Tuesday, October 05, 2004

Matthew on the draft

Students in my Historical Methods class are assigned to contribute at least one entry to this blog. Matthew is the first to contribute. Here is his take on the possibility of an upcoming draft:
At the close of last week I received this email titled the military draft. Until this point I knew of the rumor that the draft was going to be reinstated in order to build our military. Enclosed in the email was a link to the website and the actual bill sitting in the senate. The bill is titled Universal National Service Act of 2003 or simply S89. The bill states that if enacted he will take both male and female candidates between the ages of 18 – 26. Does our current president have some sort of “sixth sense” predicting that this great country of ours maybe under serious attack? If he does have this “sixth sense” then maybe he could kindly rub the crystal ball and bring back some of our allies that we lost when he started the war. Is the world in that bad of shape that we require the draft? My hopes for writing this entry is to have the people of America open their eyes and see where this country started four years ago and the direction we are now going in.
Go to this government link and type in "S89" in the "Bill Number" box.

[Update: you might want to check out what David Hackworth has to say on the subject. Hackworth is a retired military man who had great credibility with soldiers and veterans. Check out his site and this article "Uncle Sam Will Soon Want Your Kids." Of course, in your case, my readers, it is most likely that Uncle Sam wont want your kids, he will want YOU.

Meanwhile, over at Talking Points Memo, Josh Marshall has this post:
October 05, 2004 -- 01:38 PM EDT // link // print)

No, no, no ... we really really don't want a draft.

House Republicans, worried about the traction of charges that President Bush will be forced to reinstitute the draft in a second term, are rushing to the floor this afternoon to vote on the Draft legislation Charlie Rangel (D-NY) introduced early last year.

No hearings, no notice, no nuthin'.

I'll post more as the situation develops.
-- Josh Marshall
And he links to House Resolution 163 (the companion to S.89)]

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