Possible draft

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1521&u=/afp/20040420/pl_afp/us_iraq_military_draft&printer=1

What are your feelings on this?

Military service is good for people (well unless you are killed / maimed / mentally traumatized / completely desensitized to all forms of violence etc).

Heck, draft some women too. They make great snipers.

*grumbles about stupid Republicans discriminating against women.

*makes arrangments to move to canada*

It will not happen. So don't pack yer bags....

Eheh. As I often say, the day they bring back the draft in Canada is the day I become a Politician.

I would like to see them press for it...

for one... it will never pass. for another, it will further alienate/tarnish the republican party


weee...

preach on brother juro....AMEN!

cyanide lets move to vancover

i served my time already! now its your turn!

[/B]

It will never happen. The political climate has not yet degenerated back to a point where the lawmakers could push through an actual draft. If they did try, this would be the spark that really galvanized people into standing up against the these neocon extremists who continue to try their utmost to lead the country as a whole down the path toward their own private hell.

Should that time eventually come, I would welcome the opportunity to burn a draft card in public and explain, "I am doing this out of the best feelings of patriotism possible," to anyone who was confused by the meaning of it all.

maybe we would get some really cool trippy bands/musicians in the deal?

heheh..

If Bush is reelected.....I believe it will..........

If it happens...off to Australia I go!

G'day, Mate!

If there is a draft, I suspect you'll see a bunch of otherwise apathetic college students getting hip on political theroy and jumping up and down in the streets in protest. If there's a draft, I'll be right out there with them, screaming at the top of my lungs.

At least I hope those otherwise apathetic college students would . . . .because if they didn't . . .

I would have to move to Vancouver with you.

Zana

In my mind this will probably hinder Bush more than help him win, especially if some other conservatives start to beat the drum over this issue.

I know people of many political alignments who are sick and damned tired of Americans coming home dead. Myself I am literally moved to tears by the news because of the death on both sides of this war AND the deaths of innocent Iraqis being used by both sides involved.

If the Bushies really get behind this idea, they can expect more than just a minor uproar. I have never attended a protest in my life , but I will be there if they try shoving this down our throats. I lost my father both to the draft and to a stupid politicians war in Vietnam. I DO not want other people to grow up with that in the back of their minds.

I too would not cooperate with a draft if it were to be reinstated. I'd only fight if I agreed with the current International situation, and/or if our nation was truly in peril of collapsing/ being occupied ourselves. What surprises me is how they are extending the length that some enlistee's have to stay and serve. I believe I had heard some people who had signed up for a certain number of years of service were being forced to stay longer.. If I were a soldier and was doing the US's bidding, I'd be ridiculously upset if they tried to force me to stay longer than I wanted/ signed up for.


Jimmylee Brodsky

yesterday i read about Ralph Nader wanting to pull all our troops out within a six-month period.

anyone want to go third party?

http://www.theorator.com/bills108/hr163.html

Note that it specifically states that women will also have to register, which is good and right. It offends me deeply that women are excluded from draft registration.

A draft should be used only if the country itself is under invasion.

Seeing as we're the attackers (regardless of what the current administration wants you to believe), the draft should NOT be reinstated.

If/when China/USSR/Iran/England/Canada invades, I'll be the first to grab a gun and enlist. Until that happens, you can count me as a conscientious objector.

LF

Dear Lordfly,

If they are attacking on our border with the weapons of choice used these days and ultimately hidden in small briefcases; trust me, there won't be time for you to a) enlist and b) be trained.



If they're on our border, we're done.

Hell, they don't even need to be on our border and we're done.

A quieter climate is needed within all the countries; we need to start thinking of earth as one large and diversified culture if we want the planet to remain on it's correct axis.

Lynn, quite right!

SL to the rescue! overall, SL is an excellent microcosm of this idea.. and maybe it can influence the macrocosm of Earth?

high hopes? yes.. but a nice dream? yup.

A vote for Nader is a vote pissed away. You may as well stay home. Voting for Nader did no good in 2000, and voting for him in 2004 will have the same effect.

I'm voting for the lesser of two evils, which has been what I've done since 1984.

The problem with pulling the troops out at this point is the plain and simple fact that Iraq will probably fall into a depotism, or a dictatorship, and more than likely, things will be a lot worse that they are now. Until Iraq has a stable enough political system, we aren't going to be out of there anytime soon. I have 2 cousins in Iraq right now, my best friend is going to Falluja (sp?) soon, and my little brother is in Marine Boot camp right now, and I would like for them to not go, but I know that the situation over there is too volitile to bring the troops nor send any new troops over there. They enlisted, they knew they may have to go somewhere to fight a war, they're doing what they signed up to do. I wouldn't want the 707 soldiers who have died already to die in vain because we left Iraq too soon, and Iraq is taken over by someone ten times worse than Saddam ever was (which would be horrendous). That's why i'll vote for whoever will see this through to the end, I think Bush has done a good job, not necessarily deserving of another term, but if he's the only one who will keep troops there until Iraq is stable again, then it looks like my vote is going to Bush.

I think everyone recognizes the implausibility of reinstating the draft before an election. Wait until after Bush is re-elected. Or Kerry, for that matter. He helped us get into this mess too, didn't he?

Is it likely to happen? Well, if worse comes to worse... maybe? I'm also with everyone in thinking this would be the beginning of a very, very bad thing. If protests against the draft were big enough, who knows what this administration would do with its patriot-act powers?

*sighs*

I had my sights set on New Zealand, personally. Anyone care to give me a lift?

Consider this:

Bush started a war against a so-called "enemy" who was no threat to us. He has taken away resources from the REAL fight, and bin Laden is still out there. Its just a matter of time until Al-Qaida attempts another attack on America, and it will probably happen before the election.

I do not think we as a nation will react the same way Spain reacted last month, but if we do get hit, it will send a strong message to those who don't get it yet. That message being that Bush has made America less safe. The attackers will probably most likely NOT be from Iraq. Bush fails to realize that every fundamentalist psycho who hates America will keep coming after us. Toppling Saddam changed nothing.

On top of everything else, Bush taking sides and openly supporting Israel was the worst possible thing to do. It only gives the appearance that we are only interested in "destroying" Islam, trying to take their oil and whatever other half-assed conspiracy theory they believe in.

Whether Bush is re-elected or not, whoever gets the job will not stabilize Iraq in the next 4 years. It will probably take at least a generation or two before things settle down.

Until now, it's been mostly Democrats voicing support for a draft, notably Charles Rangel. Hagel is the first Republican to do so that I know of.

The US armed forces have met or exceeded their recruiting goals, and are close to meeting their re-enlistment goals. (info here) Inasmuch as they have a personnel problem, it's not recruitment, but retention -- and for that, a draft would be worse than useless, as re-enlistment numbers for conscripts are far worse than for volunteers.

In short: there's not gonna be a draft, and the people calling for one know it. They're doing it for political effect: Hagel so that he can look tough on defense, Rangel and the other Dems as a means of turning people against the war and against Bush, and on both sides just as a way to get their names in the papers.