The jackass brays back: Rangel wrangles with National Youth Slavery

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

[dirtboy]

Are you quite sure you wish to score a meager political point by comparing military service to slavery?

[garyb]

If a person is required to perform a service for, say, two years, for a substandard wage, is it not slavery?

[society-by-contract]

Are you quite sure you wish to score a meager political point by comparing military service to slavery? If military service is not coerced it is not slavery. However, coerced conscription *is* slavery.

[pabianice]

Someone send this moron a copy of "Starship Troopers..."

[dirtboy]

If a person is required to perform a service for, say, two years, for a substandard wage, is it not slavery?

No, it's called serving one's country. As millions have over the years.

[OHelix]

I'd love to see what happens to the poor recruit who suggests to the drill seargent that said recruit is not "owned".

[Tacis]

Reinstating the draft would be a great idea. A year (maybe, 9 months, maybe 18) of mandatory military service for all males and females would be a very good thing and would help integrate many foreigners (not illegals) into the American mainstream.

The unfortunate thing, here, is that Rangel does not belive this and would oppose it vigorously. This was one of those trial baloons to make him ( and the anti-American lefties) look like they are out front with Bush on defending America. Rangel is a black race pimp and would only be interested in universal military service if blacks were segregated into locations where he and the other race pimps could propagandize them against whitey.

[ex-snook]

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. After all, there are a lot of hawks around and they want to take on Iraq, Iran, NK, Syria, China, etc. I'm sure they will walk the talk. Right.

[steve50]

Even with a draft the perfumed princes won't get within a 1,000 mile of a shot fired in anger. If they don't get enough volunteers let them raise the pay, freedom isn't free afterall.

[latrans]

Rangle is simply attacking the policy by using a scare tactic.

[mhking]

Compulsory military service equaling "youth slavery"? Oh, please.

[mhking]

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[Fee]

Rangel is an idiot. If we have a draft Army, the military will have a huge pool of cheap labor. Military pay will stagnate or go down. Blacks and Hispanics have benefited from a higher paying volunteer force. It represents a rung in the economic ladder for them to climb upwards. They will be the first to pay economically from Rangel's policy. Many of the inner city minority recruits barely meet the academic standards. Since they are the ones willing to serve, the military has invested in training programs to upgrade their academic skills such as reading and math. The volunteer military has helped many minorities to improve their skills so they can be considered for higher ranks and other advanced training. In other words it has provided them with opportunities not available in a draft force where the military has a large low cost pool to draw talent and leaders from. The first to get hurt under Rangel's policy will be his own constituents.

[j_tull]

At least everyone would learn to use a firearm!

[dogbyte12]

Much of it is hyperbole of course, but he does have a point. I am a vet, a volunteer. If I was in congress, I would have an entirely different perspective than somebody who decided that they were too important to serve, let somebody else be cannon fodder, etc...

I don't think universal service would end wars, quite the opposite. It would give moral clarity to our national position. A congress of 535 members who once wore the uniform would understand their freedoms just a wee bit better, and cherish and defend freedoms throughout the world.

It is a volunteer army. However, nobody that I served with was from even the upper middle class let alone rich, in the enlisted class. It is a dividing line. It is not a conservative or liberal thing. Rich folks don't serve.

The word chickenhawk is thrown around quite a bit, but it can be useful in the sense that, when somebody isn't willing to die for a cause, but they are willing to let your kids go instead, it does give you a moment to reflect on the urgency of the cause.

[ThinkDifferent]

Someone send this moron a copy of "Starship Troopers..."

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, but a mandatory draft is by definition involuntary servitude.

[Lil'freeper]

Starship Troopers is a great, thought-provoking read. Society in that book also advocated public floggings- a fantastic idea.

[tlrugit]

Drivel, and singularly idiotic drivel at that.

I suppose if tell my son or daughter to wash the dishes that too would count as childhood slavery. Certainly to be totally PC we would never call it service to the family. So in like manner service to the community and the nation. Some seem to forget that service is not the option of choice for the desperate and disposessed, but the preferred choice of pride for the responsible and the strong.

I volunteered for the Navy and served my four years, some of it Vietnam combat, because I knew that I owed much to the extent (and beyond) that I had received much, and wished to repay that, enabling others to receive in turn. A sense of duty to the society that nurtures us will inevitably keep that society strong; a sense of entitlement can only weaken it.

[silverdog]

I take it from your post that years as a commissioned officer for some reason do not count as service? The line between enlisted personnel and commissioned officers is normally drawn based on education AND a willingness to serve more than a minimum term. Family income background doesn't have a whole lot to do with it.