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Reply With QuoteNope, they signed up. Now alot of other countries can't say the same.Originally Posted by Broken
Then you will agree that any soldier now in Iraq should be allowed to come home if they want to. Otherwise they are certainly "being forced to contribute to the general welfare of society".
Nope, they signed up. Now alot of other countries can't say the same.
No man is free until all men are free - John Hossack
I agree completely with this Administration’s goal of a regime change in Iraq-John Kerry
even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act-John Kerry
He may even miscalculate and slide these weapons off to terrorist groups to invite them to be a surrogate to use them against the United States. It’s the miscalculation that poses the greatest threat-John Kerry
"Then you will agree that any soldier now in Iraq should be allowed to come home if they want to. Otherwise they are certainly "being forced to contribute to the general welfare of society"."
They're all volunteers.
Duh.
When their commitments are up they can do whatever the hell they want, just like i did.
Now let's take that a step farther, and assume that their is a legally enacted draft imposed by congress.
Guess what, we empower our representitives in congress and the executive branch to pass laws in OUR name, hence, if congress passes a draft, WE pass a draft.
So even then, legally, we are obliged to follow the laws passed by the people we elected to represent us.
Last edited by Bill; 20 Dec 04, at 03:06.
LOL
Not only that, the general welfare of society is considered a "wasteful government program." LOL
What of the NG soldiers who are now suing the Federal government for "deceptive contracts", which seem to allow the government to keep them in Iraq past the one year that they were led to believe was the extent of their commitment?
Should I be forced to pay taxes against my will? If I am not forced to, how do we pay for our armed forces?
ALL of y'all missed my point. I did not say that government can't compel you to do something. The point is that when they DO compel you, you get no credit - there is no virtue that accrues to you - because presumably you wouldn't have been willing to do that which you are compelled to do unless and until you are forced.
So, the liberal that gets a warm fuzzy feeling for being so compassionate towards one group by compelling another group to help them is not entitled to their virtuous feeling, and neither is the person that faces legal action if they don't comply.
Anybody see where I'm going? I'm not saying that government can't compel military service in an emergency (or anytime at all, should the government proclaim it). But those conscripted soldiers and the ones in authority that drafted them can't lay claim to any credit for their service.
If a draftee should serve honorably and well, THEN we may all be properly grateful. (Almost all the men that hit Omaha Beach were draftees. I admire the ones that did their jobs under incredible conditions, and for THAT I afford them all due credit. But unless they volunteered for the military, the mere fact of their service does not reflect anything at all about them.)
You people are arguing over details, not the point that counts.
"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory."
- George Orwell
Certainly I do not agree. Read my post above.
There are no draftees in the US military today. But if there were, they would not be entitled to your or my esteem, merely for having served forcibly. The fact of their service confers no virtue on them, but the nature of that service MIGHT.
Furthermore, if they were serving in Iraq under threat of legal action, they would not be entitled to come home until properly constituted authority told them they could.
DAM', junior, you got that wrong on BOTH points.
"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory."
- George Orwell
No, it's actually one of the general duties of the federal government enumerated in the Constitution: "...in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity..."
"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory."
- George Orwell
You are forced to pay taxes against your will. All of us are. And the fact that it is compulsory is both 1) necessary and 2) absolutely voids any claim of benevolence or altruism on our part. But liberals don't get that. They seem to believe that they are better people because, well, they just care so darn much more than the selfish bastards that want to keep too much of what they earned. Well, we'll show them: we'll tax their socks off, and that will mean we're better - more virtuous - by the measure of how much we're willing to compel others to pay for our warm fuzzy feelings of philanthropy.
We can argue about what measure of somebody's time, treasure, privacy or whatever the government can forcibly take - and it has to be some of all of those - but because you insist on somebody paying more than I would take so that your conscience can be salved will not raise your morality above that of a common street grifter.
Everybody get what I was saying?
"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory."
- George Orwell
Unfortunately, the "national security" tag has been used by politicians as an excuse to beat down opposition to, or coverup, all sorts of issues which have nothing to do with national security. So, simply tagging one's sacred cow with the words "national security" does not trump disagreement or debate. The essence of democracy is that no issue is above debate. The reality is that some will go to great lengths to discourage critical debate of their particular sacred issues. That is just the nature of politics.
Really? I think you understand that all conservatives are not the same. I doubt that you agree with Pat Buchanon on all issues.
Why, then, do you put all liberals, whatever that means, in the same box? Personally, I don't promote higher taxes on the wealthy due to some misplaced sympathy for people who can't get up off their sorry butts and find a decent job, I think higher taxes on the wealthy makes economic sense. I think it is beneficial for our country as a whole. I didn't come to these conclusions in a vacuum, the historical economic data leads me to this conclusion.
"What of the NG soldiers who are now suing the Federal government for "deceptive contracts", which seem to allow the government to keep them in Iraq past the one year that they were led to believe was the extent of their commitment?"
They shoulda read the fine print.
If you believe high marginal tax rates are a good thing, then you're reading the wrong economics textbooks, comrade. Where did you take Econ101, Pyongyang?
No rational economist will tell you that high marginal tax rates are beneficial to the country, because they're not. The ONLY reason to do that is to make the rich pay 'their fair share'. They can afford it more; they should pay more. Envy and class warfare are the only basis for that outlook, because tax revenues actually FALL when this is the tax strategy.
Every single time marginal rates have been cut, economic activity has INCREASED, and tax revenues collected by the government actually RISE, so whichever books your 'historical economic data' is coming from, you might want to get your crayons and check and see if all the pages have been colored in, yet.John Kennedy knew it, did something about it, revenues went up...and then Democrats seem to have lost their bookmark, because they - and you, apparently - have not been able to find that chapter in their Econ textbooks since then.
And how you'd go about defending the morality of economically punishing the most productive members of society is one for your own values system to work out. Personally, I believe that it's a clear case of the violation of the "Equal protection under the law" clause of the Consititution to have higher rates for one group of people over another, and I look forward to the day that somebody challenges the immoral practice of taxation at different rates.
"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory."
- George Orwell
And the point you're making in this post is a seperate debate, and doesn't bear on what we're talking about here.
It's an interesting aside, I'll grant you that, but not relevant to our discussion.
"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory."
- George Orwell
Yep, simple as that...
No man is free until all men are free - John Hossack
I agree completely with this Administration’s goal of a regime change in Iraq-John Kerry
even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act-John Kerry
He may even miscalculate and slide these weapons off to terrorist groups to invite them to be a surrogate to use them against the United States. It’s the miscalculation that poses the greatest threat-John Kerry
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