John McCain is feeling a draft

Posted  by AzBlueMeanie:

At a town hall in Las Cruces, New Mexico on Wednesday, John McCain was asked the following question:

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  Senator McCain I truly hope you get the opportunity to chase Bin Laden right to the gates of hell and push him in as you stated on your forum. I do have a question though. Disabled veterans, especially in this state, have horrible conditions [...] My son is an officer in the Air Force, and I am a vet and I was raised in a military family. I think it is a sad state of affairs when we have illegal aliens having a Medicaid card that can access specialist top physicians, the best of medical and our vets can't even get to a doctor. These are the people that we tied yellow ribbons for and Bush patted on the back. If we don't reenact the draft I don't think we will have anyone to chase Bin Laden to the gates of hell.

JOHN MCCAIN: Ma'am let me say that I don't disagree with anything you said and thank you and I am grateful for your support of all of our veterans.

Of course, today the McCain campaign issued a statement clarifying that it was "obvious" that McCain was referring to the veteran health care issues the questioner listed and he did not endorse the draft.  Really.  What part of "anything" does the McCain campaign not understand.  Don't talk down to us.  If McCain only wanted to agree with the veterans health care issues (which he regularly fails to support) but disagree with her comment about the draft, he could have said so.  He didn't.  He said "I don't disagree with anything you said."

VoteVets.org issued this press release VoteVets.org | News:

Jon Soltz, Iraq War Veteran and Chairman of VoteVets.org said, “At least Senator McCain is being honest.  A vote for him is a vote for the draft.  Period.  Unless Senator McCain radically changes his worldview, there would be a draft to implement his plans.”

Soltz added, “When you take into account his indefinite military commitment to Iraq, his desire to send more troops to Afghanistan, record lows in recruiting and retention, and possibly more wars he is looking to get into, like “Bomb Bomb Bomb” Iran, his numbers don’t add up without a draft.  Whether America likes it or not isn’t relevant – a draft is the only way to do everything Senator McCain wants to do.  I give him points for being honest and upfront, though, that we’re going to need a draft if he is elected.”

This isn’t the first time that Senator McCain has hinted at a reinstitution of the draft if he is elected.  Asked on September 29, 2007 in New Hampshire about the draft, McCain said he would, “consider it.”

McCain has said he would consider a draft on other occasions. Think Progress » McCain On Reinstituting A Military Draft; McCain Would Consider a Draft. Every Parent In America Should Know This

If McCain wants to bring back the draft, then I must insist upon the following.  Every Neoconservative chickenhawk The New Hampshire Gazette Chickenhawk Database who has been hawking for perpetual war and lobbying to continue feeding the military-industrial-congressional complex for years, will be the first to be drafted.  I will volunteer to serve on the draft board and the very first draftees that I want to draft will be the pundits, commentators, columnists and radio talk show hosts in the Neoconservative propaganda media.  That means you William Kristol, Charles Krauthammer, David Brooks, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Rielly, etc., etc., etc., and everyone at Fox News - you can have your own "Freedom Brigade."

Those who desire war should be the ones who fight it.

Comments

[Jeff Latas]

Well Meanie, you beat me to the punch. I have been slowly contemplating an article on the McDraft. Before I go into my story, I do want everyone to realize that I am not an advocate for a draft, however the outcome of conscription in our armed forces would have profound effect in our society and how the public views the most violent arm of foreign policy, military action.

A little more than two years ago, while I was campaigning for the US Congress, the question of a military draft came up. I openly opposed it, but the liberal questioner cornered me a little later and explained that a draft makes all citizens a war’s owner. To me, it seems logical that if anyone’s kids has an opportunity to serve as a non-volunteer, unnecessary and harmful military ventures would come under a much higher scrutiny by the public and the MSM (after all, even Wolf Blitzer’s daughter could be eligible). It makes sense that seriously considering a draft could be one of the quickest ways to end the occupation in Iraq and have a real foreign policy that is based on diplomacy and not military might.

It takes an act of Congress to enable the military to start drafting. Maybe it’s time to start this debate; again. Some of the more recent history on draft legislation was introduced to Congress in just 2003. In that year several Democratic congressmen (Charles Rangel of New York, James McDermott of Washington, John Conyers of Michigan, John Lewis of Georgia, Pete Stark of California, Neil Abercrombie of Hawaii) introduced legislation that would draft both men and women into either military or civilian government service, should there be a draft in the future. The Republican majority leadership suddenly considered the bill, nine months after its introduction, without a report from the Armed Services Committee (to which it had been referred), and just one month prior to the 2004 Presidential & Congressional elections. The Republican leadership used an expedited parliamentary procedure that would have required a two-thirds vote for passage of the bill. The bill was defeated on October 5, 2004, with 2 members voting for it and 402 members voting against.

A little history about ending the most recent draft started while Nixon campaigned in 1968, helping him win the election. After elected, his administration actually got Congress to sponsor a bill to end drafting by the end of June 1971, but the Department of Defense and Nixon administration decided the draft needed to continue for a short while. In February 1971, the administration requested of Congress a two-year extension of the draft, to June 1973. Opponents of the war wanted to reduce this to a one-year extension, or eliminate the draft altogether, or tie the draft renewal to a timetable for troop withdrawal from Vietnam (sound familiar). It was Senator Mike Gravel of Alaska, (yes the same guy) who took the most forceful approach, trying to filibuster the draft renewal legislation, shut down conscription, and directly force an end to the war. Unfortunately after a prolonged battle in the Senate, in September 1971 cloture was achieved over the filibuster and the draft renewal bill was approved. On July 1, 1973, President Richard Nixon created the All-Volunteer Force as a result of the American public's dissatisfaction with the draft.

[flounder]

I went to Preston Corn's launch of his Congressional bid here in Prescott. I think I was the only there who wasn't related to him.
On his website Corn had some usual boiler plate about finishing the job in Iraq and how "freedom wasn't free". I jotted this down, and after he gave his speech, I walked up to him and read his words to him.
Then I said, "Hey Preston, by my math you are still young enough to enlist in the military and fight in Iraq like you want other people to do, why don't you enlist? You could do a lot more for what you claim to believe than being a entry-level minority party Congressman."
A shit storm erupted, with about 8 people yelling the usual slurs at me; eventually it devolved into Corn telling me that in every war, some people are the heads and some are the toes. I commented that this sounded a lot like him saying he was too good to serve in the military.
The best part was when one of his family-cronies made an analogy, asking what I should do if he punched me in my face right then and there. I told him that since he was making an Iraq-"war on terror" analogy, that my response would be to punch the mean little old lady standing next to him.
I like to think that I had a small part in derailing his ambitions for Congress...

[Francine Shacter]

I wholeheartedly support public service. I believe every citizen should perform 2 years of public service after graduating from high school. There would be options and one option would be military service. If there were this requirement, then there would be greater "ownership" of military action by the citizenry which, I believe would limit military adventurism. Since proposing such a law would result in a massive amount of discussion, this could also be a means of getting people to think about the implications of all aspects of public service: military service, the Peace Corps, programs like Teach America, and new programs designed to aid population groups in serious need of assistance. Discussion of these programs and the requirement that 18 year olds pick one would concentrate our thinking about and discussion of - public service! To me, it is a win-win. After the two years, young people would have the advantage of access to advanced education. Although we usually think about that as college, the young people should have a choice between academics and trades.

I would like to see a healthy and even heated debate about the merit of such a program. Since it would affect every young person 18 years of age, I would expect a lively (that could be a vast understatement) exchange of views!

When I ran for Congress in 2006, I spoke about the importance of a sense of community - we're all in this together/I am my brother and sister's keeper. I also said, everytime I had a chance, that Democracy succeeds not because we have a policeman on every corner but because the more than 300 million people who live in the United States consent to be governed. Anything that enhances the buy-in of our citizens to our society strengthens our country and will keep it as a democracy.