Talk of a draft grows despite denials by White House

[paul_valaru]

You ain't go nothin' we want.




Except maybe some brewski's.

hey, we have

good beer
great hockey players (don't say you don't want em, you keep taking them)
decriminalized pot
18 or 19 drinking age
women can go topless in Ont.
nickelback
mike myers
pamela anderson (ok, but admit, at one point, you did want her)

 

[A.B.Normal]

Psst ,you forgot Les.

 

[paul_valaru]

Psst ,you forgot Les.

CRAP!!

and we have Leslie
Nixy
Mr. Bish
Prof
ME!!!!!! (fine one downside)

if I missed anyone, I apologize

 

[paul_valaru]

oh, and A.B. Normal

 

[freako104]

hey, we have

good beer
great hockey players (don't say you don't want em, you keep taking them)
decriminalized pot
18 or 19 drinking age
women can go topless in Ont.
nickelback
mike myers
pamela anderson (ok, but admit, at one point, you did want her)

and though theyre dead you had John Belushi and John Candy. they are missed. the rest is all correct tho. and i am still in the point of wanting her. she is blonde after all i like blondes

 

[Gato_Solo]

I hear what you're saying Solo. It sounds like you generally believe in a draft. That i can understand but the fact is that this passing fancy might just last a few more years and could even grow. If Had you asked me three years ago i would probably agree with you much more than i do today. Nevertheless the fact remains that a draft at this point in time would tear this country apart. If we're discussing a draft four years from now under different circumstances then i might agree.

There's the rub, now isn't it? Sounds like you think a draft is alright during peacetime, which is quite natural, but during a war, or other military action, it's a bad idea. Nobody really wants to be shot at when you come right down to it. Even some of us who volunteer raise hell when we're actually sent out to fight and die. The main reason for this idea to come up now is two-fold...
1. We folks in the military are being run into the ground. Long deployments take a heavy toll on retention. We need some more 'bodies' to give us a break.
2. Too many people out there take the current administration with a grain of salt. Some folks actually have a legitimate complaint, while others simply spout hot air, and will never do anything to change the status-quo. Give them a couple of years in the service, and show them how all their rights were earned and maintained. Give them something more than just the right to whine and complain. Give them reasons to see beyond their own immediate selves. But, most of all, give them a reason to vote.

I'll let you know this much, though. By the time any draft is implemented, this war will be long over, and we'll be bringing troops home. A draft is not instantaneous, and can take years to get up and running.

 

[tonksy]

gato has a valid point. it would take awhile to implement the draft...and to beef up training facilities to accept all these people. the navy only has the one bootcamp now...2 shut down in the 90's...i don't know about the other branches of the military.

 

[freako104]

theres a Marine base in Baltimore and an Army base in Frederick(my dad worked in the army base as a contract employee). as far as actual boot camps? i cant say

 

[A.B.Normal]

Looks like females won't be drafted http://technologyreports.net/stopthedraft/?articleID=1496

 

[Professur]

We also had this year's Cy Young award winner, a montreal native: Eric Gagne.

now I just have to find out what the hell a Cy Young award is.

 

[paul_valaru]

We also had this year's Cy Young award winner, a montreal native: Eric Gagne.

now I just have to find out what the hell a Cy Young award is.

an award given by older women...*sigh* he's too young

 

[tonksy]

it's a baseball thing. cy young was...........a pitcher?

 

[Squiggy]

I'm missing something here. The draft is already in place. !8 year old males should already be registered. At this moment, the draft is just suspended. It would take no time at all to reactivate it.
The draft is a neccessity. We have to be able to maintain manpower levels when faced with adversity and thats just common sense.
gato, I think Bush's dismantling of the GI bill and cuts in veteran's benefits are what is going to cause the retention to fall...IMOH.

 

[Gato_Solo]

I'm missing something here. The draft is already in place. !8 year old males should already be registered. At this moment, the draft is just suspended. It would take no time at all to reactivate it.
The draft is a neccessity. We have to be able to maintain manpower levels when faced with adversity and thats just common sense.
gato, I think Bush's dismantling of the GI bill and cuts in veteran's benefits are what is going to cause the retention to fall...IMOH.

But it's a small part, Squiggy. I hear it just about every day from the younger folks who work with, and for, me. Too many days on the road, and too much time away from their loved ones takes quite a heavy toll. I don't know how folks in the Navy or Marine Corps can handle that kind of stress (up to 9 months away from home at a stretch), but I do know that that's the number one reason I hear for folks getting out nowadays. As for registeration for a draft, that's all it is. Registration. Drafting those folks would take at least 2 years to get everything up and running. You know how that system works as well as I do. Of all the services, I think only the army has more than one basic training facility open right now, and those are operating at reduced capacity. To get everything ready, you'd have to strip the NCO ranks of every twentieth-or-so person in order to get a fully staffed and operational training base up and running. That means you'd have to cut back on your other commitments. Not likely while we're involved in Afghanistan and Iraq.

 

[Gonz]

Bish-I think, in terms of our present discussion, draft & conscription could be interchangable. Very few make that differentialtion.

Back to Leslie's response. (again)

The draft has been used to conquer tyrants, recapture friendly countries & save coulntless lives. It has been required to lessen the load on volunteers & other draftees alike. It's not only cannon fodder that gets drafted. Mechanics, doctors, cooks, shipping/receiving clerks, nurses...just about any job in the private sector is matched in the military. It is a necessity.

If you disagree, ask yourself where Britain, France, Greece, Poland, Denmark, Luxemburg, the Netherlands, Belgium, Norway, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Romania would be today. Yugolavia & Italy were volunteers to that axis. Without America's help (and her umpteen million volunteers & conscript warriors) you can safely assume they'd be nothing like today. You'd pray for the ability to bitch back & forth with someone like me, except you'd most likely think like I do. You'd know the pain & misery of war. You'd see the toll that regulated behavior takes on the human soul. You wouldn't know a Jew-they'd all be dead.

That was stopped because of the great leadership of a few men (Churchill, Patton, Truman, Montgomery), a desire to end oppression & tyranny, the quick thinking & action of free men as well as lots & lots & lots of draftees.

The draft is an occassional necessity. It isn't pretty but it isn't all bad.

 

[HeXp£Øi±]

There's the rub, now isn't it? Sounds like you think a draft is alright during peacetime, which is quite natural, but during a war, or other military action, it's a bad idea. Nobody really wants to be shot at when you come right down to it. Even some of us who volunteer raise hell when we're actually sent out to fight and die. The main reason for this idea to come up now is two-fold...
1. We folks in the military are being run into the ground. Long deployments take a heavy toll on retention. We need some more 'bodies' to give us a break.
2. Too many people out there take the current administration with a grain of salt. Some folks actually have a legitimate complaint, while others simply spout hot air, and will never do anything to change the status-quo. Give them a couple of years in the service, and show them how all their rights were earned and maintained. Give them something more than just the right to whine and complain. Give them reasons to see beyond their own immediate selves. But, most of all, give them a reason to vote.

I'll let you know this much, though. By the time any draft is implemented, this war will be long over, and we'll be bringing troops home. A draft is not instantaneous, and can take years to get up and running.

I hope you realize Solo that i have the utmost respect for veterens. My fater went through bloody hell in vietnam and a close friend of mine did two terms in the same war. Vietnam was another controversial war and i might have disagreed with it as well were i around at the time. The fact is that i was against this war prior to it's beginning not because i didn't feel that it was cut and dried 'wrong', but because there was no unity supporting it. Minority supported wars( i'm talking globally as well as nationally here), and unpopular wars especially under such extreme and uknown conditions are at high risk for failure.

Becuase i do not support a draft under these circumstances does not mean that i only support a draft under peacetime circumstances. That's obviously a ludicrous idea and i hope you don't actually believe that i subscribe to any such notion and i'd appriciate it if you wouldn't put words in my mouth. This is not WWII.
I'm sorry that you're overtaxed in your duties but i highly doubt that a draft at this point in time is going to fix our problems. The men and women in the middle east are overtaxed becuase the administration is failing to give us what we need in the area not becuase we have a shortage of troops.

 

[Gonz]

This is not WWII.

No sir, it is the opening volleys of WW3.

 

[Gato_Solo]

Becuase i do not support a draft under these circumstances does not mean that i only support a draft under peacetime circumstances. That's obviously a ludicrous idea and i hope you don't actually believe that i subscribe to any such notion and i'd appriciate it if you wouldn't put words in my mouth. This is not WWII.
I'm sorry that you're overtaxed in your duties but i highly doubt that a draft at this point in time is going to fix our problems. The men and women in the middle east are overtaxed becuase the administration is failing to give us what we need in the area not becuase we have a shortage of troops.

Then, perhaps, you should further explain your viewpoint before ending your post. That way, niether of us come off 'half-cocked'. And you're wrong about one thing. We do have a shortage of troops. Everybody but the SecDef knows that.

 

[HeXp£Øi±]

Then, perhaps, you should further explain your viewpoint before ending your post. That way, niether of us come off 'half-cocked'. And you're wrong about one thing. We do have a shortage of troops. Everybody but the SecDef knows that.

Yes but we're beginning to cut back the troops in Iraq, or so says the president. I shouldn't have made that last statement as i realize we are somewhat short but if only the commander in chief would tell it like it is. I understand exactly what's going on over there and better than most. I'm hearing our brass making statements to the tone that the terrorists can no longer get to our military so they''re going after the red cross, the UN, French and italians etc. Bullshit. They're isolating America even farther by scaring away our would be allies. I'm under no dilusions whatsoever concerning our situation. We're being overtaxed but not becuase we lack the military power but becuase we lack a stationary police force in Iraq. Our force is a fighting force not a police force and in essance a draft at this point in time would be the drafting of a police force. Is that what you really want? I realize that the plan is to be out of Iraq soon but i am sceptical about the administrations timetable.

 

[Gato_Solo]

WASHINGTON — A widely circulated e-mail claiming that the Bush administration is trying to revive a military draft is causing widespread panic in cyberspace, but Republicans said Wednesday that the conscription scare is a political ploy engineered by Democrats.

The e-mail says legislation pending in the House and Senate would reinstate the draft, claiming that "the administration is quietly trying to get these bills passed now, while the public's attention is on the elections."

The message, however, fails to state that the bill in question was authored by Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., (search) and Sen. Fritz Hollings, D-S.C., (search) two of the most liberal members of Congress who are also staunch opponents of the administration.

"Clearly these bills are filed not by Republicans, not on behalf of the administration, but by those who are being partisan Democrats about this and trying to scare people," said Sen. John Cornyn, (search) a Texas Republican.

Rangel, in fact, has been a vocal proponent of the draft, claiming that only a draft would address the issue of the disproportionate number of working class and minority people serving in the military.

"I believe in the draft and this being a shared sacrifice," Rangel said. Rangel also acknowledged, however, that the legislation is also aimed at igniting more controversy and debate around the war in Iraq.

Whatever...