OK. When the DRAFT comes

[in_cog_ni_to]

will the WEALTHY and CONNECTED kids get to go die for their country? Where will the Rangel Draft bill go? Will they continue with taking poor kids or will this be an "equal opportunity" DRAFT?

[WI_DEM]

1. from what I understand there will not be a college deferment

like there was during the Vietnam era and other eras. But I'm sure the wealthy and connected kids will still have some "connections" so that many of them can evade combat.

Hmm, I wonder when the Bush twins are going to enlist?

[uppityperson]

14. College deferment is only for quarter or semester you are in

Finish whatever round of classes you are taking and off you go.

[in_cog_ni_to]

21. No kidding?

College won't keep them out?

[uppityperson]

23. Nope. Not any more. Next to go may be homosexual deferment

however, you can get job retraining when you return and work at a nursing home or mcdonalds so who needs a college education anyway? And thousands of young men and women do not have to declare themselves homosexuals and wear pin triangle when in public. :sarcasm: I hate these guys and am very concerned for the young people I know and I don't know.

[napi21]

2. Until recently, I thought all you draftt worriers were just silly.

Well, silly is the wrong word. I thought you all were worrying about nothing. A draft would be political suicide and this admin would never do it. Now, I'm not so sure. Every report I hear says the services are missing their enlistment #'s by more. Now, I do't want to see a draft again. I grew up with that, and it was always the topic of all high schoolers. But I'm not sure what their alternative is going to be if the numbers keep falling.

This is ONE situation where I'm actually glad Shrub has 3 1/2 more years in office! (God I never thought I'd say that!) Something will HAVE to be done in that much time, and he won't bbe able to shove it off for the next President's problem.

[in_cog_ni_to]

3. 40% drop in recruitments.

They do have to increase those numbers in some way and it looks like the Draft is their only alternative. I lived through the Viet Nam draft and it was just horrible. We would spend our lunch hour outside listening to the radio and what numbers were being called. :scared: It was awful. I knew people who had graduated and were in that waiting game.

[aintitfunny]

4. The Wealthy and Connected kids will get out of it

Do you think they can rig voting and not rig the draft? It will be sheer coincidence when the offspring of republican's, right wing donors, Corporate leaders and the like will have extremely high numbers and will not be called at all. :sarcasm:

[kath]

5. yep, the wealthy ALWAYS manage to get out of it...

[in_cog_ni_to]

6. Just thinking about the "rigged" draft

pisses me off beyond belief.

[aintitfunny]

9. It pisses me off and makes me want to weep

but I have no doubt that they will cover their asses and protect their children, while my son would not have a chance. I am one angry liberal mother in Maryland.

[Zinfandel]

8. I don't think all the wealthy were born on the same day!

The numbers (in the last draft) were chosen by birthday 366 days--- 366 numbers.

Still, as before the wealthy will find a way around it.

[Greybnk48]

7. they will wait until summer

when the campuses have cleared out and the kids have started summer jobs.

[understandinglife]

10. Given that the age range is up to 44 y/o, I suspect they will go after....

....the unemployed who have at least a high school degree, first. They will also go after folk with a variety of skills - construction, medicine, computing/communications.

In other words, I think it will be selective conscription and not merely a 'lottery.' I think they will have ample mechanisms to insulate the rich from conscription without resorting to 'college deferment, professional school deferment' mechanisms.

Get used to it -- "America" has ceased and Bu$h's neoconster regime has absolutely nothing restraining them from conscripting any person based on whatever parameter(s) they decide to use.

Thus, I think it quite likely that individuals identified as being in 'the opposition' and individuals who have been identified as 'gay, transgender, pagan, non-fristian religious, ........' are likely to be selectively conscripted.

A primer on when "America" ceased can be found here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3688434

Peace.


www.missionnotaccomplished.us - Be it MNA Day 3 or 8 or 15 or .... the day will come when 10s of millions of Americans and others stop their typical activities for 24 hours and urge 10 times that many to join should another MNA Day be required. On that glorious day what we once called "America" will emerge.

[BillZBubb]

11. Two points

First, before the Repugs can institute a draft, they will need some sort of uber-patriotic mood in the country. Otherwise, the sheeple wouldn't go for it. That means another major attack against us somewhere, drummed up into a patriotic frenzy by the corporate media. IE, LIHOP II.

Second, the children of the rich and powerful Repugs will be drafted. Since there would be no way to hide exempting them, the right won't try it. Instead their kids will be assured jobs in the support areas and will get first call on Air Force and Navy positions--well out of harm's way.

[uppityperson]

15. Hey, did you hear Iran wants nuclear weapons and is a regional threat?

Israel and all that. Will Iran and Israel bombing each other be enough?

Coast Guard is the way to go to avoid hazardous areas.

[in_cog_ni_to]

16. The reason I asked this question is because my very wealthy friend

keeps asking me if the "Rangel draft bill" has been passed because she has 2 boys (18 and 12) and thinks if they're in college they won't be drafted. If there was an election and she knew her boys wouldn't be drafted, thanks to BUSH, she would vote for him in a heartbeat and she's a Dem. Her attorney husband is a repub who voted for Kerry because of the Draft issue ONLY. If repukes can get out of the Draft on a college deferment...we are TOAST. My friend detests the Chimp, but if voting for the repukes means her boys won't be draftd, she will vote for them and so will her husband and I'm sure there are many, many other people who would do the same.

[Telly Savalas]

19. We're already toast if the only reason people vote for our candidates...

is because of unsubstantiated rumors of a possible draft.

[in_cog_ni_to]

20. I know. That's the problem.

My friend is not a radical Liberal like me. She is like most of the people in this country. She pays little attention to current events and the government and if ONE thing appeals to her, like her kids not getting drafted, she'll vote on that one issue.

[ktowntennesseedem]

12. When it does come, I'm gonna rub my mother's face in it!

Just before the election, she argued that I shouldn't vote for Kerry because that would be a vote in favor of abortions and homosexual marriages and adoptions (religious-right if you couldn't figure that out yet.) I countered that she shouldn't vote for a president whose policies will eventually cause her grandson to be drafted in the near future (sister's teenager; my teenage son is legally blind, and my pre-teen daughter is PROBABLY safe since they're pushing to keep the fairer sex out of harm's way :sarcasm:). My mom insisted that they would never re-start the draft, and asked how I knew that since no one had said that (she gets her info from Faux News, James Dobson and her fundy pastor).

I want to see a draft about as much as I'd like to have a root canal without anesthesia, but at least I'll get to scream "I TOLD YOU SO!!!"

:grr:

[Zinfandel]

17. Bush is President and Abortion is still legal and Gay marriages are

rising.

Abortion will ALWAYS be legal. Republicans love the issue and need it. NOTHING brings in more money for the religious right as mentioning the word, abortion...Same goes for the republican hard right, voter turn out...mention abortion and the repugs come out in droves...

If the republicans wanted to stop all legal abortions they could of done it years ago. The republicans have been promising this carrot on a stick shit since 1980 when Reagan was president. They have the votes in the republican controlled Congress, the Senate, the Presidency and in the Supreme Court.

There is no way the republicans want to make abortion illegal, they just want to keep passing legislation to minimize this and that, to keep the religious right happy.

After all, Senate Majority leader Republican Bill Frist makes millions every year providing abortions in his hospitals.

As for gay marriages, Bush as no control of Gay marriage, as more and more states like Connecticut, are accepting the fact that two people in love should be able to get married...whose business is it anyhow, surely not mine, it has absolutely zero affect on my marriage, or anyone else's marriage, absolutely none.

Your mom was being conned as so many have...that those issues will actually affect her life as her country is being put forth into a fascist state and we the people are seen as nothing more than slave labor for the military and corporate use.

I also don't think Bush will reinstate the draft...nothing would mobilize the American people faster...As it is now the republicans get away with everything they want because people don't do shit about it...But a draft, Rove knows all that would change...this would bring people together...

That's what really started the sixties rebellions in this country, an unjust war in Vietnam based on lies, the draft and American sent off to die. No way would Rove & the republicans want a repeat of that. Don't expect a draft to unite the people, because it won't come. The republicans like the way it is now...complete power!

We have to unite on our own, to fight this republican corporate fasism.

[in_cog_ni_to]

18. Hmmmm. Interesting.

Should the Dems call their bluff on abortion then? I wonder what would happen? I don't know if I would be willing to chance the outcome of that bet. :scared:

[LaPera]

22. The republicans would just turn the bluff around...

and use it on the Democrats.

[ktowntennesseedem]

24. Well said.

I agree with you that a draft, at least what most everyone thinks of when they hear the word, will not happen. Unless the terrorists repeatedly hit us at home and scare everyone shitless until enough are willing to give their lives and their children's lives for the cause. And if we are so vulernable that we could allow ourselves to be hit that hard and that often, then I doubt we'd be capable of rising to the occasion to defeat such a successful and already-victorious enemy. I don't think we will ever embrace and blindly accept a draft as some inevitable consequence of global terror, but I do believe that, unless our current course is not drastically altered, the situation can and will become bad enough that a draft to bolster the military would be warrented.

I've still got plenty of other reasons to tell mom "I told you so."

[redqueen]

13. Even if they're drafted,

they'll serve in less dangerous spots.

[markus]

25. They have to have the armed drones in place

at all the downsized AFB and ANG installations up here along the Canadia border first.

I can't figure out why else they played such a prominent role in the BRAC discussions of the last few weeks, except they're getting ready to keep folks in.