Vote for Democrats, Get a Draft?
Read Charlie Rangel's Lips
By Dan McLaughlin Posted in National Security — Comments (61) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Kilmer noted this below but I wanted to highlight it: on "Face the Nation" this morning, incoming House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel laid out his plans to introduce legislation calling for reinstating the draft. No longer can apologists for the Democrats claim that these are mere protests of a fringe of a frustrated minority party. Rangel is the powerful chairman of a major committee, and his party controls both Houses of Congress. We will soon find out how much support the draft has in his party (it has none in the Republican party) - and whether voters who swung to the Democrats this cycle will feel surprised that a leading Democrat is proposing that they do this with their new majority.
UPDATE: As Ca. Yankee points out above, John Murtha voted for Rangel's original 2003 proposal to bring back the draft. Murtha will now chair a subcommitee of the House Armed Services Committee.
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Conservatives are portrayed night and day as uncaring cold people that would toss orphans out into the snow. When we aren't snidely whiplash we are colonel flag. There has to be some serious push back.
Rangel's prime objective with "the draft" has very little to do with the military. He's most interested in the ALTERNATIVE make-work program, that young people could choose instead of military service. He'd be happy if 90% choose the alternative service. He just wants to hand out the health, education, and other benefits (that the military veterans get) to ALL young people. They just have to spend a couple years in non-military make-work public service jobs. Rangel has absolutely no interest in a MILITARY-ONLY draft. If the draft bill turns into that, he'll no longer be supportive. Just follow the money.
One can only wonder whether that would be more work than many of Rangel's constituents are performing today.
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Bipartisanship = give + take. Republicans give. Democrats take.
It's no wonder they no longer teach US history in high schools. Today 120 people died in Iraq and according to the AP, it's a "bloodbath" over there. The propaganda will not stop but only get worse. In WWII, THOUSANDS of people died in a matter of a day or two. As horrible as war is, can we get some PERSPECTIVE here? No, we won't. The dems/press (same party) will see to it that the war in Iraq is the worst scorge on American history since the Civil War.
Dear God please help us. Our own people want us to lose.
for D-Day, but nobody called it off.
I think our tolerance for what constitutes deaths in war is extremely low now. I know many in the anti war crowd declare WWII a "righteous" war, but I can't help but think if you put the same war under today's media spotlight, we would have been hearing for calls to pull out long before they started planning the invasion of Normandy-the invasion of Norther Africa would have been declared a loss (I know at least one of those battles took more than 1000 lives in a matter of hours).
Rangel is fighting the class war. He wants more rich white kids to get shot in Iraq.
2006 is done, 2008 is another day and another fight
that as usual, Charlie's "facts" are a bunch of lies. If poor minorities were making up all the military, would there be any kids age 18-21 left in Harlem?
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Bipartisanship = give + take. Republicans give. Democrats take.
http://www.heritage.org/Research/NationalSecurity/cda06-09.cfm
Good Stuff...
"The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal comfort... has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."
--John Stuart Mill
reason anyone joins the military is because they don't have any choices.
I can honestly say, that while there probably are some people who joined, because they didn't have anything else to do, I never met any of them while my husband was in the Navy.
And a waste of time. Good to know that ol' Charlie has solved all of our country's problems so he can now turn his attention to fixing something that's not broken.
If this is how the Dems are going to try and show how tough they are on national security, bring it on.
This also shows the Dems are stuck in a time warp and still think this is 1970.
One of the frustrations on the left has been their inability to tap into a 1968-level of anti-war sentiment on college campuses for the simple reason that there is no draft and so most students can ignore the war if they wish.
Rangel's bill does several things.
First, it allows for "alternative service." This automatically means that some person or group of persons is going to have to decide who goes into the Armed Forces and who gets to mow grass in a National Park. What his bill does in eliminating the perceived unfairness of dozens of draft exemptions will be more than made up for in the perception created that IF you have connections you can perform your "national service" safely. This leads us back to Rangel's goal of returning the military to the state it was in circa 1972.
Second, a fifteen month term of service is simply a waste of everyone's time. This equates to just about a year spent in a troop unit. Barely enough time to become useful, certainly not enough time to become a contributing member of the unit. Logic tells you that we will end up imitating the practice in Wester European armies of maintaining "professional" units for real missions and consolidating the "conscripts" into units which do make-work activities.
Third, someone has to train these folks. We're talking about something on the order of a million kids a year being processed through this system. Where would the military, or the civilian organizations, find enough people to supervise this influx so that the entire program doesn't become a joke?
Fourth, Rangel creates two militaries. One professional, one involuntary and poorly trained. Aside from that he creates a system where the military is competing with National Service for enlistments.
Fifth, realistically do we think the military recruiting effort will be resourced at the same levels as today if we have National Service? No. The adoption of this without sustaining or increasing the recruiting budgets will kill the volunteer military.
Having talked to several ex-IDF grunts, the consensus that I've gotten is that there's a significant segment of Israeli society that wishes to be rid of the national draft and the adoption of an all-volunteer force, as is found in the US, due in large part to the fact that IDF is bloated and corrupt in ways that would make the Louisiana Democratic political machine blush.
for a larger military, who would have thought it? Just in case, you see. I'm sure it's pure coincidence but the timing is interesting. The draft and national service have one irresistible attraction to liberals[?], it's coercive, sort of like honey to a bear.
Lindsey Graham, man of steel, is waffling on this and with the Times behind it could God Himself say no.
Time to check out the lefty blogs and that new phenomenon the Libertarian Democrats. What's that old saying," be careful what you ask for",?
"a man's admiration for absolute government is proportinate to the contempt he feels for those around him". Tocqueville
Democrats won the election. They must be responsible now!
"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it"-Winston Churchill
is broken, but host Bob Schieffer specifically asked Rangel if his draft proposal, which is one he has proffered for several years, were just an anti-Iraq statement or if he were serious about the draft. Rangel was serious, and his main reason was that making the military representative of society, even Bush's friends was the implication, would make our leaders less likely to send our troops to war for no reason.
Charlie Rangel is a decorated veteran of the Korean war, and I wonder if some of his notions of our military aren't carry-overs from that period and thereafter. I had a very recently retired Air Force staff sergeant tell me that these veterans of past wars do not understand what is today's military. This was not an insult. Plop a PC in front of Albert Einstein in his day...
is a key component of the left's war against the U.S. They believe that if every male college student is at risk of being sent to a "highly dangerous environment" where they are "likely to die" we will quickly have the sorts of college anti-war demonstrations that condemned millions of innocent people to die in Vietnam, and even more to be sent to re-education camps.
If Rangel re-instates the draft, doesn't that play into Kerry's idea that only if someone flunks out of college will they be "stuck" in Iraq?
A bill to re-instate the draft probably won't make it through a 51-49 Senate, but if it did, wouldn't it be great to see the Dems' reaction after President Bush vetoed it? President Bush's "coalition of the willing" against the Democrats' "army of the unwilling"?
The bad news: Conservatism is hard to sell. The good news is that it works.
with McCain calling for increased troop levels for a 'final push' in Iraq, a veto from Bush sends too much of a mixed message.
Rangel has introduced the draft bill in the past but voted against his own bill. Kerry must have been a co sponsor, wrote it then voted against it.
http://www.hillnews.com/news/100604/rangel.aspx
"With regard to hope not being a method, Senator(Shrillary), I agree with you, and I would also say that despair is not a method. When I come to Washington, I feel despair." -General Abizaid
One of the things that Moonbats don't realize is that regular Democrats need to restore street cred with regular America. Don't think that Rangel hasn't talked to The Missus about this bill.
There will be a Draft and Hillary will ram it through if she becomes President. Think of it as the "Starship Troopers" bill. She'll be able to do it because the Draft bill will come out of the Congressional Black Caucus, stamped "APPROVED" by the NAACP and the CBC.
The Armed Services won't want it, but it's what they'll get, because the Porksters, who will be running the Democratic Party by then, will see the military as a means to train young men and women first as infantry, then to route them into trades unions.
Don't be idiots. Just because the smart play may be to increase the size of the All Vol to, say, 15 Divisions, doesn't mean it will happen. A consensus will develop in the Democratic Party that the Moonbats must be put down for the long term health of the Party and that using the military as a socialization method to create more Democrats (instant job right out of high school, courtesy of the Clintons) is good for Democrats, therefore good for the country. You'll begin to see articles in the New Republic and in The American Prospect saying that we have a Praetorian Guard military that is not accountable to the people, and that we need the People to be more involved in their army. You'll begin to see veterans of the Peace Movement arguing for two things: isolationism and national service to make that isolationism saleable to the American people.
Oh, a military buildup means higher taxes. I forgot to tell you that.
One of the realities that Democrats will confront is that Islamic Fascism and the growth of Chinese power are twin threats to the life of the Republic that aren't going away. They've been in opposition, so they've been able to play the Bush Is Hitler card and get away with it.
Now they can't.
But now they can't. They have to ressurect FDR, or go home. Now the Democrats have to realize, at long last, that the enemy is not at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it"-Winston Churchill
You're thinking like a Republican. Think like a Democrat, and you'll begin to understand why there will be a restoration of the Draft.
"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it"-Winston Churchill
Once again Washington proves it isn't what is said that is important, it is what is left unsaid. Read the fine print. I think Section9 is spot on.
Rangel isn't pursuing the draft for national security, more like welfare, affirmative action(discrimination), socialism, unemployment, and building a future democrat dependent voter base all in one.
There are great benefits in serving especially overseas to gain discipline, develop patriotism, and learn how fortunate we are to live in the US. However, Dems would find some way to F that up.
"With regard to hope not being a method, Senator(Shrillary), I agree with you, and I would also say that despair is not a method. When I come to Washington, I feel despair." -General Abizaid
Look, suppose we get lucky if the Dems win and get a President Obama. Things COULD be worse (Hillary, AlGore, Edwards, Dennis Kucinich...need I go on?).
Okay, work with me here. Rangel, the Black Caucus and the Labor Goons come to Obama with the Warfare to Welfare Starship Troopers Universal Military Service Bill. Now the Joint Chiefs will go apeshot at first, but they'll figure that the handwriting will be on the wall, so they'll lobby for longer service, more money for rebuilding training centers like Dix, Leonard Wood, and Sam Houston up to where they were in WWII (literally THOUSANDS of barracks will have to be built-lots of work for Bechtel). What I SUSPECT will happen is a draft that is designed to fill out the National Guard while beefing up the Active Units by, say, 25 percent.
-There will be deep involvement of the Trades Unions in routing those with specialties into a Union. That's good for Democrats.
-Training centers will have to be dispersed to prevent overcrowding. We're talking about cycling a million people a year into a three year cycle and then moving them into State National Guards.
-Pentagon will insist on a full training cycle of two to three years of active service, probably two years active with one in State National Guard, to relieve the military of the obligation of keeping someone in the actives for too long. But training of draftees will be the priority for the cadre of volunteer legionaries that will make up the core of the Army.
-This will, inevitably lead to more requests for the Navy and Air Force as peopel beat down the doors to get into those services. Marine Corps will have NO problem getting volunteers.
Expect some things from the sunsetting of the Bush tax cuts and the increases in taxes that are coming: naval buildup because of the increases in PLAN fleet size and the need for numeric increases in airpower. Basicall, a rush of volunteers trying to avoid the Army Draft.
-Bottom line? Pentagon will use the Draft to fill out the National Guard units to full strength. Think of the Israeli Defense Forces. You keep a huge reserve of trained personnel and call them up twice a year. You keep them in the National Guard to reduce social and economic dislocation. UMS will be for men and women. The full GI Bill from WWII will be restored, as will the entire line of Veterans benefits and Equal Housing Benefits for Veterans gets restored.
Do not think that Democrats haven't thought to where this gravy train leads. The Armed Forces, for instance, has family health care. That will catch on, as will the tax burden that supports it.
Think of what happens when you put a rifle in someone's hand, as well as the whole network of social and political obligations that go with it. The New Dealers understood this, which was why Roosevelt's politics was so successful and had so much resonance with the people. Smart Democrats are beginning to rediscover this.
Charlie Rangel is not stupid.
"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it"-Winston Churchill
and that it might have the opposite effect in the long run. Look what happenned after WWII and Korea and Vietnam. Republicans win the Presidency each time for quite a while. Carter was a fluke-just a response to corruption like this election.
But not before Democrats institute National Defense Teacher Training and the National Defense Health Care System.
See how it works?
"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it"-Winston Churchill
As a libertarian Republican, I'd like to ask my fellow Republican friends to take a moment and giddily chide your libertarian friends about Rangel's proposal. You all deserve it.
From Dave Boaz of Cato to Jacob Sullem of Reason Magazine, many cynical libertarians were saying "ahh, let the Democrats win... better to have divided government." They were gleeful of making Republicans like Conrad Burns and Jim Talent go down to defeat.
Now this Draft proposal comes along; the most anti of all libertarian proposals. What do all those libertarians who called for a Republican defeat have to say now?
Eric Dondero
www.mainstreamlibertarian.com
I WAAAAARNED YOU? But did you listen? Oh, NOOOO....
Sharp, pointy teeth...
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It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones. -- Calvin Coolidge
The unanswerable reply: "If Bush's position were fundamentally different on this issue, he's had five years to suspend draft registration with a stroke of his pen."
(Actually, he ought to do that right now, to keep Rangel's folly in the news cycle for an extra day or two....)
Maybe Rangel figures that if we have compulsory military service, it will be impossible ever to go to war again, because we'd get 1968-style protests.
the leftists' attempt to weaken the US military. It is the only thing they believe standing in their way of taking control of the country and superseding the constitution. They like Chavez because they have the same plan for the USA. The difference is the very capable US military will not let them do what he has done. Therefore, they must eliminate/degrade it in any way possible. As someone mentioned above, you put Dems in control of all positions of power in 2008 and you will have this horrible bill.
Also agree with the point on those ignorant so called libertarians who voted for democrats. You need to reread your history and dictionary and get it straight in 2008.
The Democrats will cast them loose because they have to survive politically. Democrats are not as suicidal as Republicans make them out to be. And I say this as a Republican.
They will get Democrats and they will get the draft.
I will dance a jig when William Rivers Pitt has a rifle put in his hand, courtesy of Charlie Rangel.
I say we start a fundraiser here at RedState: the "Send Markos Back to the Army" fund. He voted for these clowns. He can by God go back to his old artillery unit and train draftees.
I want to see William Rivers Pitt cook an MRE. I really do. Okay, a draft doesn't quite solve the problems and Rangel is lying through his teeth when he says that the Army is made up of Poor Black Children. However, you have to admit that the ENTIRE CROWD at DU and DailyKos deserve two years in leg infantry.
It's what they voted for.
"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it"-Winston Churchill
become chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. The dem leadership are mostly old leftists; they aren't getting cut loose.
Rangel's bill is a twofer for them: big welfare program and severely decreases military effectiveness. This bill's passage would be the beginning of the end.
Don't think he hasn't. This will be part of a Democratic Administration. Giuliani or Romney need to understand what's coming.
"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it"-Winston Churchill
His arguments against the war isn't good enough and can't get enough traction, so he wants to employ a draft in order to foment a groundswell of anti-war protests. That's my theory. It's beyond cynical.
Is to get Bush to give a Big press conference about how the Draft is not desired by him or by the military, nor is it neccessary and he will Veto it when and If it crosses his desk.
This will completely disown the Draft Bill from him and lay it on the Dems' shoulders alone.
And he needs to say it Loud and Often in order to get it past the Media Censors.
"The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal comfort... has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."
--John Stuart Mill
Is to get Bush to give a Big press conference about how the Draft is not desired by him or by the military, nor is it neccessary and he will Veto it when and If it crosses his desk.
He can punctuate it by rescinding the peanut farmer's executive order and putting the machinery back into mothballs.
the Ds and MSN will spin it as something necessary because of "Bush's War." The Big Lie will become the Known Fact and that will settle it.
That said, I agree with the poster above that it is a callous, cynical attempt to get the slack jawed boys in baggy pants, and especially their mommies, all exercised about Bush's War. There is considerable electoral discontent about the progress and prognosis of the war in Iraq, but the Left has not been able to foment significant opposition to the fact of the war in Iraq. They need to spread opposition to the fact of the War into the ranks of the independents and moderates and, especially, the mommies. Get those modern mommies thinking that the evil Republicans want to draft her spoiled little boy, and happy days will be here again.
But I'm not cynical either!
In Vino Veritas
Just because a handful of Democrats favour it, it doesn't mean there will be a draft. Immediately after an election it may get more votes than just before, but I doubt it will reach double figures, let alone a veto-proof majority.
I still say Bush should have rushed round the country promising to veto a Democrat draft. It would have swayed a couple of seats, maybe.
Quentin Langley
Editor of http://www.quentinlangley.net
I know that this current proposal is a skam, but as a Nam Vet, I am not sure I totally disagree with the idea of the draft. If fighting terrorists is the defining moment for America, then I truly believe this responsibility should be shared by all. Unlike Nam, I would propose no exemptions except for health so that everyone would have the same chances of serving. I would not be opposed to having alternative service, but for the most part, I think the draft should be used to shore up aour current voluntary base.
Any society above the hunter-gatherer level is based on division of labor and specialization -- not everybody does everything, not even every downright essential thing.
(Before somebody replies with the obvious quote from the Notebooks of Lazarus Long, what Heinlein was saying was that everybody should have a wide base of basic familiarities to fall back upon in an emergency, not that everybody should try to be a jack-of-all-trades as a routine matter.)
This basic truth also torpedoes the stupid "economic draft" argument of the leftists. Yes, people who lack the skills and credentials for pleasant high-paying jobs get stuck with more difficult and less rewarding ones. The fact that the latter might happen to be life in the Poor Bloody Infrantry (rather than some other equally unpleasant but essential task such as unplugging the sewers) doesn't invalidate the basic rules of society.
That's all it's ever been. Rangel won't vote for it, nor will very many other members of Congress. Speculation about a draft as part of the Democrats' platform is silly. It would be political suicide for them.
How many times must a Democratic leader sponsor such a bill before you stop defending them on it?
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It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones. -- Calvin Coolidge
My point was that the bill is going to die on the floor, if it gets that far. It won't pass. It didn't the last two times it came up, and the nays outweighed the yeas by 200-to-1 on the last go-round.
In that light, speculation about the Democratic Party (as opposed to specific Democrats like Charlie Rangel, Jack Murtha, or wossisname that also voted for it last time) including a draft as part of their platform strike me as overblown. It looks like pretty crass political showmanship to me, and Rangel the sort who feeds off attention (sadly, I wouldn't trust him if no-one was watching him, either). For heaven's sake, someone get the clown out of Congress.
I'm not defending Rangel (and I don't appreciate being misinterpreted so, but I suppose that's my fault). I'm pointing out that, this being the fourth article in twenty-four hours on Redstate on this very subject, maybe the fears of a new draft are a bit paranoid.
Dear god, what is Rangel DOING? Is the supposedly-unified Democratic party doing everything for political purposes as it's been claimed? If it is, what the hell is going on!? Everyone, especially liberals, are horrified of a draft; if the DEMOCRATS (not even Bush and the Republicans) did it, the entire Democratic base would be gone. Nothing left.
I think Rangel and Murtha are two outstanding idiots in the Democratic party when it comes to this; every party has a group of morons. Expect the rest of the Democratic party to completely ignore and disown these two; a movement for the draft won't come from the Democratic Party as much as it will be from two idiots who happen to be in a party that does not agree with them.
If the Democrats actually betray their base like that (impossible), expect the party to drop off the political map. It'd be a political implosion that would make the Hartford Convention look like a small blemish next to it. Also, expect Mexico to have an illegal immigration problem as big as the one America has right now.
Of course one must against the draft before one can be for the draft in order to be really against it. If this does not appear to make perfect sense, that's simply because one needs to be a Democrat to truly understand the nuance of such logic. C'mon .. we need to catch up (!)
He toucheth the mountain - and it smokes
I sincerely regret that I misinterpreted Rangel's words to wrongly imply anything negative about Democrats and I personally apologize to any CBC member or Democrat whom I offended.
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Bipartisanship = give + take. Republicans give. Democrats take.
From the community, to college campi, even to MTV's "vote or die" campaign (which featured commercials of kids getting their "congratulations, you've been drafted - you're getting sent to die in Iraq" notices), all we hear from any who converse about it is that "Bush wants the draft."
When it's pointed out that the only people who have mentioned the draft in a positive, possible way - let alone proposed legislation to enact it - are Democrats, this is either met with disbelief or ignorance.
I don't see this changing. Rangel may introduce it again (and again, and again), but it'll be "Bush's draft," regardless of who supports it or if it goes anywhere.
This reminds me of the Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll taken just before the 2004 election, which showed that nearly 70% of Americans thought that George W. Bush was "far richer" than billionaire Heinz husband John Kerry; if a notion is fostered in the public's mind (in that case, it was that Republicans were rich elitists, and that Democrats were down-to-earth populists; in this case it's that the Republicans - and specifically President Bush - want the draft), then the facts can be contrary to that belief, but to no avail.
In this case, that means that such a bill can likely be introduced a thousand times by a Democrat, and, to the electorate, it'll still be owned by the Republicans and by the President.