Shut down all the hospitals!

[Telly Savalas]

People who have health insurance don't have any skin in the game. That's why we need to pass a law to shut down all our nation's hospitals. It will awaken people to the plight of the 47 million Americans who don't have health insurance.

[RoyGBiv]

1. Huh?

I'm sure this is a continuation of a flame war somewhere else, but I can't resist asking.

:wtf:

[Telly Savalas]

2. I'm just applying the rationale used to support a draft to other issues.

[RoyGBiv]

4. Oh ...

Should have guessed.

I don't think it's an appropriate analogy, but I get what you're getting at.

[aquart]

7. Really.

Well, you have failed to make your case. Or any case.

[Telly Savalas]

9. Thanks for your input.

[RoyGBiv]

16. Draft 'em all ...

Every last one.

Why? Because those not subject to it now just don't get it. My child is of drafting age. I say this with a high degree of reluctance, but withing the last 24 hours I've also witness the depth of the ignorance that goes into this issue.

Hell, draft me.

I've not yet seen a good argument against it, and I've seen a lot of idiotic commentary that pretends to be an argument. I've also seen a lot of willful ignorance regarding the military. It all argues for the need for a draft, for people to care and take note of what is happening in the world.

[Mythsaje]

17. Idiotic Commentary?

Here's what I had to say about it. Few people call what I have to say "idiotic." Even if they don't agree.

*********

Wow. This whole draft debate has touched off a few firestorms. I don't mind, really. My handle was bare inches from being "Stormsaje." I think debate is healthy. And while some of the debate here today has made me want to tear my hair out, it hasn't genuinely angered me. More like exasperation.

That I can handle. I'm not taking it personally, so I don't have to retreat. (I don't engage in debates when I get too emotionally involved--prevents me from saying things I REALLY don't want to say).

Here it is in a nutshell.

I oppose the draft. Period. No exceptions. I think forced service is anethema to a free, open, democratic society. I don't CARE what your rationale is. Anything can be rationalized.

Make NO mistake. What we're talking about here is taking kids who are presently minding their own business (whatever it might be), dragging them through training, slapping a gun in their hand, and sending them off to kill MORE people in order to support Bushco's present War of imperialistic aggression.

The argument is that it will "level the playing field" and make EVERYONE responsible for the war. If you think that the elites won't come up with new and inventive ways to prevent their children from fighting, you're dreaming. The power and influence they have NOW is worlds away from the power and influence they had forty years ago. You have NO idea. Some of them have more money than you can even IMAGINE.

No, what it will mean is that we'll be acting in COLLUSION with their future plans to invade other countries. It won't PREVENT wars. It'll make them easier to justify.

How so? Well, we certainly won't suffer from a lack of volunteers to fight in stupid fucking wars. Need more meat for the grinder? Well, hell. Just draft some more boys. It's as easy as pushing a button. Need a reason? Bomb something of OURS. "Oh my God. They just blew up our embassy in <insert city here>."

Protests? Look like volunteers to me. Grab 'em up, say they're "aiding the enemy" and ship them off to the front lines or Gitmo. What are they going to do about it?

God, some people are suckers.

The FIRST thing people need to do when something is suggested is look at both the positive AND the negative. What's the WORSE thing that could be done with this, if someone had the chance? Never, ever assume that it's all for the good. It NEVER works out that way. Not when you're talking about the realities of power.

How people who talk about how 9/11 may have been orchestrated, and that the Diebold machines are stealing our votes, can possibly think that handing them future generations of OUR CHILDREN could ever be a good thing.

Two weeks into winning the last election and we're thinking "hell, we got everything under control."

The fuck we do.

C'mon, people. Use your heads. Trust NOTHING.

All information, regardless of source, is suspect.

[RoyGBiv]

18. Don't take it personally ..

I said I've seen a lot of idiotic commentary. I named no names. If I were to name names, yours would most definitely not be among them.

I'll be blunt. The idea of a draft is idiotic, imo. Were it to go into effect, I would move heaven and earth to rescue my daughter from the possibility of it. If I were subject to it, I'd take the invitation from my friend in Sweden and go live there. I've spent the last four years trying to teach my daughter those friendly recruiters weren't so friendly. I do not disagree with you.

I, however, am fed up with the some of the commentary on this subject that approaches the subject from the perspective that assumes those in the military now are morons, that those who would willingly volunteer are stupid, that the idea of public service in the form of military service is, in and of itself, morally wrong. I don't get that from you. I've read a lot of what you've said on the subject, and I disagree with very little of it. But some people aren't thinking at all, or if they are thinking, they should take the advice of Ron White, and the next time they have a thought ... just let it go.

[Mythsaje]

19. Ah, gotcha...

Yeah, I've seen some of that myself. I try to reason my way through things, even if I do have an emotional response to them.

[RoyGBiv]

20. You do a good job ...

You do better than I could do.

I'll be blunt again. I'm drunk tonight (partially for reasons I've stated elsewhere). Before my previous comment to which you responded, I sent an e-mail to my friend in the Navy, a friend from high school, a friend who has been in the military since 1987 and was a part of the first Gulf War. I think about him a lot when I think of these things. I worry for his life. I get angry when I see people talk of the military as though it is an organization full of idiots. My friend is not an idiot. He knows perfectly well what is happening right now. He hates it.

Earlier tonight I read a disparaging commentary on those in the military now, and quite frankly it pissed me off, in part because of my friend. That commentary was given in complete ignorance. If that is the point of view that is guiding us, then, yeah, draft my ass. Draft my child. Force us into the position where we openly defy the powers-that-be. That's what my friend suggests. He's just waiting for his tour to be over in the hope that he can get out then and not be subject the orders of someone like Rumsfeld.

[Mythsaje]

21. I've been accused of that a time or two...

Though my issue is more with the system than individual soldiers. Except, of course, those who rape 14 y.o. girls and laugh about it. And the system that puts soldiers through the grinder again and again until some of them snap and do insane things.

[RoyGBiv]

24. The rapists ....

No quarter.

My friend in the Navy has no use for them. Well, actually, he has ideas about how to reinstitute plank walking for such people. More than anything, he dislikes people in the military that give the military a bad name.

[Mythsaje]

26. I've had friends in every branch of the military

but I've also known some real boneheads too. It's a cross-section of America, ranging from people with their heads on straight to some real weiners. We were discussing the recent lowering of standards and I said that I wasn't sure the military standards were all that high to begin with... (Believe me, if you knew who I had in mind, specifically, when I made this comment, you'd understand exactly what I meant).

Someone I've known for some 20 odd years, who I thought was weird, but a decent enough person, turned out to be not-so-decent. I was actually a bit surprised that the army took him in the first place, and after he'd served he got out virtually unchanged from the dipshit he was when he went in. Then, after he showed he couldn't really make it OUT of the military, he went BACK in and a few years ago got popped for child porn on his computer.

Believe me, if they let this guy in TWICE, the army's standards weren't all that high to begin with.

I happen to know there are some great, upstanding citizens in our military. But sometimes I just think that's an accident of the fact that there are just a lot of great, upstanding citizens period.

If you get my drift.

[RoyGBiv]

27. I look at it this way ...

I know cops that are completely professional, totally suited for their jobs. I know customer service personnel (my job) that are perfectly suited for the position. I know military people that understand the job and what it means.

And then I know total idiots.

It's like everything. People end up in jobs for which they are completely unsuited. The problem with the military, in my view, is that if you work your way through basic, you can end up in a position for which you have more responsibility than you would be qualified to have in any other job anywhere. I am in a position of responsibility in my job. The standards I had to meet to acquire that position are more stringent, from a management standpoint, than those in the military who have a similar position. No, I can't do 50 push-ups, and if a superior went ape-shit on me I would not be be likely to sit there and take it, but I do my job well. My friend, who also does his job well, has to take the nonsense from the ape-shit Ensign who gets a pseudo-sexual thrill from forcing those under him to do extra PT simply because he's trying to prove his superiority.

To put it another way, the people in command in the military have this awful tendency to be incompetent, in part because those that were competent recently went against the grain with the Bush admin and lost their jobs as a result. The non-coms who have been doing it awhile and know their jobs well, but don't have strict authority over certain things, end up having to play politics just to keep their positions. It ends up being like a corporate environment, only one in which the peons risk death.

And, yeah, the standards, especially in the all-volunteer force, tend to be pretty low. My friend has had people under him who were illiterate, and he, a person who because of his dyslexia didn't truly learn to read until he was a sophomore in high school, ends up having to teach them simple things like how to read the signs that tell them not to slide down a stairwell else risk a night in the brig. The thing that really irritates him is that he knows he's not the brightest bulb in the lamp, yet he looks at the things his ultimate superiors order (Rumsfeld) and knows instinctively that it's all totally, thoroughly wrong.

[Mythsaje]

25. self-delete

[Viva_La_Revolution]

3. Emergencies only (cause they'll treat you even if you don't have insurance)

and shut down the doctors and dentists offices.

This might just work.

[William769]

5. All I can say about this topic is...

Oy fucking Vey!

[Telly Savalas]

8. Well then how about

passing a law whereby we dump toxic waste into our rivers to awaken people to the need for a stronger EPA?

or

passing a law whereby we cut off funding to all schools to awaken people to the financial needs of education in poor area?

or my favorite

passing a law whereby we send more young people to Iraq to awaken people to the evils of war?

[William769]

10. Sanity versus insanity, thats all I'm going to say on this subject.

[Stu DeBeouf]

6. Huh?

How does this stop Kramer from saying dirty words?...that is the topic, right?

[Telly Savalas]

11. Actually I must confess to being one of the dozen people

in North America who is oblvious to the details of the Kramer incident. Sorry.

[seabeyond]

12. bullshit if we dont have skin in the game. paying outrageous fees

and fighting for them to pay every step of the way.

[Telly Savalas]

14. OK. We'll tone it down by just banning private health insurance.

[bluestateguy]

13. Sounds like the Naderite crap from 2000

Yeah lets swing the election to Bush because that will really stimulate a new progressive movement!

[Telly Savalas]

15. So it's undercover Green Party operatives who are invading DU

and spreading this "skin in the game" idea?

[Kiouni]

22. I work for a hospital

and my insurance is ridiculously expensive. explain that one!

[frustrated_lefty]

23. Do that after you orgasm for peace.