Free Republic

Swiss gun ownership remains fairly high for Europe — there are about 27.5 guns for every 100 people in Switzerland — Pro-gun advocates in the U.S. often point to Switzerland to prove that high gun ownership doesn't necessarily mean high gun deaths. Where Switzerland does shine - is in its low number of mass shootings. It hasn't had one since 2001, when a man raided the local government body in Zug, killing 14 people before himself. This said, there are a few factors that may play into their lower rates of mass shootings. First, Switzerland has mandatory military service for...

Sweden said Wednesday it would reintroduce compulsory military service from 2018, eight years after it was abolished. The Scandinavian nation, which has not seen armed conflict on its territory in two centuries, ended conscription in 2010 after it was deemed an unsatisfactory way of meeting the needs of a modern army. "I hope that we are going to find a path to a more stable, robust and functional means of recruitment," Defence Minister Peter Hultqvist told a news conference. The new policy will affect Swedes born after 1999, according to a report by a former member of parliament for the...

Army Secretary John McHugh said Monday that opening up all combat roles to women would push lawmakers to engage in an “emotional discussion and debate” about whether or not women should also be required to enter the draft. “If your objective is true and pure equality, then you have to look at all aspects and at some point Selective Service will have to be one of those things considered very carefully,” McHugh said at the U.S. Army’s annual meeting in Washington, D.C., according to the Washington Examiner. McHugh said that Congress would have to decide to require women to sign...

As drones, cyberattacks and other high-tech developments change the nature of war, two prominent scholars argue that we must also rethink who fights our wars: the time has come, they say, to bring back the draft. The article, "Universal Conscription as Technology Policy," appears in Issues in Science and Technology, a journal published by the National Defense University. The authors are Mark Hagerott — a distinguished professor of cybersecurity studies at the U.S. Naval Academy, who was cited by Foreign Policy as one of "The Top 70 Military Thinkers "— and Brad Allenby, President's Professor of Sustainable Engineering, and Lincoln...

On July 15, 2010, Democrat Charles Rangle introduced a piece of legislation into Congress that would basically reinstate the draft (compulsory military service). H.R. 5741 will give the President of the United States the power to require all American citizens between the ages of 18 and 42 to perform either military service or civilian service in the interests of "national defense and homeland security." It would also give him the power to require citizens to join the military during wartime to meet the manpower needs of the military. In February 2009, President Barack Obama asked Congress to send him a...

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES July 15, 2010 Mr. RANGEL introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Armed Services. A BILL To require all persons in the United States between the ages of 18 and 42 to perform national service, either as a member of the uniformed services or in civilian service in furtherance of the national defense and homeland security, to authorize the induction of persons in the uniformed services during wartime to meet end-strength requirements of the uniformed services, and for other purposes.

Thirty years ago, future U.S. Sen. Harris Wofford led the committee that concluded that year-long mandatory civilian-service programs were politically infeasible. Wofford, however, did not give up on the idea. And as the nation prepares to mark tomorrow's annual Martin Luther King Day of Service, maybe what was infeasible then is workable today. What's changed? The economy, for one thing. Consider City Year. City Year corps members, young adults ages 17 to 24, volunteer for a year of service in cities throughout the country - usually in public schools - and receive a college scholarship in return. It was described...

If not for the state of New York, one has to wonder how many blogs would actually be interesting.The roll call here is illustrious - Charles Schumer, Hillary Clinton, Al Sharpton, Eliot Spitzer, Caroline Kennedy, Michael Bloomberg … so many names, so little bandwidth. Indeed, the Empire State is home to some of the greatest frivolity in the nation. Even relative newcomers like Governor David Paterson, with his proposed fat taxes and I-tunes taxes, are keeping blogger fingers rat-a-tat-tatting away.One of my favorites is Representative Charles Rangel, the gravel-voiced dinosaur (or legend, depending on your perspective) from Harlem who once...

My wife mentioned the other day she heard some Obama supporter state that since the military is so thin that a President Obama will have to bring back the draft. Did anyone else hear this? Can anyone supply a link to either a transcript or video of this? Thank you for your help.

Some Democrats have decided to try to transform the military draft into what the Social Security issue was 25 years ago. Time and time again since the late 1970s, Democratic candidates and campaign committees sought to win the votes of seniors by raising questions about whether Republicans would dismantle Social Security if they ever won control of Congress. The Democrats’ scare tactics on Social Security were not without basis. Republicans opposed the creation of Social Security, and for more than a decade, many conservative GOP candidates and high-profile officeholders, including former Rep. Newt Gingrich (Ga.), bashed the system and berated...

Said the Breck Girl today, Edwards, a former North Carolina senator said that Lute's remarks show "the true danger of the administration's breathtaking failures in Iraq and around the world," according to a campaign statement. "Now, instead of ending this war and doing what is right for our troops, their families and the nation, President Bush is floating the idea of a draft that would send more young Americans to Iraq," Edward said.

Frequent tours for U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan have stressed the all-volunteer force and made it worth considering a return to a military draft, President Bush's new war adviser said Friday. "I think it makes sense to certainly consider it," Army Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute said in an interview with National Public Radio's "All Things Considered." "And I can tell you, this has always been an option on the table. But ultimately, this is a policy matter between meeting the demands for the nation's security by one means or another," Lute added in his first interview since he was...

Official Title: To provide for the common defense by requiring all persons in the United States, including women, between the ages of 18 and 42 to perform a period of military service or a period of civilian service in furtherance of the national defense and homeland security, and for other purposes. Status: Introduced (By Rep. Charles Rangel [D-NY]) This bill is in the first step in the legislative process. Introduced House bills go first to House committees that consider whether the bill should be presented to the House as a whole. The majority of bills never make it out of...

Baghdad: US marines who suffered the highest casualty rate of any unit in Iraq have revealed that they were so short of soldiers that they used cardboard dummies to fool insurgents into believing they faced more men. Company E of the First Marine Division dressed the cutouts in shirts and placed them in observation posts to trick rebels into thinking they were manned. More than one third of the unit's 185 troops were killed or wounded during its six-month tour last year in the insurgent stronghold in Ramadi, west of Falluja, during which it faced 26 gun battles, 90 mortar...

Many of you have asked us to come up with a flyer for distribution on campuses near you. Any good suggestions will be taken (all others thrown in File 13) (:-} Draft Flyer All Dozen Flyers

DEMOCRATS PUSH DRAFT IN CONGRESSPresident Bush Opposes Draft And Republicans Will Ensure Defeat Of Bill, Kerry Open To Idea____________________________________________________JUST WHO IS PROPOSING A DRAFT?Democrat Congressman Charles Rangel (D-NY) Introduced The “Universal National Service Act Of 2003” To Reinstate Military Draft.  “A BILL To provide for the common defense by requiring that all young persons in the United States, including women, perform a period of military service or a period of civilian service in furtherance of the national defense and homeland security, and for other purposes.” (H.R. 163, Introduced 1/7/03 By Rep. Charles Rangel)ü      Today, House Of Representatives Will Vote On...

The article below was found in a newspaper database that I can access through my state libary from home. I was looking for info regarding Kerry's comments about the National Guard/Reserves and came across this article pertaining to the questions being raised about Dan Quayle in the 1988 election. . New Orleans, Aug 19 - Senator Dan Quayle of Indiana is among at least a dozen members of Congress who, as young men in the Vietnam War era, joined local Reserve or National Guard units and served out military tours near their homes. Senator Bill Bradley, a New Jersey Democrat,...

<p>NEW HAVEN — A teenager has been arrested as the alleged gunman in a city man’s scheme to avoid being drafted by having himself shot in the leg.</p> <p>Police arrested Alex Lowery, 17, whose last known address was 140 Hallock Ave., late Thursday on a warrant charging him with first-degree assault and weapons counts in connection with a June 24 shooting in the Hill.</p>

Did a professor at a high-brow Catholic university in Memphis plagiarize from an anti-semitic website in writing an article for the local county Democratic Party newsletter? Mike Hollihan has the extensively researched details on the article, which predicts a military draft if President Bush is re-elected, and his encounters with the alleged plagiarizer. After first de-constructing the professor's article and showing how it was "a carefully constructed lie," Hollihan later finds the article aappears to have been plagiarized from an email widely circulated on Internet from an anti-semitic website. Plagiarizing lies from an anti-semitic website - the Left's zeal to...

Key Democrats in the House and Senate will renew calls for the military draft as part of a critical barrage they are preparing to launch against President Bush over the length of troop deployments and the heavy reliance on reservists in Iraq. Military experts outside Congress say there is a political advantage to be gained by Democrats who want to make the president squirm at a time a growing frustration among military families and other Americans over the occupation. But they also say that there are legitimate policy grounds for re-instituting the draft, which was phased out after the Vietnam...