at ... come on, everyone, sing along!
Alice's Restaurant.
And if you'll remember, after telling the whole story about Alice, and the restaurant, and being convicted for littering (on Thanksgiving), Arlo Guthrie told us that all that wasn't what he came to talk about at all. He came to talk about The Draft.
The Draft. It was the elephant in the room from about 1966 to 1972. It was there, it couldn't be avoided, you couldn't help but see it and talk about it. It overwhelmed everything. Would you go? Could you get out of it? What would you have to do to get out of it?
I knew one guy who bulked up -- he had to gain about 75 pounds -- and put himself over the maximum weight limit to be drafted. Someone else had himself hypnotized so that whenever he saw a blood pressure cuff his blood pressure would go up. He failed the physical too. Yet a third character went for his physical on speed, and he passed with flying colors. Crap! He went back for a second try sans drugs and his blood pressure, as it turns out, was too low to pass the physical. My first BIL failed because he was 50% deaf in one ear as a result of childhood illness. Lucky. His own best friend was a full-time student and two of his classes got cancelled; the next thing he knew, he was marching into Cambodia.
Once again, not what I came to talk about today. There is talk and fear and speculation about the re-activation of The Draft. I think it will not happen. Congressman Rangel, who is a peace-minded liberal Democrat, introduced a bill to reactivate The Draft to highlight the fact that is is our poor and uneducated who would be most affected. He could do this just to make a point because there is no way Congress is voting to reactivate The Draft. If they did, not a single one of them would be re-elected, and they all know this. It's probably the fastest ticket to unemployment they could come up with.
I heard somewhere that the military does not want -- adamantly -- A Draft. Why? Think about it.
They would be drafting a generation of people who are accustomed to bringing doctor's notes to school to get out of gym, or out of history or English, if possible. Would watching a dissection make you sick? Here's the note; don't have to do it. It is also a generation that has benefitted from a great deal of what is called "special education", much of that by federal mandate. If someone is entitled to special additional instruction, or more time on a test, how exactly is that individual going to respond to basic training, or combat, unless he or she is especially motivated to do so? Not well, I'm thinking.
I'm looking at my own daughters, who would first of all move to Canada in a second rather than join the Army, and secondly who are already too old, since A Draft typically targets 18 or 19 year olds (even though one is eligible until 26, under the old rules.) R has had a host of orthopedic problems, especially with her shoulder, and she's been under treatment for years. Now, 50 years ago, the Army would have told her to suck it up, or more likely, we would never have known the extent of her problem, since there were no MRIs, no nuclear diagnostic testing (which she has had, on shoulder and ankle both.) No military is taking her, since that's a lawsuit waiting to happen, especially with a documented pre-existing condition. Now let's talk K.
Oy vey. Trust me, Army, you do not want this girl. First, of course, there's the issue of her damaged and easily-compromised immune system, also well-documented. But seriously. First night in basic training, first time someone yells at her, she's going to become a weepy puddle of goo. They won't be able to send her home fast enough. This kid is not military material. Once again, 50 years ago, recruits knew they had no choice, they knew that a dishonorable discharge would follow them through life, and more. Now ... well, no. People don't care about that stuff in the same way. (How many do you think would just say "I'm gay" and be done with it? Plenty, and that would spell the end of the whole "no gays in the military" thing. If they needed people, they'd take gays too, because there isn't the same stigma anymore in claiming to be gay; tons of people would either admit to it or pretend to. An easy out.)
Anyway, that's just my kids, and they're pretty representative, I think. They're not even special ed. classified, but lots of people are, and the military can't provide an IEP for each recruit. The military does not want a draft. It would only force them to field an Army that they cannot control in any meaningful way, and I think they know it.
What would happen, of course, is that they would not draft anyone with the ability to escape the draft, which means the money, mostly, and we would be drafting only the poorest people, the ones with no way out. Where have we heard that before, hmm? Think Vietnam, think Civil War. Not that other people don't serve, whether by Draft or by volunteering. But large numbers of the people in any fighting force are going to be from the poorer segments of society. That's just the way it is.
The Draft is simply not feasible in the society we have created for today's children. There are ailments and special needs among the poor too, of course, even if they are undiagnosed; the number of people drafted who would have to be re-processed and mustered out would be staggering. It just won't work, I tells ya.
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I'm watching MSNBC
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