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Acquaint yourself with the strawman fallacy GunnyL, because the above bolded sentences litter your entire response. You are cheating GunnyL. That's what you are doing when you employ this fallacy. It's a weapon the incapabale employ to hoodwink the proper rules of debate.
The Straw Man fallacy is committed when a person simply ignores a person's actual position and substitutes a distorted, exaggerated or misrepresented version of that position. This sort of "reasoning" has the following pattern:
1. Person A has position X.
2. Person B presents position Y (which is a distorted version of X).
3. Person B attacks position Y.
4. Therefore X is false/incorrect/flawed.
This sort of "reasoning" is fallacious because attacking a distorted version of a position simply does not constitute an attack on the position itself. One might as well expect an attack on a poor drawing of a person to hurt the person.
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html
Yes. An unqualified success.
There's no need for a draft.
In 1991, we has a much larger miliraty over a significantly lower population base. The only reason the military isnt that large now is because Congress hasn't authorized it.
Correction ... the only reason the military isn't that large now is because Congress CUT it ....
That's not true. It's because the military can't recruit enough people to fight Bush's war.
It is very true and your partisan blather makes it no less so. We were actually supposed to start manpower cuts prior to the First Gulf War, but they were held in abeyance until its conclusion.
All four sevices went so far as to buy people out at 15 years to make the cuts. If your MOS was obsolete and not compatible for retraining in another, you were bought out. The hangers-on over 20 were forced to retire.
Bush had NOTHING to do with it. Congress approved the drawdown during Reagan's last term. Don't presume to tell me you know more about something I lived through and affected my life with nothing more to support it than some bullshit Bush bash.
Actually, cuts are still occuring. For example:
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0208/022708cdpm2.htm
Cuts ahve been going on for some time but it doesn't make big news for some reason.
It's a shell game. They hire civilians to do non-critical jobs in place of the military personnel cut; which, in the longrun costs them MORE money, and puts a ridiculous strain on the military personnel.
Civilians don't do overtime. Guess who sucks it up? Civilians are not covered by the continuing resolution. Guess who sucks it up when they're sent home?
Civilians don't deploy .... etc
The services also add more reserves to try an meet mission requirements should an actual war arise.
I certainly don't get the way the military manpower is being handled with a two-front war going on. Congress must be busy investigating steroids.
Correct.It is very true and your partisan blather makes it no less so. We were actually supposed to start manpower cuts prior to the First Gulf War, but they were held in abeyance until its conclusion.
Correct.
If Congress were to authorize a force level comparable to 1991, we'd have that force level w/o a draft.
I need no strawman argument to get over on you. You don't know what you're talking about and I do. Pretty-damned simple, really.
You're just talking in circles now, trying to deflect your way out of an argument you obviously lost from the beginning, due mostly to your ignorance to the topic you're attempting to discuss.
If you didn't need it, then why did you employ it?
The Army is going to have be maintained and expanded one way or another. And it could probably be done cheaper and more efficient with a draft as opposed to the current model: if the same stresses of maintainance and buildup were applied.
Listen, this is not my opinion. Rather it is that of the GAO which blasted the way in which the war is being fought. The GAO, not me, concluded the current structure is rife with corruption, waste and mismanagment due to what the GAO said was a lack of government control and transparency.
( Another way of saying the current more 'private' model is terribly ineffective and actually a liability to the war effort)
Again, one hand we have GunnyL - an internet posters opinion, and on the other we have the conclusions of the GAO.
Plus, it is a real lesson in responsibility for the actions we as a nation make.
I didn't. Yo can't argue the topic so you attempt to deflect by questioning the method by which I posted; which, is irrelevant.
You don't know shit, and you have repeatedly proven it, and had your ass pwned at every turn in this thread. I'd think you'd be tired of the beating.
If you didn't need it, then why did you employ it?
The Army is going to have be maintained and expanded one way or another. And it could probably be done cheaper and more efficient with a draft as opposed to the current model: if the same stresses of maintainance and buildup were applied.
Listen, this is not my opinion. Rather it is that of the GAO which blasted the way in which the war is being fought. The GAO, not me, concluded the current structure is rife with corruption, waste and mismanagment due to what the GAO said was a lack of government control and transparency.
( Another way of saying the current more 'private' model is terribly ineffective and actually a liability to the war effort)
Again, one hand we have GunnyL - an internet posters opinion, and on the other we have the conclusions of the GAO.
Plus, it is a real lesson in responsibility for the actions we as a nation make.
...
The idea is further detached from reality by the fact that, under Bush or McCain administrations, a draft doesnt have a prayer. Under an Obama or Clinton administration, presumably it becomes unnecessary as they rapidly pull us out of Iraq and theoretically eliminate the need for a larger military.
But these people take themselves seriously, so it is only right we should consider their proposals with all the seriousness they deserve. There is after all a serious underlying problem, even if it isnt the problem they are trying to address.
What do we do about an overstressed military? Their rhetoric aside, it is becoming increasingly clear that neither Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton actually plan to pull out of Iraq with quite the rapidity theyve suggested. As great a campaign selling point as abrupt abandonment is, they may privately realize how disastrous a pell-mell pulling up of stakes would be. John McCain, more realistically, expects us to be in Iraq for up to a century, much as weve been in Germany, Japan and Korea for more than a half century now. All of that means we need troops.
...
There could be a quick and easy fix to all of that. It does require compromise, a little give and take. Sometimes the best answer is something that gives everyone a little of what they want. The draft could do it.
This would not be your grandfathers draft, though. Were talking about a draft that will bring the country together, not rip it apart.
Draft opponents note that we currently have the best military in the world. A highly professional, highly trained, high-tech volunteer force. The world has never seen anything like it. The last thing we want to do is bog it down with a bunch of reluctant whiny short-timers. The draft will have to be engineered to prevent the cure from killing the patient.
So heres the deal. First off, no exemptions. At 18, its off to the draft. If youre not physically fit for military service, then its off to the Work Corps. More on that later. For now, suffice it to say that jobs can be found for all. Those mentally unfit for military service to include those who dont want to be in the military also go to the Work Corps, where appropriate tasks will be found for all.
Military draftees will serve two years. They will be limited to non-combat roles. They could help eliminate a lot of those Halliburton contracts that drive everyone crazy by performing the same cleanup, truck driving, and hash-slinging positions at or below minimum wage.
Those who do want serve their nation in combat may volunteer to do so, which will make them eligible for higher rates of pay, enlistment bonuses, and enhanced GI Bill benefits. They can in fact get the only kind of deferment this system offers, with scholarships in advance, by committing to military service upon completing college. In the case of some selected professions doctors, nurses, engineers, accountants, various useful specialties individuals can commit to four years of post-graduate government service and also enjoy government scholarships.
Women, presently barred from combat arms, can also enlist for the full range of opportunities and benefits they now enjoy in the military, some of which of course do include combat. Our military, in its key functions, can remain the highly trained, highly motivated professional force it has become in the 35 years since Vietnam.
While there may be some tensions in a two-tiered military, those professional soldiers can provide an inspiration for the draftees that may in fact encourage many of them to properly enlist and better their lot. With non-combat roles making up the bulk of any military, a draft of this sort could allow vast expansion. It will also restore the common national experience that an older generation remembers fondly, when everyone was a part of the same thing, and everyone did their bit.
Which brings us to the Work Corps.
Note the negative work connotation. This name may sound a little harsh and unappealing, particularly to those unacquainted with labor. It is intended to.
...
Yes, you did. And I wish I could respond to "You can't argue the topic so you attempt to deflect by questioning the method", as I have no clue what the hell you mean by 'questioning the method.' Perhaps, you could be more specific and explain yourself properly.
Another thing. What is it with posters thinking there is anything to "win" or "lose" via this message board? Are you trying to show me how big your penis is?
By the way, I noticed you completely avoided the topic with the usual I have nothing of substance to contribute so I'll just lazily type the "You don't know shit," or the "had your ass pwned," responses.
The GAO has loads to say about the Military and the way it is being run. The report is in the public record.
The GAO has far more authority than you or I on the subject.
I suggest you zip your pants up. Take a break from showing the board how big your doodle is, and begin reading authoritative studies authored by people with prestigious credentials.
The GAO is a bunch of uptight, bureaucratic asshats that get paid to find problems. It is about as unbiased as you are.
I suggest you go down to the nearest Armed Forces Career Center and enlist in the Marine Corps. After you have about 8 years in, you just might have a clue as to what's going on. Until then I suggest you apply the maxim "it's better to keep your mouth shut and let people wonder whether or not you are an idiot than to open your mouth and prove you are."
On the "Desperate for a Win" front: I am not the one deflecting all over the place and grasping at straws. That would be you.
But DO ramble on. In this case there is nothing I can say or do that could possibly make you look any more ignorant, petty and pigheaded than you are doing for yourself.
The GAO is a bunch of uptight, bureaucratic asshats that get paid to find problems.
This is getting to be a bizarre pattern with you.
You cannot respond directly, or with substance. That much is now apparently clear.
Your only recourse remains to offer insults and innuendo directed at whoever the unlucky target is (in this case the GAO) of your cheap verbal attacks.
What's really ironic is that you admit the GAO gets paid to find problems. The weird thing is, you say it as if thats a bad thing.
Well yea, that's their job Einstein. Thats why they exist.
They are an accounting office - a non-partisan one.
Offer some substance or shut your mouth.
You brought no substance to this discussion....the "substance" you brought was a bag full of dog turds that had nothing to do with your accusation that the military was doing a bad job. You made a claim, and then backed it up with information about a completely different subject that had nothing to do with military decisions or them doing their job.
I wish I could respond.
However, I don't know what the hell this garbage post has to do with the original thread topic.
If you're going to make an accusation you better damn well reference out the specific points of contention.
Because right now all I see if an intentional move to make broad references. It's almost as if you don't even believe what you're saying, since you're so damn lazy to actually spell it out with specific references to these "alleged" you actually used the word "dog turd."
You are one bizarre internet personality.
