Liberal Conservatives and Conservative Liberals
acording to the latest issue of details magazine (the issue with lance armstrong on the cover), democrats are increasingly more traditionally conservative than republicans in their policies and legislations. now that the dems control the house and senate, more powers are offered to them in passing conservative legislation. don’t believe me?
on cnn.com this morning was this story about new york democratic representative charles b. rangel, who wants to issue legislation requiring conscription (the draft). rep. rangel is already set to step into the position of chairman of the house ways and means committee and has stated he will funnel more money to his own state of new york. while defending the statement to the new york times, he offered up his opinion as example, using the state of mississippi: “Mississippi gets more than their fair share back in federal money, but who the hell wants to live in Mississippi?”
anyway, i decided to send a message to rep. rangel, voicing my displeasure in his proposed legislation.
To The Honorable Charles B. Rangel
Rep. Rangel,
My name is Jeremiah Wassom. I proudly served in the United States Marine Corps from 1998-2006. I know you served in the Korea War, which is very impressive to me. I have the utmost respect for veterans of WWII, the Korea War, and Vietnam specifically for their extreme hardships and perserverance.
I am contacting you in reference to your proposed legislation on conscription because I believe you truly know how inefficient it would be at stopping future wars. Especially based solely on politicians’ fears of their children’s lives at stake. That alone, by the way, is a horrible reason to enforce conscription upon this nation. Our United States military is superior due to its voluntary service - those who serve WANT to serve, WANT to protect the traditions we protect, WANT to put our lives on the line for America and its inhabitants. A conscription legislation would put people directly on the lines who do not want to be there, who would do an inferior job, and who would, in effect, weaken the harder-than-steel links which make up our armed services.
As we are both veterans of combat, I assume you understand the intense reliance on trusting the members of your squad/platoon/fire team/etc. If I were forced to serve combat-time next to a conscripted person who was not in the correct mindset to effectively serve, I would be placing not only my own life on the line, but also the mission at hand. If you are truly concerned about the many losses of military men and women in Iraq now, your legislation would only increase such losses in future engagements. And, according to CNN, you are proposing this based on the possibility of future armed action in Iran, North Korea, and Iraq. Therefore, you are contradicting the possibility of this legislation actually making any effort at lessening politicians’ desire to put US lives at stake yet again.
Maybe there is some aspect of conscription you have not yet elucidated for the American public, but based upon everything I have seen of what you are proposing, I believe you are making a mistake of your position in politics and it has been many years since you have served. Please, for the sake of our honorable military and the safety of the United States, reconsider this legislation.
Thank you for your time and, most of all, thank you for your prior service in the military.
SEMPER FIDELIS
Cpl. Jeremiah Wassom, USMC
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