We've already established that this probably won't even come to a vote (and if it did, it would fail miserably), and I've already given my opinion on the matter, so there's no need for anymore of that. However, I do want to give mention to an OP/ED piece published today in the New York Daily News, written by Representative Charlie Rangel himself, which reads:
"The question of whether we need a universal military draft will be important as long as this country is placing thousands of young men and women in harm's way in Iraq. As long as Americans are being shipped off to war, then everyone should be vulnerable, not just those who, because of economic circumstances, are attracted by lucrative enlistment bonuses and educational incentives.
Even before the first bomb was dropped, before the first American casualty, I have opposed the war in Iraq. I continue to believe that decision-makers would never have supported the invasion if more of them had family members in line for deployment.
Those who do the fighting have no choice; when the flag goes up, they salute and follow orders. So far, more than 2,800 have died and 21,000 have been wounded. They are our unrecognized American heroes.
The great majority of people bearing arms for this country in Iraq are from the poorer communities in our inner cities and rural areas, places where enlistment bonuses are up to $40,000 and thousands in educational benefits are very attractive. For people who have college as an option, those incentives - at the risk to one's life - don't mean a thing.
In New York City, the disproportionate burden of service on the poor is dramatic. In 2004, 70% of the volunteers in the city were black or Hispanic, recruited from lower income communities such as East New York, Brooklyn; Long Island City, Queens, and the South Bronx.
The Bush administration, the Pentagon and some Republicans in Congress are considering deploying up to 20,000 more troops to Iraq, above the 141,000 already on the ground. Among the planners are Army Gen. John Abizaid, head of the U.S. Central Command, who has admitted the difficulty of finding additional combat troops for the war without expanding the size of the active-duty military.
If Abizaid is right, increasing troop strength will mean dipping further into the reserves and National Guard units, which are already carrying an unfair burden of multiple deployments. The overstretched active-duty Army is filling the ranks in Iraq with stop-loss orders and extended deployments, and even recalls of the Individual Ready Reserves, active-duty veterans who have time remaining on their military obligations.
These facts lead me to wonder how anyone who supports the war cannot support the military draft, especially when the growing burden on our uniformed troops is obvious, and the unfairness and absence of shared sacrifice in the population cannot be challenged.
If this war is the threat to our national security that the Bush administration insists it is, then the President should issue a call for all Americans to sacrifice for the nation's defense. If there must be a sacrifice, then the burden must be shared fairly.
That is why I intend to reintroduce legislation to reinstate the military draft, making men and women up to age 42 eligible for service, with no exemptions beyond health or reasons of conscience. I believe it is immoral for those who insist on continuing the conflict in Iraq, and placing war on the table in Iran and North Korea, to do so only at the risk of other people's children."
Charlie Rangel, you're not going to prove a point, all your going to do is stir up a controversy the Democrats simply don't need right now, and spark attacks from the right claiming reinstituting the draft is part of the Democratic parties agenda. Furthermore, I think you should try looking at stats from this decade, rather than quoting old statistics to simply "build" your argument.
