Does this mean that Markos Zuniga (Daily Kos) will be drafted and sent to Iraq ?

I love the smell of irony in the morning !

William Amos on November 19, 2006 at 3:43 PM

How is that “ironic”? Do you even know what the word means? Zuniga actually served in the armed forces.

Its Ironic in that Markos supported the democratic party and now someone in the democratic party might just send him to Iraq.

William Amos on November 19, 2006 at 3:47 PM

Umm LOL I love this in that Rangel, Kerry and Markos all served in the military yet THEY seem to always feel superior to you know to everyone else in the military.

I think what they are arguing is that the military needs more elitists like themselves as they are the best and can win any war and fight morally and ethically.

Its the politics of ego.

William Amos on November 19, 2006 at 3:51 PM

Grebrook You’re back. Kudos for not being so humiliated by your last outing that you would leave us.

TheBigOldDog on November 19, 2006 at 3:52 PM

Here is the problem I have with this, besides the idea of a draft being idiotic on its face. A classic Democrat talking point has always been that the “rich” use their influence to avoid the draft. Assuming this is their genuine belief and not just another piece of class warfare rhetoric, wouldn’t they be concerned that the “rich” would somehow get out of the draft, thereby forcing more “poor” people into the service?

Shivv on November 19, 2006 at 4:02 PM

Give me a break, we all know this is going nowhere other than forcing the Bush administration to back down and begin withdrawing troops.

Yeah, you’re exactly right. Typical of democrats to waste time and effort on useless political ploys.

Does anyone here know what the democrats stand for? The only thing I know is they stand for the opposite of whatever Bush does. “Bush cures cancer, Democrats now claim cancer is good for you and shouldn’t be cured”

“A new direction” Where? what direction? The democratic party … they were for nothing before they were against whatever Bush does.

darwin on November 19, 2006 at 4:05 PM

He has described the military as “perhaps the ideal society – we worked hard but the Army took care of us in return.”

So when is he- who I am assuming is Kos, you aren’t very clear- going to just come out and call for a military coup?

How the hell can anybody take these idiots seriously?

B Moe on November 19, 2006 at 4:08 PM

Give me a break, we all know this is going nowhere other than forcing the Bush administration to back down and begin withdrawing troops. Hypotheticals don’t amuse me. This is like that pathetic “Defense of Christmas” resolution passed last year when Republicans claimed Christmas was under siege.

Grebrook on November 19, 2006 at 3:52 PM

Thanks to Democrats who’ve wanted us to lose all along so that they could win some elections. The terrorists play to the media and the left. Early on you guys revealed that you weren’t ready for the war and that you would politicize everything that happened, so they play to it. This situation would have been completely different had the jihadis not saw that everytime they turn on their TV, you have divided the country and politicize each and every death. They aren’t stupid, they know what they’re doing. If we were a united front, the situation wouldn’t be nearly what it is. They see that they can affect American politics and that you Democrats will pull out, and they can claim victory. They’ve seen in since very early on, and the stupid American peoples’ votes just gave the jihadis yet another reason to boost their efforts. Thanks media.

RightWinged on November 19, 2006 at 4:15 PM

As I see this, a Democrat will introduce it, Bush wants us to compromise with the opposition party, and it might now be needed as Universities, and High Schools across the country try to limit access to Military recruiters so why not support Rangel’s upcomming Bill? America voted his party into power, and we Republicans don’t need to be called obstructionists, right?

Let’s support the decision of the American majority, and embrace the horror! Support the Democrat Draft Bill! /sarc

DannoJyd on November 19, 2006 at 4:21 PM

Draft? YES!, but don’t draft ’some’, draft everybody when they graduate from high school. (If you don’t graduate, you go anyway.) Learn some discipline, earn some respect, lose a few pounds, get physically fit, make new friends, learn a skill, get a hair cut! We could even include training that ordinary high school leaves out, like American History, citizenship, duty, honor, ethics, marksmanship, basic weapons handling, and basic self defense. Hey, just had a thought, if your high school has JROTC, and you took the course each year, your draft could be one year instead of two!!

So Mr. Rangle, I say, “GO FOR IT”! While you are working on reinvigorating the US Military, I also suggest you raise the Federal tax on a gallon of gasoline. We do want to encourage the consumer to use less of it, do we not?

rockhauler on November 19, 2006 at 4:25 PM

Grebrook, why is that when leftist such as the kos klown serves they’re called “patriotic” but those of us who are conservative who have or are serving we’re called “stupid” by the likes of John Kerry? Answer me that but I know you can’t.
As for the draft, when I was in we didn’t want the losers who didn’t want to join the military on their own in our ranks and my husband feels the same way. If you don’t want to join on your own then you’re not wanted. Of course Grebrook will be the first on a plane to Canada I am sure.

Catie96706 on November 19, 2006 at 4:31 PM

Of course Grebrook will be the first on a plane to Canada I am sure.

Catie96706 on November 19, 2006 at 4:31 PM

See that? Another good reason to support the Draft!

DannoJyd on November 19, 2006 at 4:37 PM

Hey, why not? This may be an idea whose time has finally come.

I don’t like the idea of conscription (I grew up in a country that had it and I volunteered, btw), but I have to say that out of all of the draftees I had to deal with, only about 1 percent of them turned out to be utter crap. The rest of them were successfully turned into pretty good soldiers and citizens too. Sure, it’s hard work at times, but you end up with a bunch of lazy, self-centered, MTV zombies turned into individuals with discipline, manners, honor and a sense of duty.

Drag the Berkeleyites out of their Starbucks cocoons, put a uniform on ‘em and proceed to break them down, followed by building up citizens that AREN’T a complete waste of our oxygen.

I’ve seen it work. I’ve made it work. It may just work here as well.

Careful what you wish for, Rankle, you may just get it.

Misha I on November 19, 2006 at 4:44 PM

Rangel’s proposed draft legislation is the product of a dishonest politician acting in bad faith. The last thing Rangel or anybody wants is a draft. Rangel proved he wasn’t serious about a draft when the Republicans called his bluff last time and forced a vote on it. Rangel voted against his own bill, along with everyone else.

The fact is that we have a better military with volunteers than with conscripts. The military can grow all the way back to the size it was under Reagan with volunteers. The complexity of military technology today requires volunteers who will stay long enough to master it and longer for the military to profit from its investment in human capital. The military doesn’t need unmotivated conscripts who are come and gone in a couple years, right at the point when they become useful.

Rangel’s true motive is to scare voters into thinking that they must close down the war before they get drafted into fighting. The fear of fighting is what motivated student protests against Vietnam. The protests stopped dead when the US pulled out, even though the war continued another couple years. The fear of being drafted to fight in Iraq spread among lefty dimwits the last time Rangel proposed a draft. It’s a con by Rangel to frighten the young into voting Democrat. It’s boob bait for boneheads, and the Left is full of them.

Tantor on November 19, 2006 at 4:59 PM

Why stop at 42? Let’s draft up to 80, and as low as age 13. 80-year-old people can effectively do things too, and 13-year-olds can hold guns.

If Rangel proposes this, and it passes, Bush had best veto it and force them to override his veto… then, as Grebrook says, democrats will be finished for generations. So long 2008 and beyond.

Enoxo on November 19, 2006 at 5:13 PM

Rangel picks an absolute loser just so he can come back and say “We tried and Bush stopped us”. So Iraq will still be Bush’s fault even with Dems in power and leftist media giving away our secrets, etc.
Planning by Dems, this is what they do best.(ha ha)
If they put just half their effort into really protecting America….never mind.

shooter on November 19, 2006 at 5:25 PM

Logic: We rush into wars because we’re using “cast-off” kids in the military today. If we were to draft lots of kids from lots of different strata of society, then we’d not *USE* that military, because the society would say “not with my kids, you don’t”.

The modern volunteer military is seen by the elitist Left as a sump, sucking in the under-privileged leavings of an “unjust” society. The Left is all too quick to emphatize with these sons of poverty, but they’re not that quick to want to dine with them.

If we get in more kids from the “country-club set”, who *OF COURSE* in the world between Charlie Rangel’s ears, wouldn’t get deferments, people from *HIS* constituency wouldn’t be bearing an “undo burden”. In short, he wants more of those suburban white kids, who are now getting into college to serve.

Of course, this resembles the draft that they had (and may still have) in various European fey-socialist societies, where at 18 or so your “generation” is taken into the military as a rite of passage, Conscientious objectors and others with connections get placed in “alternative” forms of “community service”.

So, we have institutionalized “community service” and mandatory generational intake into the belly of the military beast.

This may backfire on Mr. Rangel and his ilk: if there’s anything that my 16 years of service taught me is that socialized medicine is hardly ever fair, service is invariably poor, and shortages and institutional shortfalls and mismanagement are easily explained away by telling customers to “suck it up”. It’s a system, and the *FIRST* duty of any system, biological and organizational, is to *PROTECT THE SYSTEM*, even if it’s *ANNOUNCED* intention is to serve the public.

In short, it would shoot chablis socialism in the foot. Imagine trying to sell Hillary-Care to folks who *HAD* Hillary-Care in the military, where generals wives went to the head of the line (all pigs are equal, but some pigs are more equal than others), pregnant civilian wives too precedence over *SERVING* females with gynecological issues (I saw this one *ACTUALLY* unfold, with the result that the soldier went sterile), quality of care is *EXPECTED* to be poor, and other privileged classes (retirees) clog the system.

Rangel is a pimp.

I’m an old coot…so I most certainly do not mean “pimp” in an even remotely good way…*WORD*….

Puritan1648 on November 19, 2006 at 5:36 PM

Save the draft for when we really need it - when the shortsighted Chamberlain terrorist supporters will bring a world war instead of nipping it in the bud. Until then a volunteer fighting this war on terrorism makes him/her more honorable, virtuous and patriotic in my eyes.

infidel on November 19, 2006 at 5:46 PM

Rangel picks an absolute loser just so he can come back and say “We tried and Bush stopped us”. So Iraq will still be Bush’s fault even with Dems in power and leftist media giving away our secrets, etc.

shooter on November 19, 2006 at 5:25 PM

OK. I agree, but my point remains that this is why we need to support the Democrat Draft Legislation. We must not give the democrats any more ammo, and by supporting the upcomming bill we show that we are willing to compromise as the majority of American voters have demanded.

DannoJyd on November 19, 2006 at 5:50 PM

I get confused when I try to think like a liberal.

SouthernGent

No kidding. That’s why I always keep aspirin handy when conversing with libs.

darwin on November 19, 2006 at 5:56 PM

Gotta love those right-wing chickenhawks.

Yeah, after Muslims flew planes into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001, left-wing democrats were lining up at recruiting stations. Or not.

You people are pansys. The only way to get a good chunk of your ilk into the military is with a draft since you wouldn’t dare compromise your principles by actually defending the United States, the country under whose freedom you live. That said, the military is better off without you, and Markos “Screw Them” Moulitsas Zuniga.

As for us “right-wing chickenhawks,” I wrote about that on my now defunct blog. I also wrote something on Taps that is relevant.

Allahpundit, I hope you don’t mind the link to my blog, I just think it’s relevant. I’m not really “advertising” it since it’s no longer updated.

pencilnub on November 19, 2006 at 6:06 PM

Democrats realize that they will never be able to field a voluntary army if and when they are in complete control, even with a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, so they will need a draft.

Perchant on November 19, 2006 at 6:14 PM

I will give the democraps credit, there is ONE thing they know how to do even better than the French, how to lose a war. But let’s not question their patriotism. Let’s question their resolve. All show and no stay.

Zorro on November 19, 2006 at 6:26 PM

It’s time for a heaping dose of sarcasm. I thought the dems were claiming to be for fiscal restraint. Some dems are saying that they want to get out of Iraq and save the $8 billion per month. Rangel is saying that he wants to inflate the army so that we can fight Iran and North Korea, too. What a unified party line! /sarc

Calling Nancy Pelosi and Steve Hoyer… one of your chairmen-in-waiting is wrecking your message. What are you going to do?

flutejpl on November 19, 2006 at 7:03 PM

Although I disagree absoutely with you on the notion of the draft, Dr. Waugh, I have to agree with you on the need to actually declare WAR. Congress essentially passed a declaration of war in the days following 9/11/01, but one key word was left out of it: WAR. Had we come out and formally declared war on terrorism or Islamo-fascism, we’d still have anti-war people screaming, but at least they wouldn’t be able to de-legitimize it with words like “police action.”

flutejpl on November 19, 2006 at 7:28 PM

We’ve got 7 lousy Diggs on this topic.

Sorry Allah, but I did try to do the job that Americans don’t want to do.

DannoJyd on November 19, 2006 at 8:00 PM

Hey wants the draft so we will need more illegal aliens doing what many Americans aren’t home to do. (they drafted the youths in the work force). We creating enough people to do the work? Meanwhile the illegals will not have to be drafted, they get special treatment.

StuLongIsland on November 19, 2006 at 8:55 PM

thanks, naliaka, I forgot to add that if the media would accurately report what actually happens in Iraq and The Stan, that would also improve recruitment and retention

Janos Hunyadi on November 19, 2006 at 9:01 PM

For all those anti-war liberals out there, send me a letter from boot camp and maybe I’ll send you a care package!!!!

LOL!!!!

Yakko77 on November 19, 2006 at 9:19 PM

Give me a break, we all know this is going nowhere other than forcing the Bush administration to back down and begin withdrawing troops. Hypotheticals don’t amuse me.

Grebrook on November 19, 2006 at 3:52 PM

OK, but I think it’s a pretty good example of irony. Wouldn’t you say, nitwit?

Jaibones on November 19, 2006 at 10:08 PM

Of course, the delicious irony is that, several months ago, Rangel (and DNC) were running around and misleading the public (rock-da-vote youth) suggesting that Republicans/Bush wanted to reinstate the draft…

Oh well. Call it projecting.

California Conservative on November 19, 2006 at 10:30 PM

What.A. Fool

MalkinFan on November 19, 2006 at 11:41 PM

Americans are quick to forget the foibles of democrats. Rangel might use that to his advantage.

No matter how you feel on the issue, it would be a huge mistake to discount their upcomming efforts.

DannoJyd on November 20, 2006 at 12:01 AM

So Mister Rangel wants to start up the draft. The Navy and Air Force are cutting people, Navy to the tune of 10,000 over the next couple of years in order to pay for all of the new planes and ships they need. BTW where do they intend to get all of the money for the new troops? Are they going to cut social programs? No, they will raise taxes.

I have talked to people who were in the service during Viet Nam and stayed in during the all volunteer years. They all say that the people in the military are far better now than ever before. Plus with all of the high tech gear you can’t justify bringing someone in for 2 years, who doesn’t want to be there in the first place. These people have been known as gen dets in the Navy and the Navy has done away with 2 year enlistments because it is not cost effective.

ic1redeye on November 20, 2006 at 1:49 AM

Chump,
Dichead

Assssholchew

kala mai, excuse me.

Kini on November 20, 2006 at 2:21 AM

(oh, and that was sarcasm incase it wasn’t clear)

RightWinged on November 20, 2006 at 8:27 AM

I think that everyone should have an opportunity to do service for the country in some fashion. For those who join the military, I have no thing but the highest respect for you.

However, I think that a volunteer military is best. I don’t like the idea of a draft, however, Darth Misha I has some darn good arguments for it.

If military service will help the inter-rectum/cranial issues to end to see in many of the 18 to 38 crowd, then I’m in favor of it.

E L Frederick (Sniper One) on November 20, 2006 at 8:38 AM

You guys are forgetting..Cholly Rangel has absolute moral authority..he served in Korea. Therefore any idea he has concerning the military is a good one because ‘he was there’. I don’t know why they’re trying to whip their base up. The GOP is in complete disarray; Arbusto can’t wait to open the borders…I guess they are afraid the media hasn’t sufficiently destroyed the publics support for the war that they need to scaremonger the kids..or, they’re afraid of what the Baker commission may recommend so they’re trying to head it off with this draft thing. Either way, the feckless turds we have left in either house floundering around will find a way to screw this up.

austinnelly on November 20, 2006 at 9:17 AM

Grebrook, the troll, wrote: “Gotta love those right-wing chickenhawks.”

Please don’t feed this troll.

The topic is how Rangel intends to introduce a bill to reinstitute the “draft.” It is not about “chickenhawks” either the right or left wing variety, though liars like Grebrook like to wrap the accusation of “chickenhawk” around the topic like an “absolute moral authority” card.

One wonders when and how Grebrook served, and if he never served, then why HIS appellation of “chickenhawk” does not completely disqualify HIM from even participating in this discussion. After all, the fundamental concept of accusing a person of being a “chickenhawk” is to foreclose the ability to rationally discuss the war from ANY WHO HAVE NOT SERVED in the military or fought in a war. Why should it not apply to loudmouth trolls like him?

Teddy, on November 19, 2006 at 10:22 PM, got it exactly right when he wrote: “Rangel knows that our reinstating a draft is out of the question, but he’s hoping that just the idea of the draft comin’ back will strike fear through every social class and lead to their collectively rejecting (any) war with anyone no matter what.”

Our volunteer military has been an astounding success. Contrary to what the traitorous left claims (including that fool and military fraud John F. Kerry), recruitment goals are being exceeded.

Not only that, but the standards to join the military are high enough to insure that the quality (moral and intellectual) of our troops has never been higher — a level that a draft could never equal.

The military is no longer the employer of last resort, as they were in the era of the draft. They are extremely selective in accepting recruits and strive for upper third quartile candidates. Even the US Marines, which had the past reputation of being where criminals go when given a choice of that or jail. In the volunteer military, any criminal record (beyond simple moving violations) disqualifies a person from joining the Marines. In fact, background checks and security clearances are performed on each marine recruit.

Which leads to a second reason why Rangel and his leftist pals want the draft to be instituted.

The volunteer military began in 1975. But it was not until the 1980’s (under President Ronald Reagan) that the volunteer military had reconstituted from the Vietnam era low point, had turned the corner.

By 1990, the Goldwater-Nickles Act of 1986 had done something that even WWII hadn’t, it enforced the concept of joint operations among the armed forces as part of a DoD reorganization effort. The key to the victory in Desert Storm (and our low casualties), was the ability of all branches of the armed forces to interoperate.

Larry Schweikart, in his book, America’s Victories: Why the U.S. Wins Wars and Will Win the War on Terror, discusses why this is important, how this has led to the most successful military organization (and the most lethal to our enemies) on the planet.

Robert D. Kaplan in his book Imperial Grunts: On the Ground with the American Military, from Mongolia to the Philippines to Iraq and Beyond, explains that this is why the fact that America is the sole superpower, and how it translates into a Pax Americana.

Fools, liars, and idiots like Grebrook (and ideologoues like Rangel) continue to see today’s military through the filter of Vietnam in the hopes that they can UNDERMINE the military and the war (and all future wars). That is the real goal of conscription from the leftwing point of view.

After all, from their perspective, a competent military WINS WARS. An incompetent military LOSES them. And they most certainly want an incompetent military.

It’s part and parcel of what being a liberal means.

georgej on November 20, 2006 at 9:28 AM

Look… Liberals wan’t to dictate everything. Religion (or lack thereof), taxes (according to who they decided), etc, you all know what I mean.

What a Draft means, in liberal parlance, is another way to dictate control of the military by controlling who joins the military.

You see, the thing about “the draft”, is that it also comes with selection rules for who is “most draftable”. (These kinds of rules, by the way, are why the last draft we had failed).

Lord help is if the Liberal Socialists running the Democratic Party (like Rangel, Kerry, H.Clinton, Murtha, Pelosi, etc) get control over who is “draftable” into our military.

Oh… wait… these liberal socialists (except for the Presidency, ARE in majority leadership of our government… Lord help us.

Lawrence on November 20, 2006 at 9:50 AM