Draft Beer, Not Kids!
Posted on 05/08/2002 10:33:16 AM PDT by Starmaker
Is conscription making a comeback? Will the word "lottery" be reassigned its 1969 definition? Can we look forward to seeing the lifeless bodies of 18-year-old draftees coming home draped in red, white and blue? It's not likely, but the subject of reinstating the draft is being raised once again.
In a May 7 article in the Jewish World Review, columnist Jack Kelly made a rather disturbing statement: "If we are serious about winning the war on terror, and serious about homeland security, we'd better think seriously about reinstating the military draft." Now, unless "Military Draft" is a new brew from the folks at Sam Adams, I'm not interested.
Our seriousness in combating terrorism is not limited to the number of people running around in fatigues playing "Cowboys and Muslims." To address Jack Kelly's statement, I would counter that if we were truly serious about winning the war on terror, and serious about homeland security, we'd better think seriously about reinstating the right to keep and bear arms.
In all fairness to Mr. Kelly, his call for a draft focuses mainly on forced recruitment into domestic military service for homeland defense:
We should draft for the Army National Guard. Airport screening and border patrols are tedious work which cannot be well paid, but for which we require intelligent, vigilant people who are loyal to the United States. A 15-month period of service would permit a year of active duty after basic training.
But even this is going too far. The National Guard is not the state militia of old. All servicemen and women in the Guard are subject to direct federal control and can be called up at any time.
There was a time when citizen militias were the norm. These were groups of average citizens who rose to the occasion when their homeland was threatened. The Second Amendment to the Constitution recognized their importance: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
Militias were important because they were considered to be one of the last lines of defense the states had against attack, not just from a foreign power but from the federal government itself. You won't hear it discussed much today, but one of the reasons the Second Amendment was proposed in the first place was that the framers believed the people of this nation had the G-d-given right to defend themselves against all forms of tyranny.
There were also many concerned colonists who feared the prospect of a strong standing army, and looked to the militias as the best means of providing for a national defense. The Constitution did allow Congress to call upon those militias to help defend the United States if the need arose, but those days are gone. Today, we have a standing army, a permanent national military that is more powerful than any other fighting force the world has ever seen.
Unfortunately, even that did not help us last September. The strongest military in history failed to prevent a handful of Muslim radicals from killing over 3,000 people within our own borders. I fail to see how reinstating the draft would address that.
But perhaps that isn't what Kelly has in mind anyway. Reinstating the draft would be symbolic of our unity. He goes on to say in his column that "reinstitution of conscription.....would be an important signal of national resolve," and that it would stand apart from the empty gesture of patriotism that, up until now, "largely has been restricted to rhetoric and flag-waving."
Kelly is right about one thing—our security is indeed something that demands serious attention. However, if we do want to get serious, forget the draft. The single biggest threat to our security as a nation comes not from foreign terrorists, but from an over-zealous, ever-expanding federal government. If we truly wish to remain secure, that government must first be made to restore the rights it has deliberately and systematically stripped away from its citizens.
For example, we need to see the resurrection of the right to keep and bear arms and all the unconstitutional gun laws taken off the books. This includes repealing such restrictions as the ban on "assault" weapons and armor-piercing bullets, and affording citizens the right to defend themselves—yes, even on commercial airliners. After all, if our inalienable rights become alienable, what would we have left to defend?
If you are one of those people calling for a draft, may I suggest you stroll down to your neighborhood tavern and have the bartender pour you a tall, frosty one. Kick back, relax, stuff your face with pretzels, watch the ball game, maybe throw a few darts or shoot some pool. If, however, you are serious about homeland security, fight to recover the rights that have already been taken away from you and help restore the federal government to its constitutional limitations.
To comment on this article or express your opinion directly to the author, you are invited to e-mail Lee at ever_vigilant@hotmail.com .
I can't side with either of the extreme opposing camps: those who want to abolish it totally, or those who'd implement it permanently (to staff various charity "volunteer" social programs).
IMHO, at the present time, the current system of registration without active selection is appropriate. If there were to be any change, I'd agree to having young ladies sign up for the lucky lotto on their 18th birthdays. There are suitable positions for them within the military. Perhaps not front-line combat, but they provide useful service to their nation in time of need as well.
Such as when?
Tuor
One quarter of the 9/11 attack was stopped by citizens armed only with attitude. How much more would have been stopped by more citizens armed with the same attitude AND effective tools...
Yes but, that's not relevant. Conscription is the ultimate slavery to the State; it is the pinnacle of tyranny.
If a free society is not willing to defend its existence voluntarily then it is unworthy of the freedoms it enjoys. It's the obligation of the citizenry to intelligently weigh the issue of what is worth killing for and what is not...and then act on their conclusions.
I would have joined the military after Dec 7, 1941. Though, I don't know what I would have done had I actually made it to combat in WWII : I may have ended up cowering in a fox-hole. I may have fleed. I don't know. It's impossible for a man to say what he would or wouldn't do in combat.
But I do know I would have joined voluntarily.
Korea and Vietnam, on the other hand: No way. My opinion was that we had no business in either of those wars, and I would have refused to go. I would have gone to jail first.
Hamilton writes, in The Federalist
They considered that the Congress was composed of many wise and
experienced men. That, being convened from different parts of the
country, they brought with them and communicated to each other a variety
of useful information. That, in the course of the time they passed
together in inquiring into and discussing the true interests of their
country, they must have acquired very accurate knowledge on that head.
That they were individually interested in the public liberty and
prosperity, and therefore that it was not less their inclination than
their duty to recommend only such measures as, after the most mature
deliberation, they really thought prudent and advisable.
He's talking about Pat Leahy? Tom Daschle? Barbara Boxer? Sheila Jackson-Lee? Henry Waxman? Hillary Clinton?.........
Do you imagine for a second that I would allow fools and miscreants like these leftist-pandering socialist leeches decide what I will place my life in harms way for?
I think not.
I am a free man. I will follow dignified and intelligent men and women into a honorable war to defend our country but I'll be damned if I'm going to be drafted and told to fight in Lebanon, or the Sudan, or Bosnia....or some other piss-hole that can't get it's crap together.
I always find it fascinating that two people can read something and come away with such disparate views. I suspect that in this case, at least, I had already rejected the extreme Libertarian philosophy by the time I got around to reading this book, and so the political subtext just rolled off me. I do remember thinking that this particular scheme sounded vaguely Fascist, although Heinlein's later work (after "STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND") made it pretty clear that he was a raving Libertarian. Most of these later works are practically unreadable (for me, at least- too didactic and humorless, with not much of a story to hang the sermons on...).
But "De gustibus..." and all that! (FWIT, his best book was probably "THE DOOR INTO SUMMER"- practically no political philosophy in there at all!) By the same token, "FARNHAM'S FREEHOLD" remains an awful book, in several ways. The first time I read it, I couldn't believe that it was actually written by RAH. I thought it was someone trying to ruin his good name.
<<< Standing Ovation >>>
I never did read any of the books by which he was best known (other than ST): The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, The Number of the Beast, Stranger in a Strange Land, etc. Partly because my liking of SciFi is decidedly mixed and partly because Job stopped my reading of him, but mostly because the blurbs for the books just didn't appeal to me.
There is no denying that RAH had a big impact on SF, but most of his stuff just wasn't for me.
Tuor
Very well said!
I would add to the list, putting one's life on the line
to keep the oil industry profits high......
At least his books had the added benefit of warming the house, eh?
Tuor
Draft Beer, Not Kids!
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