Originally Posted by TheMeInTeam:
Originally Posted by The Nagel:
like i said.. i'm not sure about the idea, but other than generic rethoric and spewing, i've never had anyone give me a good reason why it would be a bad idea.
/shrug
It's a bad idea for the same reason why mandatory military service is a bad idea, and they're basically the same idea except that you would just be making people second-class citizens rather than locking them up or however else you would enforce mandatory military service. We're not facing any existential threat. There's no need for even a draft, let alone the huge numbers of people who would join with your plan rather than have their voting rights taken away. It would be a ridiculous waste of money and an even bigger waste of everyone's time.
except in a few years, it would settle down... people either feel the need to serve, or they do not.
i never did.* lots of people don't. how many 18 year old are going to do a 4 year stint taking part in something they have little use for? sure, it means they get to vote later, but right now they need to get a job make money and party their pants off.
i believe that the influx of people joining the service just to able to vote would maybe increase the number of military personel maybe 20-25% in the first 8-10 years and would drop off to an extra 10% higher that we have now.
no one would be second class citizen... that's silly. we have people now, some people work to build things, some people work to sell the things the first group makes. this way you'd have one group that serves the country, and one group that builds the wealth. you can't run a country without money and you can't keep a county with defense... they would be intertwined parts of the whole, both dependant upon the other.
and besides.. it's just an idea, no reason to get snotty about it. can't people just converse anymore?
* that's not 100% true. in high school my best friend had joined the army between his junior and senior year, went to basic, came back to finish HS, then went to AIT in Benning, to be a rigger in the rangers. he'd almost talked me into joining when i came across a capt. in the national guard, one of the admins for the school i went to. he was an utterly horrible human being. if you wern't on the football team or in the jrotc, you wernt worth the time it would take to call you worthless.
i was sent to the office ( for reading a book. in lit. class. ) and he acted like i was the 2nd son of sam.
he accused me of being on drugs ( i wasn't) and i told him "look, you believe what you like. nothing i say will make any difference to you, so you just go on and knock yourself out beliving lies because they make you happy."
and on and on. he presented such an awful example of an officer, it made me write off any ideas of the military.
shortly before i left the school for good, i was sent by a teacher to another room to get something. don't rememeber what, and he jumped me in the hall. " WHAR YOU S"POSED TA BE?"
i'm going to...
WHY AREN'T YOU IN YER CLASSROOM??
my teacher told me....
YOU CAN'T JUST ROAM AROUN THE SCHOOL LIKE YOU OWN THE PLACE, BOY!
i stood silent. he waited. i finally said "would you like me to answer your questions, or would you just prefer to yell at me some more? since you see to enjoy it so much?"
he stood staring at me. eventually he said "WELL?" and i told him the errand the teacher sent me on. which made him yell at me again " WHY DIDN'T YOU JUST SAY SO TO START WITH, BOY? WHY'JU MAKE ME WASTE TIME MESSIN WITH YOU?"
to which i said " BECAUSE YOU WOULDN'T CLOSE YOU MOUTH LONG ENOUGH FOR ME TO ANSWER YOU, YOU WORTHLESS WEEKEND WARRIOR!"
i thought he was going to explode. i've never seen a man's face that red in my life. we're talking crayon candy apple red, here. i was hoping he'd pop a cork and hit me, caues by this time there was at least a couple dozen people watching, and i'd get PAID, and i knew it would at least get him busted, if not tossed out of the guard to punch a 17 year old student in the school.
he got real quiet and said ' your mine now punk. i'll be seeing you after school for the rest of your natural born life."
i politely told him ' no, you won't. i got stuff to do after school' and walked away. a second later i heard him yelling at the people who'd stopped to watch.
i never stayed after school. and i never joined the military. i figured if i couldn't just shut up and accept this nimrod squawking at me in a school, i'd end up in levenworth, or shot, if i tried to make it through the military.
all due respect for the people who can, and have, but it clearly it just wasn't meant for me.
all due respect, that is, to that one gasbag form my high school. he gave a bad name to americans as a whole, the national guard in specific. he was like a bad stereotype in a bad teenage comedy. pathetic worm. puffed up little blowhard with delusions of adequacy
but all you other military personel, my hats off to you, hoo-rah, semper-fi, and all that. you have my undying respect.