Is This Really an All-Volunteer Army?

NY Times (Week in Review) ^ | April 6, 2003 | STEVEN A. HOLMES

[Pharmboy]

C'mon: it's impossible to have all aspects of society follow the demographics of society as a whole. We must get off this kick. These are individuals we are talking about. Following this reasoning, where will it end? Will we need a quota system for left-handed Methodists?

Ability, character, drive: that's what counts. The left-wing racialists should STFU--once and for all.

[goldstategop]

And patriotism. The Left really loathes America.

[SubMareener]

There really sad thing is that journalists are not representative of American Society.

[Pharmboy]

An excellent point. We should start a movement for diversity (of opinion) in the newsroom so it reflects an image closer to the real US of A.

[IronJack]

Leave it to Marx's newsletter, the NY Times, to bolster Rangel's wedge issue. There's no REAL story here, but by gosh that won't stop the TImes from creating one.

[Shenandoah]

SAN FRANCISCO - Protest Centcon has called an emergency meeting to explore alternative plans. Certain, initially, that their message would grow until millions upon millions would join their ranks, bedecked with flower garlands, top officials have been forced to concede that they are running into unforseen resistance. Not only have the expected "love-not-war" peacenicks not materialized, but the enemy is growing in strength and numbers. According to Field Marshal General Susan Sarandon, what organizational planners had forseen as a collapse of the Vast Right Wing has resulted in merely pissing people off. Sarandon expressed dismay that tactics such as pooping and vomiting on the front stairs of government buildings has not inspired patriotic Ameicans to denounce President Bush as an international terrorist. She did, however, express satisfaction that the barrage of demonstrations and rallys had given drag queens an opportunity to party.

[bert]

Those who work suceed. Those who lazily remani behind an don't work fail.

Laziness is epidemic among the left.

[Enduring Freedom]

The Left are irrational, seeking power and control at all costs.

They cannot be debated, convinced or persuaded.

They can only be vanquished.

[Timesink]

a small band of critics continues to maintain...

Wow, they buried this in Week in Review? Usually a small band of critics is all the Times requires to play their pet leftist polemics page one above the fold.

[Pharmboy]

I hereby nominate your post above for "Quote of the Week."

[xkaydet65]

No politician and certainly no loberal wnts any institution to reflect the way America thinks.Thinking is unpatriotic among the left.

[Tulsa Brian]

God, I hate this newspaper.

[Pharmboy]

Right on, IJ. If there were low numbers of blacks in the military, they'd b*tch; if there are a bit more in the armed services than their percentage in the population, they b*tch.

There is never any satisfying the left, and as a poster above says, that's why we should not bother to try. They just need to be defeated.

[Timesink]

An excellent point. We should start a movement for diversity (of opinion) in the newsroom so it reflects an image closer to the real US of A.

Oh, believe me, they're way ahead of you on this. Go to any journalism industry news site and you'll find "Diversity" sections as big as regular news sites play "Sports." You would think it was still 1962 from how hard they beating people over the head with the issue day in day out.

It's also unquestionable, close-the-book, QED proof that the news business is OVERWHELMINGLY liberal.

[Nagual]

If we had the draft on right now, the left would still be whinning about the same thing. These people are nuts.

Why don't we just hire illegals to do our wars. The left is great at hiring illegals and expect the rest of to take care of their medical and economic needs.

Shut Up!

[Oldeconomybuyer]

...The question has hung heavy since war with Iraq first seemed inevitable...

...Only among the elite liberal establishment bent on dividing our society by race and economic status.

[error99]

I did not volunteer to try to better myself.
I did not volunteer to study hard.
I did not volunteer to resist temptations.
I did not volunteer to be selective of my friends.
I did not volunteer to go finish school.
I did not volunteer to get a job.
I admit it.
I did all of those things because I "had-To".
If drinking whiskey, playing cards, chasing women, staying out all night,
and sleeping until noon just paid a little better;
then I probably would have volunteered for that.

[facedown]

"Parents are certainly major influences, mothers in particular," said Paul R. Sackett, a professor of psychology at the University of Minnesota who studied the challenges that face military recruiters.

Pure genius.

[Drango]

There really sad thing is that journalists are not representative of American Society.

They seem to more represent Russian society.

[Notwithstanding]

Re: the forces being "heavily layered with minorities"

It is my experience

(and is borne out statistically in recent widely reported news that frontline combat troops are disproportionately white southern males, rather than minorities)

that the layers of minorites are in support roles such as supply and administrative work that occurs largely far from any combat zone (nb: most such jobs are easier to qualifiy for, which explains the disproportionality). Obviously some of non-combat positions are very competitive -- but not the ones that are disproportionately minority.

As such, this truly is a low-risk way for innercity kids to get some skills that they can use after their enlistment is over.

It is also my experience that affirmative action is more apt to occur in these units, and less likely to occur in combat units and the officer corps.

Minorities tend to work for the government in disproportionate numbers - the military is no different.

This reporter is a whiner who seems clueless as to the facts of life: those without money take jobs that those with money won't do.