I’m moved by your message of hope. With the Republican party so dominated by corporatism and foreign influence the only hope for the country lies within the Democratic party.
George Washington once spoke of the rise of political parties with concern. He felt that loyalty to the party would become greater than that to the country. It is so with many people. Certainly the Republicans I speak to. Though the feeling I have with Democrats, is that there is still a love in many hearts for the people of this nation and the ideas of liberty and law. We must stop what we have become.
We have become an ugly people in the last eight years. We have a stain on our nation. The people of the world see it. Many of our own people see it. Do we want to live like this?
What country launched unprovoked wars of aggression and despoiled whole nations? Who snatched people from the street and held them without charges in secret prisons, tortured them with brute force and with exquisitely calibrated techniques approved by the highest authorities? Who spied without qualm or restraint on their own people, no warrants needed, no evidence required, just a nod from some faceless official in the security organs? Who believed that the national leader is beyond the law, that any order he gives is rightful and just and cannot be punished, simply because he has given it. Who treated protests against the established order as security threats and acts of terror, and repressed them with mass arrests and police violence? Soviet Union? Nazi Germany? Who? Is there anyone that wishes to live in a country that can be compared to the past evils?
Time to rid ourselves of those that corrupt our country. To join again the free world.
You reminded me of Katharine Lee Bates lyrics to America the Beautiful that also gives us hope.
O beautiful for pilgrim feet
Whose stern impassioned stress
A thoroughfare of freedom beat
Across the wilderness!
America! America!
God mend thine every flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law!
What political party encourages colleges and universities to bar military recruitment and ROTC from their establishmnets. What political party discourages military recruiters from high schools?
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p>What political party engaged in foor dragging to preclude involvement in WWII resulting in additional missions of lives lost and peraps the entire was against Nazism and fascism?
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p>What political party ecouraged USA’s explosive involvement in a sout east asian war by concocting the report of false attack on a US warship?
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p>What political party encouraged the attack of a neighboring sovereign island to our south?
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p>What political party leads a congress that enjoys a 10% approval rating?
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p>Need I go on?
To suggest otherwise is a load of baloney. Controversies about ROTC and recruiters came from the campuses, not from any party.
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p>A Democratic President fought and won WWI.
Democratic Presidents fought and won WWII.
A Democratic sent troops to Korea.
Democratic Presidents sent troops to Vietnam.
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p>In the World Wars Republicans (and the country as a whole for that matter) were the isolationists. In the Cold War flare-ups if the Democrats hadn’t acted it would be more fodder for the Republican soft-on-Communism charge. In 1976, VP candidate Bob Dole derisively refered to “Democrat wars” – as if!
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p>Democrats have a stellar record of fighting when we need to, thank you very much, but have also done a better job of learning from our mistakes.
Which political party receives the lion’s share of donations from active duty troops?
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p>Hint: It’s the party that would rather support the troops than just use them for staging. Answer here.
Senator Obama has joined Senator McSame to call for national service. With the appropriate outs for the rich and powerful to avoid military action, we can expect our poor and middle-class youth to be marched off to endless war no matter who wins the election.
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p>With so little difference in the politicians, it is of little wonder that the most exciting topic is pigs with lipstick. Keep your hopes and dreams of liberty hidden for another four years. This year I’ll write-in the pig.
National service does not equal “marching off to endless war”. For example, the recent DNC in Denver had a day of service that focused on things like serving meals and building playgrounds, which is a better indicator of what Obama means by “service”. Furthermore there’s the obvious striking difference that Obama opposed the war we’re currently in and intends to end it when elected, while McCain supported it, continues to think it was a good idea, and doesn’t intend to try to end it when elected. More wars obviously means more people going to war, while fewer wars means the opposite.
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p>On the same day, in fact I believe in the same speech, that he made the recent lipstick on a pig reference that got the press all in a buzz, Obama announced an education policy based in part on the work of a Nobel prize winning economist. In a sane world, that policy would’ve led the news. The reason “the most exciting topic is pigs with lipstick” is that our news media is very badly broken, not that there aren’t better more newsworthy things to talk about.
So, we draft the young to serve meals and build playgrounds. What a noble ideal. We need a draft for this?
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p>And if the youth fails to meet the expectation what do we do with him? Prison? Hand the troublemaker a rifle and send him to Afganistan?
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p>Government is our friend. All you need is love. Where are my rose colored glasses?
Who said anything about conscription?
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p>What Obama seems to have in mind, based on that article that you linked to (but apparently did not actually read), is something more along the lines of the GI Bill for “good deed doing”.
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