Obama calls for mandatory government service.

[Anton P. Nym]

how come this hasnt been all over the news?

Probably because the source for that blog entry is "World Net Daily", which is about as reliable as the Weekly World News. This looks to be just another Swift-boating to me, folks; it's from the same people saying that Obama is a Muslim terrorist plant and eats babies for breakfast.

If some reputable source (ie: not a propaganda engine that even the Republican Party is embarrased to have) comes up with some sort of quote about Obama looking at a program of national service, that's the time to start pondering.

-- Steve

 

[Unknower]

I think there has to be some psychological difference between an American and a Swiss. Although most males around the age of 19 own guns, they have a low rate of crime and gun violence.

Only occasional rampages with assault rifles.


EDIT: I don't know how many loonies Swiss get, but I've heard of few cases.

 

[fulano]

Kinda like in here, Mexico.

We have "obligatory" military service when we turn eighteen for us males. We go to military college and there they do a kind of "lottery" with us(at least in the state of Sonora where I'm from). A container with some balls is brought in and you literally have to pick one:

black-you get you walk and wait for your walking papers to be liberated(your card) and you are exempt after a few months(bureaucracy is a ***** in here);

white-you are drafted and you are obligued to attend every Sunday(if I remember correctly) once a week at daybreak to be "trained"(which is total crap because the training sucks).

We can choose not to do it(like I have), but it's still mandatory/obligatory to do to some extent. In many cases it's even required when looking for jobs. And yes, even though I've never set foot in there, I have first hand account that arguably, you are indeed treated like a sack of shit during your stay there(if you were unlucky enough to get drafted; but at least they teach you how to "shoot" with an unloaded, ages old, rifle), but you at least do a brief community service which is actually good. After you finish it, you literally have "fulfilled your duty to your nation".

My friend Adrian seems to have a kick everytime he recounts the "horrors" of his military service, more likely because he found it absurd and demeaning, although he kind of felt like he actually gave something back to society, to some extent(he used to teach english and worked in basic literacy programs),and he states he wasn't ever physically mistreated. He was just running, most of the time, and marching, and doing drills every now and then

What Mr. Obama is saying sounds like a happy flowery-rainbowy version of what we have going in here. It might not be so bad if the damn thing isn't either corrupted or abused.

My two cents.

 

[Gapperjack]

Since the conclusion i reached was National police. Which as history has shown is never a good thing...

What? Nearly every country in the world has a national police force. How has history shown this to be "never a good thing" exactly?

I think the idea of compulsory service is a good idea, but it shouldn't necessarily have to be military, it could be civilian as well. It doesn't seem fair to force a pacifist to join the army, and not everyone is going to respond well to military style discipline. Alternatives could be working in a hospital (nothing medical, just some of the basic porter duties), police cadets, any large organisation with strict standards.

Well jeffers, in Britain we did have national service up until 1963. I must agree though I can't see our current government being able to organise it, considering one gets the impression that they couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery.

 

[werepossum]

how come this hasnt been all over the news?

Probably because the source for that blog entry is "World Net Daily", which is about as reliable as the Weekly World News. This looks to be just another Swift-boating to me, folks; it's from the same people saying that Obama is a Muslim terrorist plant and eats babies for breakfast.

If some reputable source (ie: not a propaganda engine that even the Republican Party is embarrased to have) comes up with some sort of quote about Obama looking at a program of national service, that's the time to start pondering.

-- Steve

Steve, please look at the site - it actually has the full video of the speech. Unless you believe that the American Thinker has the resources to create a fake full-motion, full sound video of Obama AND that Obama has for some reason not questioned it, this IS exactly what he said.

That said, compulsory service has been a part of the Democrat agenda for some time. The idea that Obama intends to raise a federal police force as large as our armed forces - which would enshrine the Democrat party in exactly the same way as Putin's party in Russia - is immensely terrifying because he's almost certainly going to be our next president. But I don't think that's what he intends.

Instead, the "national civilian army" will be a million plus people drafted to serve as teachers, nurses, day care workers, street cleaners, school janitors, painters, and whatever else the federal government desires they do. This is the new feudalism that began with the imposition of the income tax as opposed to excise or sales tax - the idea that the government decides its share and takes it off the top, THEN you get what it is left.

In the new feudalism, the government will take some portion of your time and labor - a portion IT decides, by the way - and use that time and labor as it wishes. Historically both free and non-free owed special services - such as free or paid labor at harvest or in time of war - but the non-free also owed regular service for one or more days each week, days which the lord used as he wished for his own benefit without payment. We are now being drawn back into that model, where the government claims a portion of each high school student's time, a larger portion of each college student's time, and then all the new graduate's time for a specified period. The first two services will be without payment, with the servant's parents responsible for his upkeep, but the third will come with a modest payment to enable the servant to support himself during his service. Other serf duties such as heriot (where the lord takes the deceased's best weapons and armor, his best animal, or his best suit of clothing if he has no weapons or animals, later reduced to a monetary payment now known as the estate tax) and merchet (the fee paid to the lord by an unfree man to be allowed to marry off his daughter, now called a marriage license fee) have already been restored. Interestingly, one strong measure of whether a man was free or unfree was whether his father and grandfather had paid heriot upon death, and whether he had paid merchet for his daughter to be allowed to marry.

Whether you think this is a good thing or a bad thing depends on your preferred balance between freedom and services. The more wealth and labor the government takes from you, the more services it can provide to you and others.

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

I'm not decided on the subject of mandatory national service, but as has already been pointed out, several non-totalitarian countries have mandatory service requirements of their citizens. Given that the majority of those are military in nature, the fact that Barack Obama's plan is not military makes me less nervous about it. Also, despite how imperial the American presidency has become in the last decade, I do not think he would ever be able to ram such a program through Congress, which in my opinion just makes it so much more campaign noise. On the con side, I would worry that corporate interests who seem to influence so much of the government through the back door of campaign funding and lobbying firms would re-direct a new stream of labor to their best interests rather than to the interest of the general public.

 

[Perticular Elk]

I agree, Mandatory service would build discipline in youth and solve all enlistment problems. but implementing such programs would be impossible with the American Govt sabotaging the war effort (Vietnam anyone?) I still see red on Obama. He is as Communist as a candidate could get.

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

Having recently seen one of the great lasting legacies of the Depression Era WPA, the Hoover Dam, I'm more inclined to support something along the lines of a New Deal program, but again, I'm very ambivalent about it because I worry that it would become a political pork barrel rather than a program in the public interest.

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

I agree, Mandatory service would build discipline in youth and solve all enlistment problems. but implementing such programs would be impossible with the American Govt sabotaging the war effort (Vietnam anyone?) I still see red on Obama. He is as Communist as a candidate could get.

I think it's very interesting that the most recent Democratic president was actually quite a ways to the right of the Nixon administration. It just goes to show how successful the Reagan Revolution actually was. As communinist as a candidate can get? Maybe by today's standards, but historically, not by a long [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Deal] shot [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_V._Debs].

 

[stompy]

If it's something like Policing or other, non-combat, roles, then it should be fine. But conscripts... not such a good idea.

 

[Erana]

...I usually go for equality, but frankly, I'm fine if they don't draft women.

 

[Mr. Purple]

Bull! Mandatory my butt! He tries it and I take a permanent vacation to Japan.

 

[John Galt]

I'm suprised noone's up in arms about all this. I know I would hate it if they brought it to Australia. I'd protest not to or make up some excuse to be let out. No way would I bother doing any mandotery government service. I'd rather go to college and enjoy life not being forced tro do crap I don't want to.

Yeah, I'm pretty opposed to the idea of forced service. I'd much rather not have the government force me to do anything and just let me just live how I want to. I pay taxes and don't go on weekly rape and pillage sprees, what the hell more do they want? I think going to college would benefit me much for than spending two years in the military.

 

[kodiak90]

yeah well I don?t mind it but I?m not fighting for the fucking corporate interest of this goddamn country, sign me up when fucking Russia starts to invade. Plus I?m pretty sure that just as easily on how the government spends billions of taxpayer?s money training us for those two years they could use it for I don?t know, giving us a basic college education for free? I mean it?s amazing how everyone is so quick to consider sending youth out to war as cannon fodder, but not so quick to give us an education and actually be part of the solution. And I?ll be damn if I?m going to any place [besides the beach] that has an infinite amount of sand or remotely related to sand.

 

[iamnotincompliance]

Having at least skimmed over most of the responses here, I believe I can point out one little problem with comparing the US to compulsory-service countries: Israel, Sweden, Switzerland and the like require[/a] such laws because with smaller populations comes fewer volunteers. The US, 300 million strong and still growing, has enough volunteers for five separate main branches of service and then some. While such service might help the economy a la WWII Germany, it certainly won't help the national debt any (the military being one of the largest expenditures), although that's really a moot point when you're $9 trillion in the hole.

Last time I had any hard numbers, I recall that if the US slashed military spending to a quarter of what it is currently (currently being four years ago), we'd still be spending more than the next most well-armed country, Russia.

So far as the facts go, I'd call it even (possibly helping the economy through service vs possibly helping the economy through eliminating the debt some time before I die), but I for one am not service inclined. Those who were/are in in the military, good for you, I wouldn't do that. That's quite possibly the worst compliment a soldier's ever been given, but I also think I skewed entirely off topic, so it's time to stop this before it gets entirely out of hand.

 

[SilentHunter7]

The Coast Guard, Border Patrol, and FBI aren't enough? Still, I HAVE always thought that a Soviet Style Forced military service would be a good thing for this countries youth... Just two years, no longer...

Agreed. 2 years serving the country could straighten a lot of people out. It doesn't even have to be combat duty (I'm still of the opinion combat jobs should remain all-volunteer), a lot of military jobs will never have you firing a single shot. Hell, you can even count civil service; fire, police, EMT, municipal clerical jobs if want a stretch. The government offers every kind of job you can think of, and at a competitive salary to boot.

-edit-
not to mention that it would get people more in touch with how their government works

 

[Alex_P]

I'd prefer to sell my services to the government on my own terms rather than on the governments', thank you very much. I'm pretty sure that the contractors and the direct government employees I know would not be getting an equitable wage if they were "drafted" into their positions.

-- Alex