Reflections on The State of The Union
Jann Burner
January 26, 2007
After watching and listening to President Bush deliver his State of The Union Speech a couple of his comments began to strongly draw my attention.
Here is an exact quote from the President's State of The Union which has me a little concerned. "Tonight I ask the Congress to authorize an increase in the size of our active Army and Marine Corps by 92,000 in the next five years."
Since regular enlistment's are way down and quotas are not being met, one would assume that the next message from Capitol Hill might be something along the lines of, "much as we all hate the idea, a draft lottery of all able people, male AND female will have to be initiated in order for us to reach our goals in this great world struggle against terrorism. This draft will affect all able bodied people between the ages of 18 and 42 and will begin immediately." The age 18-42 is from a bill by Representative Charles Rangel currently before congress.
"A second task we can take on together is to design and establish a volunteer Civilian Reserve Corps. Such a corps would function much like our military reserve." Here are the two trigger phrases. "volunteer" and then "function much like our military". The innuendo here is that this Civilian Volunteer group would be at the beck and call of the Federal Government, to be called up and sent where and when the government thinks it appropriate. Apparently this would not be controlled by individual states for use in local emergencies, but would be for foreign deployment.
Initially the military reserves were under the control of the individual State governments, but this has been superceded by the Federal Government. States no longer have a say when and where there reserve units will be sent. Also Volunteer Civilian sounds a lot like the Red Cross or some such organization, but one can only assume that, like in the Military Reserve, once one is a member of this new organization one will no longer be free to cast a vote as to where and when he/she will be sent on a mission. "Much like our military reserve. It would ease the burden on the Armed Forces by allowing us to hire civilians with critical skills to serve on missions abroad when America needs them." This seems contradictory. In the previous section he uses the term Volunteer and then he says they will hire civilians. Does this mean that the common person will be induced to Volunteer and the individual with marketable skill will be paid?
This sounds a lot like the current situation where the reservist volunteer is living at or below the poverty level, with no control over when he/she will be allowed to leave, while the Mercenaries, such as Black Water and other organizations pay their men top dollar for performing essentially the same work. Likewise our military technicians and construction units work essentially for "free" while Haliburton hires thousands of people, down to and including truck drivers, for wages unimaginable at home. And they can leave whenever they like.
A secondary implication here is that, should a sufficient number of Volunteers be unavailable at home, then this paid Civilian Reserve could very well be outsourced, as happens with other government contractors operating in foreign theaters of operation. "And it would give people across America, who do not wear the uniform, a chance to serve in the defining struggle of our time." This truly sounds ominous. The implication here is that this is a WORLD WAR and every man, woman and perhaps even child should shoulder their weapon or their marketable skill and join the fray. I wonder if the Boy/Girl Scouts would qualify as a Civilian Reserve Corp? Why not, never too young to start and no reason that children should be dis-allowed from serving in this defining struggle?
Is this really what we want to do?
Here is an exact quote from the President's State of The Union which has me a little concerned. "Tonight I ask the Congress to authorize an increase in the size of our active Army and Marine Corps by 92,000 in the next five years."
Since regular enlistment's are way down and quotas are not being met, one would assume that the next message from Capitol Hill might be something along the lines of, "much as we all hate the idea, a draft lottery of all able people, male AND female will have to be initiated in order for us to reach our goals in this great world struggle against terrorism. This draft will affect all able bodied people between the ages of 18 and 42 and will begin immediately." The age 18-42 is from a bill by Representative Charles Rangel currently before congress.
"A second task we can take on together is to design and establish a volunteer Civilian Reserve Corps. Such a corps would function much like our military reserve." Here are the two trigger phrases. "volunteer" and then "function much like our military". The innuendo here is that this Civilian Volunteer group would be at the beck and call of the Federal Government, to be called up and sent where and when the government thinks it appropriate. Apparently this would not be controlled by individual states for use in local emergencies, but would be for foreign deployment.
Initially the military reserves were under the control of the individual State governments, but this has been superceded by the Federal Government. States no longer have a say when and where there reserve units will be sent. Also Volunteer Civilian sounds a lot like the Red Cross or some such organization, but one can only assume that, like in the Military Reserve, once one is a member of this new organization one will no longer be free to cast a vote as to where and when he/she will be sent on a mission. "Much like our military reserve. It would ease the burden on the Armed Forces by allowing us to hire civilians with critical skills to serve on missions abroad when America needs them." This seems contradictory. In the previous section he uses the term Volunteer and then he says they will hire civilians. Does this mean that the common person will be induced to Volunteer and the individual with marketable skill will be paid?
This sounds a lot like the current situation where the reservist volunteer is living at or below the poverty level, with no control over when he/she will be allowed to leave, while the Mercenaries, such as Black Water and other organizations pay their men top dollar for performing essentially the same work. Likewise our military technicians and construction units work essentially for "free" while Haliburton hires thousands of people, down to and including truck drivers, for wages unimaginable at home. And they can leave whenever they like.
A secondary implication here is that, should a sufficient number of Volunteers be unavailable at home, then this paid Civilian Reserve could very well be outsourced, as happens with other government contractors operating in foreign theaters of operation. "And it would give people across America, who do not wear the uniform, a chance to serve in the defining struggle of our time." This truly sounds ominous. The implication here is that this is a WORLD WAR and every man, woman and perhaps even child should shoulder their weapon or their marketable skill and join the fray. I wonder if the Boy/Girl Scouts would qualify as a Civilian Reserve Corp? Why not, never too young to start and no reason that children should be dis-allowed from serving in this defining struggle?
Is this really what we want to do?
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