"R. David Steele" steele.david@verizon(DOT)net/OMEGA wrote in message
...
| | | Yet another political post that has virtually nothing to do
with
| | military aviation.
| | |
| |
| | It is of a political nature. Do you really want the military
| | taking a political position?
| |
| |Back up your bus, Gus. He said absolutely nothing about the *military*
| |involving itself in politics here at home, so you can get off that
horse
| |right now.
| |
| |Given that the military is about
| | 50% republican, 10% libertarian, and only 15% democrat (the other
| | 25% are too young to have made up a political view but tend to be
| | socially conservative), are you really wanting the military to
| | have a larger role in politics?
| |
| |Really? And pray tell where did you get these "statistics"? From Dan
| Rather,
| |maybe?
| |
| |
| | It has been wise to have a wall of separation between the
| | military and politics (much like the separation of church and
| | state).
| |
| |Read your Clauswitz, especially the bit about war being an extension
of
| |what...?
| |
| |Brooks
|
| There are those who do not even want the military voting in that
| they want such a firm wall of separation between the military and
| the policy making.
|
|Bullcrap. Point to anyone claiming the modern servicemember should not be
|allowed to vote. Stop making this crap up.
There was forum at Westpoint dealing with military-sociology.
One of the professors commented that the military should be
prevented from voting. I have the paper somewhere. Many few
that there should be a high wall of separation between military
members and policy makers. Already there is huge barrier for
agencies like the FBI, CIA, SS, and NSA. They are barely able to
vote. Everything else is forbidden for them.
WTF?! The above makes no sense whatsoever. "Many few"??? "Already there is a
huge barrier"??! WHAT barrier? WHO has said those agencies' personnel can't
vote? FYI--you need to go read the civil service guidelines regarding what
is and is not allowed in terms of political activity by *all* federal
workers--it is not a "huge barrier", and no "every thing else" is NOT
forbidden, for cryin' out loud. Where on earth do you get these strange
ideas?
|
| However, the military has become very skewed to the right due to
| the draw down.
|
|Please, provide specific evidence that the "military has become skewed to
|the right due to the drawdown". Have you ever been in the military? Those
of
|us who have recognize that we had a wide range of disparate political
views
|evidenced in the ranks--the basic tendency may have been towards the
|conservative, but that has likely been the case since the volunteer
military
|came into being--not "due to the draw down".
The volunteer army did start the process. The draw down
accelerated. it.
Bull****. You have no idea whatsoever about what you are talking about. What
is the source for this particular gem of alleged knowledge?
|As the military became smaller, mostly the
| conservatives were left.
|
|Balderdash. The drawdown has not been shown to have resulted in any
change
|in the political makeup of the services.
Where is your evidence to the contrary? Can you even find poll results
indicating what the political views of serving military members are? I have
never seen such a poll--if you have, please provide it.
|
|Given your knowledge base, I would
| assume that you have a good handle on the make up of the current
| military. It should be self evident, without an need of
| statistical backup, that those who serve are very socially
| conservative.
|
|Nope. A lot of them are conservatives when it comes to foreign affairs
and
|fiscal matters, etc., but "socially conservative"? I attended an all-male
|military college back in the eighties, where the majority of us leaned
|conservative in many respects--but when Jerry Falwell's kids (i.e., those
|from his pet "university") showed up to visit they got a rather chilly
|reception. You'd be surprised at the number of military personnel who
|support the right of an individual to choose abortion versus having the
|government make that determination. Stop bandying about these claims of
|yours that you think don't need any statistical backing--they do, since
they
|have little basis in actual fact.
That is a libertarian position, not liberal-progressive which has
a hatred of the military and is strongly pacifist.
Answer the challenge and provide something more reputable than your strange
assertions to back your thesis--what do you have that indicates that "those
who serve are social conservatives"? Nothing, that's what--because it is
merely your opinion, and not a FACT. There is a difference between the two,
you know?
|Military service is even more distasteful those
| who are rebellious as the military (since Desert Storm) has
| become very intolerant (Navy the least so) of alcohol abuse and
| other social disorders. Most of the liberals in society thus
| find that military service is too confiding and requires too high
| a level of self discipline for their tastes.
|
|What?! You ever been to an O-Club located on a post situated in a dry
|county? I have, and let me tell you, it was a swingin' place. You think
the
|military is now made up of a bunch of teetotalers?! The fact that the
|military does not tolerate alcohol *abuse*, specifically as it regards
|driving or work performance, is nothing new--at Ft Knox in the mid/late
|eighties, a DUI for an officer yielded a guaranteed trip to the post CG's
|office--that does not mean that either were "conservative". Liberals
don't
|like drunk drivers, either.
Still libertarian
???!
|
| As for Clauswitz, that is at a very broad level far above what
| the typical enlisted or officer would deal with. Or do you want
| the military setting policy of your local school board?
|
|LOL! You are getting further afield... This started as your attempt to
take
|a poster to task for remarking upon the election process and the fact
that
|the President is indeed the C-in-C, and you have continually tried to
draw
|it into some kind of weird military-as-threat-to-civil-rule or
|military-is-synonymous-with-John-Birch-Society diatribe. Get a clue, and
dig
|up those statistics if you want your inane ravings to stick.
There are no statistics as no one has done a real study.
So you are talking out of your ass--no big surprise there.
I know,
I have looked at almost all the military-sociology studies out
there. But with over 20 years of military service, what I have
seen is that the military has shifted. I do not see many fellow
democrats in the ranks these days. Most democrats, especially
the academics, are heavily into pacifism and have a very anti
military attitude.
You are taking a very, very small data set and attributing it to the
whole--bad idea, and worse logic. I commanded a company of troops and would
have been surprised if anywhere near even *half* of them had voted for Bush
Sr over Dukakis in '88; most would have classified themselves as democrats.
That does NOT mean I can take that sample and declare that the majority of
the military are left-handed liberals--just as you can't do the opposite.
Dig up some real supporting evidence.
Here is an example. Note that the author points out that the
military is skewed to the right but that no one really knows by
how much.
Whoopie. You cite an article that acknowledges there is no statistical
database from which to assert which way military voters will swing, much
less support the assertion you have made that virtually ALL of them are
republican voting, social conservatives; the author of that article is at
least one step ahead of you, since he at least recognizes that trying to
definitely classify the military is therefore a lost cause. Then he goes on
to try and use the veterans' poll results to declare that they are a viable
method of ascertaining how current troops would likely vote--but that falls
flat when you consider that a lot of folks adjust their political beliefs
over time, and there is likely a goodly portion of YOUNG troops who will
vote the same way a lot of YOUNG civilians vote (i.e., stronger tendency to
lean leftwards). So in the end your cite is not doing much to support your
assertions.
Brooks
Military vote puzzles experts
Neither pollsters nor candidates can be sure just how active-duty
personnel will vote.
By Esther Schrader
Los Angeles Times
September 19, 2004
WASHINGTON -- Kevin Dellicker stays away from politics when he
reports for duty at the National Guard armory in Harrisburg, Pa.
But out of uniform, the captain in the Pennsylvania National
Guard does everything he can to persuade the people he served
with in Iraq to re-elect President Bush.
Shaking some of the same hands is Jonathan Soltz, a former Army
captain recently returned from Iraq. He pleads with soldiers to
vote for Sen. John Kerry.
In the swing state of Pennsylvania, where both live, the votes of
those in the military -- including more than 15,000 reservists --
who are serving or have served in Iraq or Afghanistan are much in
demand.
But which way the people fighting the war will vote in
Pennsylvania and elsewhere is anybody's guess.
Tight restrictions on seeking the votes of active-duty military
personnel, along with taboos in the military culture against the
open expression of political views, make it tough for candidates
to target military voters -- and make it tough for pollsters to
figure them out.
Historically, military turnout in elections has been low.
With more than 400,000 troops overseas now, many living in
difficult and dangerous conditions, it is not clear whether those
who want to vote this fall will be able. A Pentagon initiative
meant to make it easier for troops to cast absentee ballots via
the Internet and by fax is under fire as vulnerable to tampering.
That has left the Bush and Kerry campaigns working the edges of a
potential voting bloc that could be significant in a tight
election.
"It's very hard to get a read on how the active-duty personnel
are reacting to the war politically, because they are so busy
reacting on the ground," Soltz said. "So what I do, I talk to my
friends, tell them to e-mail their friends about Kerry.
"I talk to people like me who are out of the service now. I'm not
going to go give a speech to a group of soldiers. It's not the
thing they want to hear while they're just trying to keep their
lives together."
Political activity in the military is -- like much else --
strictly regulated.
Troops are not prohibited from expressing political opinions, but
they are not allowed to work for partisan political organizations
while in the military. Campaigning is prohibited at military
facilities, and the rules for conducting polls among active-duty
troops are so cumbersome that pollsters have generally given up.
"As a society, we rely on the apolitical loyalties and
professionalism of the military -- we entrust them with
capabilities that we don't give anyone else -- and in exchange
for that we demand total political neutrality from them," said
Peter Feaver, a professor of political science at Duke
University.
More is known about how veterans lean politically: Polls show
they tend to vote Republican.
Because of that, it has long been presumed that the active
military also leans Republican.
A poll by Army Times of its readers last December found that more
supported the administration than did not. But the magazine's
poll did not ask respondents for whom they would vote.
Its pollsters acknowledged that its readers tend to be older
career soldiers, rather than enlisted personnel, 35 percent of
whom are black or Hispanic -- groups that among civilians tend to
vote Democratic.
This year, both presidential campaigns have infused their efforts
with military imagery, and the experiences of Bush and Kerry
during the Vietnam War are under scrutiny.
A parade of retired generals gave endorsements at the Democratic
and Republican conventions. Kerry opened his speech with a jaunty
salute. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have regularly
visited military bases, and Kerry meets with veterans, reservists
and military families almost everywhere he goes.
Elizabeth Edwards, the wife of Democratic vice presidential
nominee John Edwards, parlays her background as the daughter of a
career soldier into chats with military families.
"The political appeals to this broad category of people somehow
associated with the military has not been this overt in decades,"
said Carroll Doherty of the Pew Research Center for the People
and the Press. "But of the leanings of active-duty military, the
people in the fight, the candidates are as stumped as the
pollsters."
http://www.indystar.com/articles/3/179886-4633-010.html
---
"If ye love wealth better than liberty ... servitude better than ...
freedom,
go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsel or your arms ... May
your
chains set lightly upon you. May posterity forget that ye were our
countrymen."
- Samuel Adams