Friday, January 28, 2005

Draft Day (and I'm not talking about sports)

Check out this article in Rolling Stone. I didn't believe for a minute the Bush regime's denials of plans to reinstitute the draft. For one thing, the regime has lied often enough that I give it no benefit of the doubt. For another, I believe the same as writers like The New Yorker's Seymour Hirsch and others that the regime has its eyes on Iran and Syria. If so, as this article notes, a draft is almost certain once those wars commence.

But what nutball in the regime came up with this idea of doing a selective draft of skilled people? Let's think about all the ways this will go wrong. First off, a selective draft would discourage people from gaining certain skills. If I know that, for instance, electrical engineers (specifically noted in the article) are vulnerable to the draft but, say, physicists aren't, then I'm gonna become a physicist.

For another thing, how can it possibly be good for our economy or the health care crisis to start drafting professionals and health-care workers? It's going to be hard for the US to stay ahead of the technology curve if we start drafting all those with technical skills into the military. Can you imagine what would happen in most companies in the US today if you drafted all their IT personnel? Chaos! And the same regime that claims that tort reform will lower health-care costs (it won't) is now going to draft all the doctors and nurses? What the hell do you think that will do to health-care costs?

And this idea that from ages 18-35 everyone would have to keep the Selective Service people updated on their skill base? What, are you going to prosecute people if they don't tell you they took a Microsoft class? Jeesh.

At least in Vietnam, the US government could make the argument that the military was protecting the freedom of the south Vietnamese. Disingenuous, yes, but at least they could try to sell it. But, in this case, I really don't see any difference between the Bush regime drafting people to fight its wars of conquest and totalitarian regimes doing the same. Iran has not attacked the US. Any attack on Iran is nothing more than an unprovoked attack, and a draft to support such an invasion is immoral.

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