Hornet’s Nest
Cartoonist Ruben Bolling brings us the adventures of Li’l George.
{ Daily Archives }
April 14th, 2007
Point and Click
With the army stretched the the breaking point, wrecked by the War in Iraq, people are starting to talk once again about reinstating the draft.
I used to be utterly opposed to the military draft. Now I’m not so sure.
In the current war, only a fraction of the American public — the all-volunteer military and their families — have a life-and-death interest in what happens in Iraq. They bear the burden for all of us. George W. Bush tells the rest of America to “go shopping.”
Bush treats the military like a remote control, casually pointing and clicking. Does the all-volunteer military encourage our political leaders to use other people’s lives recklessly? Or is the problem Mr. Bush himself?
Mark Shields, on the PBS NewsHour on Friday:
George Wilson, who’s a wonderful military journalist, did a book called … The Infantryman. It was a landmark book. And he interviews a man in there, Colonel Steve Siegfried, combat veteran of Vietnam. And he made the argument that, in a time of war, extended war — this is four years — that the country had to have a draft.
And Steve Siegfried said this: Armies don’t fight wars. Countries fight wars. And if a country isn’t willing to fight a war, it should never send an army.
It’s a debate worth having.
Tsk! Shocking!
Via animation fan site Cartoon Brew, here’s a hilarious and, yes, deeply offensive parody of an animation fan site. (Warning: I’m not kidding about “offensive.”)