the governing principle must be that of shared sacrifice. Remember that 'sacrifice' always means blood sacrifice. Politicians tell you the bald truth and you never listen. Throughout much of our history, Americans have been asked to shoulder the burden of war equally. Except for women, children, the elderly, the blind, the halt and the lame. And the children of the elites. And throughout the rest of our history, America has been defended by an all-volunteer military, which is what is in keeping with American principles. Carrying out the administration's policy toward Iraq will require long-term sacrifices by the American people, particularly those who have sons and daughters in the military. They are volunteers. I wish every one of them peace and safety, but they made a choice to risk harm in pursuit of benefits for themselves and for their families. They are not conscripts. Yet the Congress that voted overwhelmingly to allow the use of force in Iraq includes only one member who has a child in the enlisted ranks of the military--just a few more have children who are officers. But a heck of a lot of kids in medical school, I'll bet. Different people make different choices. This is liberty. The choices they make are influenced by their initial circumstances. This is an accretive consequence of liberty. I believe that if those calling for war knew that their children were likely to be required to serve--and to be placed in harm's way--there would be more caution and a greater willingness to work with the international community in dealing with Iraq. Could be true, but it won't happen. Children of CongressVermin 'serve' as photographers, like Vietnam 'veteran' Al Gore. What will happen, what always happens, is that politicians will massively waste their 'free' conscripts. There is a monolith in Washington to testify to this fact. A renewed draft will help bring a greater appreciation of the consequences of decisions to go to war. I love that word 'appreciation.' It's a favorite of educationists. It means sensory awareness without knowledge or understanding. Unfortunately for Rangel, history's plain lesson, perhaps not 'appreciated' but well known, is that conscript armies make the decision to go to war that much easier to make. Cannon-fodder is the food of the warfare state. Service in our nation's armed forces is no longer a common experience. Never was, thankfully. A disproportionate number of the poor and members of minority groups make up the enlisted ranks of the military... Now we get to the real issue. I was sure this was what he was saying yesterday, but he didn't come right out and say it. The implication is that the all-volunteer military, by being comprised of a "disproportionate number of the poor and members of minority groups," is simultaneously racist and bad for defense. Both are false. The military is no more racist than is the National Football League, another place where poor young black males seek to reap the best available benefit from their initial circumstances. If 'disproportion' in the one is racist and not rational, then the same must be true for the other. And an army of volunteers, actively seeking benefits for themselves and for their families, is surely a better defense of American interests than a cadre of seething, resentful slaves. ...while the most privileged Americans are underrepresented or absent. And the implication here is that the anequalitarian distribution of self-selected volunteers for the military, for medical school and for the NFL is an injustice in se. Many poor young black males don't have the money or the academic preparation to go to medical school. Most pre-med students don't have the athletic ability to play pro football. So what? We are each of us free to choose our own careers, and in so doing, we provide secondary benefits to the society at large. Our only responsibility is to ourselves and to our families. Where the choice to act in our own behalf is usurped by force, we are slaves. The irony, from Rangel's jackass point of view, is that enslaving a pre-med student in a conscript army will hurt poor young black males in two ways: By depriving them of military roles for which they would have volunteered but for which the medical student has better academic preparation. And by depriving them of two years or four years of the life-saving abilities of the physician that pre-med student will ultimately become. This is the broken-window fallacy, only Rangel is proposing to enrich us by breaking our skulls instead. We need to return to the tradition of the citizen soldier--... The citizen soldier was a volunteer. The story of Cincinnatus is fascinating and inspiring, but the point of the story is that the citizen soldier is a volunteer who fights when he must and then returns to his plow. ...--with alternative national service required for those who cannot serve because of physical limitations or reasons of conscience. And there is the call for National Youth Slavery. Those who would lead us into war... Not you, thankfully, you jackass. ...have the obligation to support an all-out mobilization of Americans for the war effort,... Not only are our children to be enslaved, our politicians are themselves obliged. Slavery is pernicious, ain't it? ...including mandatory national service that asks something of us all. It is important to understand that military conscription is a Trojan Horse. The real issue, for which Rangel is probably an unwitting stooge, is National Youth Slavery. The idea has been 'trial-ballooned' for years, by William F. Buckley, among others. And, of course, the people to be enslaved are not the ones who get to vote for their enslavement. Ironically, as with the other truly serious domestic policy issue, the incremental nationalization of medicine, the underlying concern is health care: Buckley and other dotards want to compel your children to change their bedpans. Acquiring 'free' conscript soldiers to be shredded overseas is pure gravy. "O brave new world That has such people in't!" But fear not, for the libertarians, civil and otherwise, understand that the true battle is to prevent John Poindexter from discovering that they wear mis-matched socks. What possible peril is posed by the enslavement of America's young and her doctors, compared to Big Brother? Charles Rangel may be a jackass, but at least he's a straightforward enemy of liberty. May god spare America's freedom from her alleged friends...

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[farmfriend]

Don't they have mandatory service in Israel? Probably closer to the Starship Trooper analogy. Service means citizenship.

[Eva]

While some of what you are saying is true, you miss the point of Rangel's call for a draft. Rangel is opposed to the war in Iraq or on terrorism for that matter, and he longs for the days when anti-war demonstrations on college campuses were an everyday occurrence. He sees the draft as the ultimate tool to divide the country against itself, the young against the middle aged, the poor against the rich and the weak against the strong.

Rangel longs for the time when Liberals could claim some moral authority and actually had a cause to stand behind.
Rangel thinks that he can get away with calling for the draft on racial issues, saying that it is only fair and then he will turn around and say, but we shouldn't need the draft because we shouldn't be at war in the first place.

Ignore Rangel, don't even give him a platform to stand on, his statements are totally disingenuous.

[taxcontrol]

Counter proposal:

Instead of a draft, put some training behind the Selective Service. 1 day per year during the birth month for 4 years, teach call up procedures, keep the admin and physical records up to date. Train in first aid, marching, weapon (M16) familuarity, range saftey and let them fire 10 rounds. Pay above minimum wage for the one day.

Call it the Inactive Reserves. After the 4 years, go back to the way it is now by just keeping track of where the folks are.

[M Kehoe]

And the arguement continues.

5.56mm

[Senator Pardek]

I gotta laugh at the people here who claim they are for smaller government but who are also pro-slavery.

Don't wanna fight? Don't join. It's that simple.

[freeeee]

I suppose if tell my son or daughter to wash the dishes that too would count as childhood slavery.

Children are wards of their parents.

Free men are the wards of no one.

[Senator Pardek]

If all the war hawks enlisted, (demonstrating that they are not in the long line of chicken hawks), there would be no need for a draft.

If all the yak-yaks here (I'm not saying you) who are for mandatory conscription would join or re-up, there would be no need for a draft, either.

[NorthGA]

My daugher joined the guard to help pay for college expenses. She is an enlisted private. I was really surprised to see the demographics of her army basic training unit... Many college graduates, and many who really had a lot of intelligence.

I had a lot of my assumptions and prejudices debunked - maybe Rangel can open his eyes also.

[freeeee]

Military service wasn't mandatory in Starship Troopers, but only those who had served could vote. I'd actually be willing to consider a system like that

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed..."

Consent of the governed is required for any government to be legitimate.

Our government has no legitimate authority to make us purchase, through military service, our sovereign right to give consent in the form of the vote.

Our rights are endowed by our Creator. They are not privileges to be granted by "our masters" at any price, including military service.

[Fintan]

I gotta laugh at the people here who claim they are for smaller government but who are also pro-slavery.

Ain't it swell?

[Eva]

Rangel doesn't want to open his eyes. You know that old saying, "None is so blind as he who will not see." Well, Rangel is purposely proposing a draft to stir up dissension and a little racial discord along with it. Rangel is hoping to convince some young college kids to oppose the war, by threatening them with a draft. That's it.

[steve-b]

Everyone who earns an honest living serves his country. End of argument, unless you're a communist.

[steve-b]

If they don't get enough volunteers let them raise the pay

Part of Rangel's motivation is that, if you can just shanghai people instead of having to persuade them, you can take all the money now wasted on military pay raises and veteran's benefits and spend it on something more useful such as more welfare.

[steve-b]

So in like manner service to the community and the nation.

The government equivalent to the family... holy cow, who'd have expected to find you lurking here?

I gotta ask: Do you get POd when people call you "Hitlary", insinuate that you don't boff outside your gender, and accuse you of various high crimes and misdemeanors?

[f.Christian]

The schools and the jails aren't working...get the military to do a fix up---takeover!

[steve-b]

Two better ideas:

1. Introduce marksmanship classes and competitive sports as a standard feature of high-school curricula, using the same "persasions" used for the rest of the federal educational agenda (i.e. either threaten to cut off funds for not doing this, or end the practice of threatening to cut off funds for not doing any of a thousand other things).

2. Introduce a lifetime tax exemption earned by a fairly long and distinguished military record (perhaps at least ten years including at least one combat decoration above the earnable-by-stapler-accident level). The ideal would be for the recipients to be rare enough not to severely damage the tax base, but common enough to salt the population with examples of how much better one can live without Uncle Sam on one's back.

3. Sell tapes of Rangel's head exploding upon having his bill amended (i.e. title jacked up on blocks, asinine original contents completely removed, and the above installed in its place).

[ThinkDifferent]

Our government has no legitimate authority to make us purchase, through military service, our sovereign right to give consent in the form of the vote.

In theory I agree. The problem is that our "democracy" increasingly involves people voting to forcibly take the property of their neighbors for themselves. I can envision a system of weighted voting. For example, every citizen gets one vote. Those in the military or who have previously served get another vote. Those who are net producers (i.e. pay more in taxes than they receive in benefits) get another. Entirely impractical, but it's interesting to consider. (Of course none of this would be an issue if our government would respect the Constitution, but that's even more unlikely).

[freeeee]

Of course none of this would be an issue if our government would respect the Constitution

Call me crazy, but that's what I had in mind.

Happy New Year!

[Lil'freeper]

The book we were discussing is a marvelous work of speculative fiction and was quite controversial in its day. The author is quite prescient and forces the reader to contemplate the price of citizenship and freedom, which is naturally responsibility. What form should responsibility take? Heinlein puts forth one possibility but there are certainly others. In this day of special interest groups clamoring for "rights" (and by securing them, infringe on the rights of others), responsibility is pushed out of the public sphere. Rangel is not concerned in the least bit about responsibility- in great contrast to the authors of the document you cited- which makes his sham of an argument rather offensive to me.

[Chuckster]

Maybe. Speaking as someone who served both during the draft era and in VOLAR (The Volunteer Army for the acronym challenged) I can state unequivocally that the draft produced a superior force, at least in the case of the US Army. during the early VOLAR years the discipline, and with it the effectiveness, of the Army deteriorated so badly that professional NCOs and officers were leaving in droves. I was one of them. With fifteen years of service I decided to call it quits in 1980.