Driving around my small town this Memorial Day, I saw no more than twenty flags being flown at residences without permanent flag poles. In the business district, four flags displayed. Seems to me few of our citizens see themselves as “stakeholders” in the country as a whole.
Shamelessly taken from Thunder Tales http://thundertales.blogspot.com/2011/05/whoda-thunk-it.html
Is this Gallup Poll
http://www.gallup.com/poll/147839/Military-Personnel-Veterans-Give-Obama-Lower-Marks.aspx
He looks at some of the data, especially the prior service by age distribution.
My solution? Bring back the draft, universal, male and female. No exemptions, Yale or Mississippi Delta, Berkeley or community college. Criminal record? That is a tough one. One year service, no GI Bill, auxiliary force. Basic military skills.
We need to get back to where being a citizen is more than a birth certificate. We need it for a our basic security. Does anyone think we can fight a world war in our present state of readiness? Or repel an invasion? Do it without nukes?
Military service creates a sense of unity, of cohesion, of mutual respect. I have a first cousin, a screaming Massachusetts Liberal Democrat, who did a hard Vietnam tour as a dog handler. Saw the elephant up close and personal. Despite the gulf in our political beliefs, we can communicate and cooperate.
It is both being vets that makes this possible. There is a shared belief and shared commitment to our nation, hokey as that might sound to some.
We, as a nation, are losing our common ground. We are fragmented into our communities of interest. Universal military service could bridge that. My opinion; your mileage may vary.
1 comment:
We certainly need something to remind us that all our petty little "thems" are really "us." Of course it would also help if talk radio and cable news would stop pitting us against one another.
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