How to dodge the draft?

[JOhn Galt]

You know, I thnk I could really get to like Bill Clinton or George W. Bush on a personal basis. They both seem
like real likeable guys (as opposed to Nixon, for example). Neither would be my first choice to run the country though (not even on the list actually). Now, Hillary.....................well, don't get me started

JG

 

[azanon]

W. seems like a likeable guy to me too; someone you could really have fun shooting the s*&t with at the local bar. But running our country? Everyone just keep praying we make it through these next 4 years.

 

[lets-retire]

The way I see it Vietnam and LBJ gave the military a complex that they couldn't do anything right. The Nixon and Ford administrations were too embroiled in contraversy to fix the miitary. The LBJ complex was compounded by the Carter administration's refusal to properly fund and train the military. Only in the '80's with Ronnie at the helm and Vietnam a memory was the military given the oportunity and the resources to prove itself. Bush Sr. rode on Reagan's back and showed we had the best military out there. Clinton fell off the wagon. He failed to properly fund the military, resulting in a lack of needed equipment and traning. Clinton was also very skittish about any of the military members being killed/injured. There was a line in a war move, I think it was Gettysburg, stating that a general had to try and keep the casualites to a minimum but at the same time be willing to give an order that would probably result inthe destruction of the army. Clinton failed to realize this and rather than finish a fight that might be a little messy he chose to leave as soon as the going got rough. This I think resulted in a emboldened enemy. Under Jr. we are proving we will stay the course and strike back harder not run away with our tails between our legs at the slightest hint of trouble.

Say what you want but, Clinton's refusal to pay the military a decent wage resulted in me giving up 10 years and obtaining a job working for a small city with a starting hourly wage about the same I had given up. The governments most important job is to defend this country everything else is nice to have but not essential. If the country is not protected then the rest is irrelevent.

On topic the military is not set up for a draft any longer. That would be one of the worst things to do to the active force.

 

[brewer12345]

Thanks for the tips, guys. I sure hope that I never really need to figure all of it out, but seems more and more like we are about to start shooting at Iran, and if that happens we will need more troops on the ground than the military can currently supply.

For the record, Clinton was a vain, self-absorbed, kind of superficial guy, but he was very bright, largely a centrist, and a perfectly good care-taker of this country. I sincerely wish we had somebody like him in charge now.

 

[azanon]

How to dodge the draft?

Get 33 years old like me (or better). I've got it made in the shade drinking coolade. (even though i'm probably as fit as many 20-25 year olders).

 

[brewer12345]

Get 33 years old like me (or better).  I've got it made in the shade drinking coolade.  (even though i'm probably as fit as many 20-25 year olders).

Unfortunately, I don't think 33 is old enough (I'm 31). From comments I have read around and abut plus basic politocal common sense, I'd be surprised if any future draft didn't apply up to age 35.

 

[haha]

At least (as far as I know) Clintons NSA never accidentally referred to him as "My Husband" like Rice did...

TH, are you saying that Condi called W "my husband"? I guess I missed that. Can you point me to the source? I would love to have this as a conversational ice-breaker.

Mikey

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Indeedly doodly...

Heres a news snippet...I found this MOST telling...

A pressing issue of dinner-party etiquette is vexing Washington, according to a story now making the D.C. rounds: How should you react when your guest, in this case national-security adviser Condoleezza Rice, makes a poignant faux pas? At a recent dinner party hosted by New York Times D.C. bureau chief Philip Taubman and his wife, Times reporter Felicity Barringer, and attended by Arthur Sulzberger Jr., Maureen Dowd, Steven Weisman, and Elisabeth Bumiller, Rice was reportedly overheard saying, "As I was telling my husband..." and then stopping herself abruptly, before saying, "As I was telling President Bush." Jaws dropped, but a guest says the slip by the unmarried politician, who spends weekends with the president and his wife, seemed more psychologically telling than incriminating. Nobody thinks Bush and Rice are actually an item. A National Security Council spokesman laughed and said, "No comment."

 

[haha]

Perfecto!

Mikey

 

[Cut-Throat]

I came in as the draft was going out, and my first comment about the draft is "Good riddance!"  The military wants a draft about as much as you want to be drafted.  When you attend your first anti-draft protest you'll be pressing shoulders with Don Rumsfeld, John McCain, and a host of flag officers.

Of course these folks don't want a draft of the rich and powerful. It will only make their jobs harder!

Actually we need a draft like we had in the 1960s. It will save us from continuing to make some very bad mistakes. But in reality, we have a draft currently. It is only for the economically deprived. It is their ticket to education and the hope of a middle class lifestyle.

I was a 'victum' of the draft of the Vietnam era and was against it at the time, mostly because of my own skin. Now that I am older, I realize that having the sons and daughters of the Captains of industry and the privileged of the U.S.A should cause us to think twice before going to war.

The sooner we bring back the draft, the less we will be involved in frivolous wars!

Afganistan was justified. Iraq was not!

 

[lets-retire]

It's ironic the people I hear insisting the war in Iraq was unjustified, because of the loss of life, refuse to listen when told WE NEVER STOPPED BOMBING THE IRAQIS. By we I mean the British and Americans. The French military was there but all they did was collect their fee from the Saudis and cause problems for the allies. So what are we to do continue risking the lives of our pilots and ground forces protecting the bases with no end in sight. I could name several instances where our forces were put in harm's way to fight to a stalmate in the Persian Gulf region. Gee, that sounds like what we did in Vietnam and Korea. Nobody wants to relive those wars.

Like a shrink told me if what your doing is not working try something else. Consistantly bombing the Iraqis was not working. Bush had the cajones to try something else. Quit complaining unless you want another Vietnam, which is where we were heading.

 

[brewer12345]

What a joke! The invasion of Iraq has vastly worsened the quagmire we are stuck in, enflamed the entire region, and inspired countless new recruits for insurgency and terrorism. To make matters worse, since we are obviously over-committed in Iraq, all of the other loons (N. Korea, Syria, Iran, etc.) now feel emboldened to do as they please.

We will be stuck in Iraq for years and paying for it for decades. Sound like Viet Nam?

 

[P.S.]

It's ironic the people I hear insisting the war in Iraq was unjustified, because of the loss of life, refuse to listen when told WE NEVER STOPPED BOMBING THE IRAQIS.  By we I mean the British and Americans.  The French military was there but all they did was collect their fee from the Saudis and cause problems for the allies.  So what are we to do continue risking the lives of our pilots and ground forces protecting the bases with no end in sight.  I could name several instances where our forces were put in harm's way to fight to a stalmate in the Persian Gulf region.  Gee, that sounds like what we did in Vietnam and Korea.  Nobody wants to relive those wars.  

Like a shrink told me if what your doing is not working try something else.  Consistantly bombing the Iraqis was not working.  Bush had the cajones to try something else.  Quit complaining unless you want another Vietnam, which is where we were heading.

I have a bit of difficulty following your prose, but do you believe that the US was involved in an situation resembling Vietnam prior to the invasion of Iraq?  How could it have been like Vietnam if significantly less than 150,000 soldiers were in Iraq?  I'm not sure I follow...now that the US invaded Iraq, less people died and we will be involved in the region for a shorter period of time than otherwise?  And in your estimation then, how much longer will the US be in Iraq?  If you are quite sure of your facts and dates, Congress may be interested, since they themselves don't seem to know.
Hmm...are you a troll?

 

[lets-retire]

P.S.--I have been told that I am hard to follow sometimes.  What I ment was prior to the second Iraq war we were fighting a defensive battle.  This is akin to a doctor treating your symptoms not the desease.  This had 2 possible outcomes.  1)  The eroding of sanctions resulting in another Vietnam type loss, where we didn't lose a battle but lost the war because the North Vietnamese simply outlasted us.  2)  We continue doing the same thing never winning or never losing.  Costing 100's of millions per year indefinately.  

In either case if that is how we finish the war why did we go in the first place?  I think the second senerio was not likely, due to the French working to get rid of sanctions against Iraq, and making headway to that end.  Either way the end result would be the emboldening of the terrorist groups/unfriendly governments in the area, once they realized all they had to do was outlast the Americans.  Similar to the message Clinton sent in Somalia--all we have to do is kill a few Americans and they'll go away.

Oh and I am very sure of my facts. I was there I saw the planes leave fully loaded and return completely empty. Unless their bombs just fell off in the desert someplace they were used. I doubt they fell off, there were too many planes empty upon return. As far as troll, I've been lurking for a long time, I just don't say much. The wise man learns from listening not from talking.

 

[azanon]

What a joke!  The invasion of Iraq has vastly worsened the quagmire we are stuck in, enflamed the entire region, and inspired countless new recruits for insurgency and terrorism.  To make matters worse, since we are obviously over-committed in Iraq, all of the other loons (N. Korea, Syria, Iran, etc.) now feel emboldened to do as they please.

We will be stuck in Iraq for years and paying for it for decades.  Sound like Viet Nam?

Exactly.  The thing that insulted me the most was attacking them under false pretense.  I followed the development closely, and saw the same photographs Colin Powell showed the European community that were supposedly WMD factories.  I didn't see a single photograph that definitely proved they had WMDs to me.  Oh sure, i know they used them a couple decades ago against Iran, and of course we were patting them on the back then!

So you go and attack and kill people in a country on a hunch (which turned out to be wrong).  IMHO, we added that accusation because the world wasn't going to let us attack them solely because they weren't cooperating fully with the inspectors or because they were abusing the kurds.  We knew that hunch could turn out to be wrong, and we found out later it was. But hey, lets not worry about that, lets gloat about our shock and awe firework show!

And if abusing its people is our main motive, then wth are we not helping Sudan?

And then when its all over, and Bush is backed into a wall about the WMD issue, what's the best thing he can come up with?   Arn't they better off now?   Deciphered, Bush is basically saying so what if it was a lie, the means justified the ends.  Sounds like some good morals there!

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Lets face it, if a group of corporate managers drew the same conclusions from the same level of data, they'd be thrown out on their asses. This was simply "find enough skimpy evidence to validate a decision thats already been made".

That a majority of republican voters (which I am) still think Hussein was behind 9/11 and that we did find WMD's there is strikingly sad. But it explains a lot.

Hussein was our puppy to keep the islamic fundamentalists away from Israel and Saudi Arabia. When the puppy misbehaved we stripped his military might down to the point where he had to bluff about what weapons he did and didnt have to avoid an invasion. Whether we wanted his oil or felt he couldnt play the buffer role anymore without our troops in there is in question. That he was fairly helpless and had no chance of being a danger to us or anyone else is honestly not in question at all unless you cant read or think for yourself.

What we've bought is a standing role of being that buffer ourselves, suffering the daily 1-3 soldiers killed or maimed by pot shot artists claiming to be militants. The moment we as a country decide we cant take that anymore and walk away, Iran either overtly takes over the country or covertly through political assention. In fact, the group that just 'won' the recent election is full of islamic fundamentalist, many of which were living in Iran until just before the election.

Once we have a billion well armed, nuclear capable islamic fundamentalists parked right on the border of Israel and Saudi Arabia...well then the real fun begins.

That the administration doesnt comprehend the history of Mesopotamia and the implications of their actions is nothing short of appalling.

We brewed up the makings of World War III (or should we just cut to the chase and call it "The Crusades, part deux"?) and then declared ourselves "safer". :

 

[laurence]

I know, let's nuke Mecca and get it overwith!

Seriously, with almost 2 thousand U.S. dead and over ten thousand injured (and these aren't little shrapnel wounds, were talking missing limbs) there is no way you can do the math and say this was more cost effective then the occaisional bombing of a mobile radar station. The military itself says many units are close to being broken. Equipment is getting worn out, soldiers are serving extended and multiple tours. And we don't see the hidden costs of divorce, broken families, etc.

Colin Powell said , "You break it, you own it" when the invasion was being debated. No matter where you are on this debate, now we've got to try our hardest to make it work. If we do end up with democracies in Iraq and Afganistan, just imagine how awesome that would be! It will have come at a terrible price, though.

On topic, I work for a defense contractor, and after 9/11 a colonel in the Marines I had developed a friendship with via work told me that if they went to the draft, they would start with 21 year olds, go up to 28, I believe, and then go younger. I think he said they wouldn't want me, even if I volunteered, after age 30. I was 27 at the time, and I greeted that with mixed feelings, since I had toyed with joining up, especially after the attack (had I been single, I probably would have done it).

 

[azanon]

work told me that if they went to the draft, they would start with 21 year olds, go up to 28, I believe, and then go younger. I think he said they wouldn't want me, even if I volunteered, after age 30. I was 27 at the time, and I greeted that with mixed feelings, since I had toyed with joining up, especially after the attack (had I been single, I probably would have done it).

That's my understanding too. But I pick on brewer enough as it is, so i let it go =p