The return of the Draft and Us

[larryepke]

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/11/03/draft/

http://www.defendamerica.mil/articles/sss092203.html

The first link above is to a Salon article concerning the return of the military draft. The second is a link to the Department of Defense Selective Service System request that people join their local draft boards.

So my question is: should we as progressives join the Draft Boards? I'm well over the age where I'm draft eligible, so my thoughts go like this:

As a Draft Board member, I could perhaps get more people from my area deferred, exempted and postponed from service. What if I decided to vote to keep EVERYONE who asked out of the Army? Perhaps if I were successful in getting a number of them out, more eligibles would at least request hearings.

The ripple effect, I suppose, is that those who aren’t resourceful enough would get drafted, but what if I were successful enough that SSS decided to ask for fewer people in my area? They'd likely ask for more people elsewhere, but perhaps the Draft Boards in other places we think, “Why are we sending our people to fight when Southern Cook County Illinois gets more of theirs off?” They might be more inclined to defer and exempt their people, and the ideal result would be a clogging of the system, more disenchantment with the Draft, and perhaps the thing would die again.

I've used the first person throughout this, but obviously no one person could cause these things to happen. Yet if enough people who don't support the Draft as a concept joined the Draft Boards, couldn't this happen?

Any responses?

[diamond14]

1. if you saved ONE life, it would be worth joining a DRAFT board...

obviously, the draft-aged young men are doing nothing to save their own life/limbs...but perhaps a few older people would help them by sitting on DRAFT boards...

I remain saddened that today's young draft-aged young men are not protesting the WAR, not even voting, doing little to protect themselves...they are certainly going like sheep to the Iraqnam meat-grinder...wonder how many even bothered to object to bush* $87 Billion explosive WAR expansion, by emailing their Congressional representatives?

[RummyTheDummy]

2. I signed up online for the information packet or whatever they send.

And I intend to follow through with it and try to get appointed if at all possible.

[Howardx]

3. me too

n/t

[dflprincess]

5. I signed up for the packet too

You think any of us will make it on to a draft board - I imagine if they do any background checks and figure out our politics we'll never make it.

[JackSwift]

4. You could only draft the

children of people who support the war and defer everyone else. Wouldn't that be a hoot?