Sorry, I missed the news this morning. Have you won yet?
BroonAssociatedPress
How so? I don’t have anything against people following their fervent beliefs to a natural conclusion. Certainly before we implement an involuntary draft to fill in for our lost troops, I’d like to see those who are physically able and strong supporters of the war volunteer. [/quote]
Draft? What draft? Ah, the scare tactic used on college campuses right before each of the Bush elections. And since when do the armed services give a shit about political preferences?
You join. You train.You fight. So you’d like to see people fight, or is it, DIE because of their political beliefs? Sorry bub, people join up to defend the nation, not any one political viewpoint.
Yes they should. And those “suited” to fight basically consist of anybody who meets the now very minimal requirements for recruitment.[/quote]
Bah, back in the day, when recruitment was more demanding, there were some incrediblly stupid, lazy and fat people in the military. And there still are.
How do you reach this conclusion? Are you suggesting that our military’s size is exactly right and headed in the correct direction? If so, then how?[/quote][/quote]
I was refering to those who want to fight. You think they need a political purpose to want to fight? Ha. That’s called a crusade.
I don’t believe the military needs to get any bigger than it already is, but I’m not a military expert. “Lowering standards” to get in the military is a huge joke. It was never very hard to get in. If you think the difference between a guy who barely graduates and signs up and a guy with a GED is large, you wrong.
And look, doing military things involves skills that aren’t really useful in other lines of work: shut up; don’t think, just follow orders; learn what we teach (which isn’t much), do what we say.
[quote]Freda Smith should go off and be a (male) prostitute in Iraq. Perhaps he could arrange a ‘Fredfist’ with some of his dinar guests.
BroonAmsterdam[/quote]
Sure Broon, be the first! Now, bend over and cough. Dinars up front please (er… that is to pay in advance…) 
[quote=“BroonAle”][quote=“jdsmith”]
The people best suited to fight should fight. And most of them are in the military.
[/quote]
Sorry, I missed the news this morning. Have you won yet?
BroonAssociatedPress[/quote]
As long as not losing is still considered winning at some level, then yeah, we have won, but for now only by not losing.
If we were not not winning then I guess it would then be worse than not losing.
I think the primary argument in the blog that started this discussion needs to be reprised:
Once again, I will remind you all that this argument is even more poignant because of all the anti-
‘dove Democrat’ propoganda (coward, traitor, terrorist-coddler, etc.) spouted by GOP mouthpieces. I mean, if we’re cowards for being against the war and not going, aren’t you even more so for being for it and still not going?
My just-coming-of-age nephew back home was thinking of enlisting, and I had to ask my sister, ‘Do you really believe in the government’s professed goals strongly enough to risk his life like that? Are you convinced him going over there will protect America in any way, shape or form? (Saying him being there protects other American soldiers is BS circular logic, as if they hadn’t been sent over there – ostensibly for the same reason – they wouldn’t need protecting!) Most importantly, if he comes back in a casket, will it have been worth it?’
[quote=“Vay”] I mean, if we’re cowards for being against the war and not going, aren’t you even more so for being for it and still not going?
[/quote]
:bravo: :bravo: :bravo: 
Well said. I don’t buy Frot Smug’s argument that he is serving his country by arguing on this site. Ya think anyone notices? You think Mrs Trailerpark cares about Freda Smog’s overseas online valiant defending of neo-con dogma when little Jimmy-joe Trailerpark has had his face blown off by a roadside cafe? Nah.
He won’t go because they don’t do nappies (diapers) in his size.
BroonActiveDuty
“I’m going to the war because you’re not (willing)!”
Are you surprised that not many kids are falling for this?
[quote=“jdsmith”]“I’m going to the war because you’re not (willing)!”
Are you surprised that not many kids are falling for this?[/quote]
That’s a policy problem not a patriotism one.
They aren’t going for the free education/housing/food/loans/death etc. that the armed forces are offering outside Wal-Mart, either.
Never before has it been less desirable to serve the United States, is the impression I get. Why follow when your leader really isn’t worth following and has no respect or credibility?
Better to just play the money markets, eh?
BroonAdmiral
Hmm, there’s a war or two on and elistments are down?
How incredibly odd!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
And who the hell joins the military to follow the president’s orders!?
Your knowledge of this subject certainly does have limits, doesn’t it?
[quote=“jdsmith”]Hmm, there’s a war or two on and elistments are down?
How incredibly odd!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
And who the hell joins the military to follow the president’s orders!?
Your knowledge of this subject certainly does have limits, doesn’t it?[/quote]
Maybe I haven’t been up to my arse in mud for a couple of months to be classified as a vet, or secretly pushed around a sausage stand in South East Asia in the 1970’s but that doesn’t mean that my opinion, for it is only an opinion, is any less valid. Nothing to do with facts. Given that you are so pro-Iraq war, so pro-Bush, one would think that you and your ilk would be more than happy to lay down your lives for your country and your president because both are always right and you need to protect the strength of the dinar.
I’d be sorry to see you go, for you are a decent chap but extolling others to serve with the possibility of death without at least trying to enlist yourself is feeble. Join up or shut up. I don’t intend to join up so I don’t find myself in that wonderfully hypocritical situation you are ergo no need to shut up either.
BroonAoiuhjfjkjhm
YES. Such a BRILLIANT argument.
Meant in humor. I am not surprised you missed that.
You did.
No. I doubt that Mrs. Trailerpark would care but it seems to me that the enviro snobs would be pleased to know that the next generation of Trailerpark trash would not be ruining their pristine world. Bit of a conundrum for them wouldn’t you say? Secretly pleased not to have more of those with bad taste ruining Nature but having to posture in public that they actually give a shit about those who live in Flyover Country?
Who knows? I might go to Iraq in some capacity some day, with lots of tourist dollars to spend propping up the economy.
Look. We are in trouble in Iraq. Yes. Does not make the decision to invade wrong. In fact, it makes it all the more right. What are we fighting against? Those who do not want American forces in their country or those who want to turn the nation into a thugocracy ala Saddam Hussein.
So yes, while I suppose Vay has a funny point about those who do not want to fight being called cowards while those of us who support the war are realistically not actually going to suit up, isn’t it even more ridiculous that those who shout the most about caring about international law and human rights are doing so little to protect the Iraqis? I mean we have all hell breaking loose over 500 people in Guantanamo, but not one of those earnest peaceniks actually wants to do anything to help Mr. and Mrs. Iraq? But then we see this with Darfur, Afghanistan, Somalia, Congo, Haiti, Cote d’Ivoire. What is really pathetic is that the brigade of leftwing “intellectuals” and their views that you find so “admirably funny” are so incapable of acting about anything because they cannot balance their views of moral perfection (bend over to the left and cough) that they cannot act at all and the irony is that inaction is such a decrepit form of amoral nihilism that it is in fact far worse when judged by THEIR OWN standards. Right? Pathetic is right but you just labeled the wrong group. As usual…
How am I extolling them?
They fucking signed up. What did they expect? Combat units and combat suport units GO TO PLACES WHERE WARS ARE FOUGHT!
I did sign up. I did crawl in the muck, and I did shoot nearly every weapon they had, and I was never sent anywhere more dangerous than the enlistedmen’s club in Yokosuka Japan.
It was my JOB to do what I did (well, not the drinking part, but you understand I’m sure); it is their job to do what they do.
People do NOT join the military to “make a difference.” They join the Peace Corps for that.
I think attaching political motives to military service is just childishly “Double dog daring” someone to put up or shut up. I support the US military being in Iraq. I think they should have been there a decade ago. I don’t care if it’s Bush 1 or Clinton or Bush 2. THAT’s where the troops need to be.
The reasons for them being there are political. The troops are not.
People fighting for the President…get real. By this insipid line of reasoning, the antiwar crowd should sign up and try and convince the troops to quit fighting, lay down their weapons, and have sit ins on the parade grounds, because “It’s all wrong of course.”
Take this shitstained argument to the porta-potty. It’s stupid, and intellectually morbid.
Oh yeah. And how about some “peace shields” for the innocent in Iraq right now? They could strap themselves to schools, hospitals, playground equipment. What about it peaceniks? Pre-invasion, you all were so interested in protecting vital military targets against US attacks. How about the schools? for the children? for the women? hmmm? Why doesn’t Cindy Sheehan go and preach peace in Baghdad? Hmmm? Old cow. If I looked that ugly, I would be willing to take just about any chance to speed my conversion to a better karma.
Broon,
Am I right in assuming that your position here is limited to the military, and not to other areas in which people serve with the possibility of death because others (who aren’t facing death themselves) believe it is good policy?
Would you, for example, say that a voter who supported an increase in the number of police in a given city should volunteer for the police force, or that a city council member who voted to increase the size of the fire department would need to personally volunteer in order to make their policy decision valid? (Imagine, for example, that a larger fire department was --in your view-- an intelligent policy, and that the person suggesting it was a feeble stick of man, who was an honest and wise city council member, but would be downright crap as a firefighter.)
Please understand, I’m not arguing with your view on the Iraq war here – I’m just saying that one’s position on the Iraq war seems to be at the heart of this. Supporters of a larger police deparment, for example, know that some of those police officers will likely be killed. The supporters argue that these deaths are justified in order to save even more lives, just as supporters of more troops in Iraq believe that such an increase will save even more lives. Others may argue that additional police are not necessary, but presumably would do so without suggesting that it would be a good idea for anyone who favors a larger force to join up.
It just seems that the “Well if you think that then you should go serve yourself then” position perhaps has more to do with your judgment that more troops (or indeed any in the first place) is/was a bad idea, rather than a belief that anyone who supports a policy that puts people in danger should quit their current occupation and personally go be a firefighter/policeman/soldier etc. That latter suggestion surely cannot be taken terribly seriously…
?
H
[quote]People do NOT join the military to “make a difference.” They join the Peace Corps for that[code]
:lol: Awww…come on…“No better friend…”[/code][/quote]
Worth reading (IMHO), might explain some of the differences here, too:
“War itself is a foreign concept to many solons of Capitol Hill; a small number—perhaps as few as 25 out of 535—have come under fire in combat. John McCain and Chuck Hagel are obvious and visible exceptions. […] Both men have seen the face of war up close. But on the question of the Iraq war, they are almost mirror opposites.”
Would you, for example, say that a voter who supported an increase in the number of police in a given city should volunteer for the police force,[/quote]
Actually, I’d make a different comparison – to have a true parallel, you’d have to have a bunch of people (1) demand the creation conditions that inevitably lead to a sticky problem and (2) when the problem emerges say that cleaning it up is not something in which they wish to participate.
Say a bunch of small-government types who pride themselves on commitment to “law and order” issues nonetheless were to demand a massive scaling back of a town’s police department to a lone cop on a mountain bike. When crime flourishes and the lone cop begs for assistance, these guys turn a deaf ear and/or insist that it’s the lone cop’s responsibility/fault. (Hmmm… reminds me that I haven’t seen “High Noon” in a long time.)
I don’t get this as a valid comparison to Iraq. If the city council member voted to increase the size of the fire department, that would normally require an increase in the budget of some kind, presumably in response to a validly perceived threat (fires). Let’s tweak this a bit to bring it more in line with Iraq’s defective preparation and planning:
Faced with a realistic forest-fire threat from the neighboring “100-Aker Woods”, Townsville had decided to send trucks and personnel from Townsville FD to assist with fire-fighting there. Citing to that precedent, a Townsville city council member demands that they must send Townsville FD trucks to put any and all fires that occur in the neighboring community of Fireville, a town populated mostly by repentant but quick-to-anger arsonists with a huge police department often accused of using “excessive force”.
The town of Fireville is far enough away that upon any close examination it’s clear that no real fire danger is posed to Townsville, yet the Townsville city council (led by the city council member) insists on voting to annex the Fireville community, fire the local police (small government is better! says our sly council member), and run fire trucks through the streets of Fireville all day with their lights flashing and sirens wailing. The repentant arsonists become incensed… and makers of bad puns rejoice to note that the arsonists passions have been inflamed. Our intrepid city council member maintains that we can continue to “fight fire on the cheap” while neglecting the effect that driving fire trucks through the streets of a town full of arsonists has when there’s no cops to maintain order.
Along the way, the council member also votes to decrease fireman housing and pay benefits and existing expenditures at the local burn ward (burns being the signature wound of many fire-putting-out injuries), and he takes action behind the scenes with crony companies to outfit the firemen with second-rate equipment. The firemen, by the way, are somehow not free to walk off the job in this hypothetical – don’t ask how, that’s just how things are. The councilman and his vocal supporters regularly use the Daily Bugle and other media outlets to question the civic spirit and intentions of all those who question for an instant their decisionmaking.
When later asked about the overstretched fire department, the council member says that they need all the firemen that they can get … but privately tells his kids not to sign up because it’s too “dangerous” and “the pay and benefits are terrible”. The councilmen’s most vocal main supporters (the “Firefighting Keyboardists No. 101”), many of whom are physically fit and able to assist with the current state of emergency whose root creation they urged, state categorically that they’re most needed at home so they can type online about how those who question annexing a community full of arsonists are traitors.
Well said, mofangongren. Thus, the notion that “extolling others to serve with the possibility of death without at least trying to enlist yourself is feeble” is more of a cute rhetorical device than a serious policy position. The real question is: Under which circumstances is it right support the government’s call for those who are willing to serve?
If one believes (1) that the cause is worthwhile, and (2) that adequate support is being provided for those who are asked to serve (neither of which condition --I understand-- obtains in the case of military recruits in Iraq, in your opinion or Broon’s opinion) then your average citizen should not feel compelled to serve as a prerequisite to holding the opinion that additional military recruitment is a sound policy (not any more than the feeble city council member feels compelled to join the fire department just because he thinks the town needs more firefighters).
So, as I suspected, the question comes down (as usual in the IP forum) to whether or not one supports the military action in Iraq.
There’s something profoundly immoral about backing a war you don’t consider worth dying for. You amount to little more than a vulture feeding on the dead.
So, let’s assume that WWII was a war worth dying for. how many MILLIONs of people died then? It seems like you are suggesting that waiting around MYOB and not getting involved is ok, until things get SO bad that military action is needed.
Maybe this is the European way, but I don’t like it.
Human nature is pretty easy to predict. Chavez WILL screw his people over and become the new Pinochet. It’s just a matter of time. Saddam did. The Middle East WILL explode in wars on every corner. Diffuse the situation, or in the least, get in there and get the higher ground.
It is not my JOB (anymore) to fight wars, no more than it is a soldier’s job to plow the snowy highways. We have a professional military. We don’t need a draft. It’s their job to train for and fight in military conflicts, whether I support it or not.
You seem to be supporting military isolationism spook. And while we might think that works to keep us out of the fray, it doesn’t. It only keeps us ill-prepared.
The choice to fight the wars that citizens support or do not support is the soldiers’ and theirs alone. They signed up; they knew what they were getting themselves into. And they signed up anyway.
Good for them. Defending your country above your own principles (if need be) IMHO is an honorable thing.
And another thing, this whole “Die for your country thing” is bogus. “Fight” for your country is a better way to put it. Idiots who say they are willing to “die” for their country should be put on latrene duty until they’re not so full of shit.