Ramblings by the Cat

[alfsauve]

I'm a big Heinlein fan and always thought a couple of years of service should be mandatory for everyone when they reach adulthood.

So I got around to reading the book.   Heinlein was against mandatory service.  I think the whole idea was only those who willingly served their country were eligible to vote.   Making it mandatory defeats the selection process of finding those "socially responsible" enough to be entrusted with full voting citizenship.

[m25operator]

WOW ,  yesterday I made a vague Heinlein reference that some picked up on, and now he is all over the place.  VERY COOL.

LONG LIVE LAZARUS LONG, AND FARNHAMS FREEHOLD!!!

[Rastus]

WOW ,  yesterday I made a vague Heinlein reference that some picked up on, and now he is all over the place.  VERY COOL.

LONG LIVE LAZARUS LONG, AND FARNHAMS FREEHOLD!!!

Farnhams Freehold....it's been 35 years.  I doubt I still have the book.  Was that the one where people were isolated and didn't want contact with anyone...or was that the one where an altered person was stranded with others on a planet and had to make a go of it before they were ready...  Neither?

[Solus]

Novels featuring Lazarus include:

    * Methuselah's Children (1941)
    * Time Enough for Love (1973)
    * The Number of the Beast (1980)
    * The Cat Who Walks Through Walls (1985)
    * To Sail Beyond the Sunset (1987)

[TSB]

Ramblings....

There is much more to consider for an ALL volunteer military as we have today.  People who serve today, serve for many reasons but in todays climate they are enlisting knowing there is a pretty good chance they will end up in the middle east.  That says to me that these men and women are Patriots.  Remember Pat Tillman?

The draft is flawed and mandatory service is not the answer for a country as large and diverse as the United States.  It works for Israel because it's about the size of Massachusetts!  If they reinstitute the draft, make it for everyone and offer NO expemtions for college kids, Senators kids, women, homosexuals, religion, NOTHING.....

If we are ever attacked by big drooling bugs, spitting acid based saliva and space Herpes, than we can call the "Starship Troopers", otherwise leave it alone and let the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force and the Coasties do what they do best!

Our military is recruiting at record levels, the Marine Corp has nearly met their recruitment goals set for 2012 and will probably exceed that goal next year.  Remember, it's about the only job left that still has a pension!  One thing that Obama has already learned, it's a shitty world out there and the streets of Chicago are a cakewalk compared to the decisions he'll be making in the all too near future.  If he abandons the military as Clinton did, he will never see another term!

[Sponsor]

[tombogan03884]

A few comments, First, I might be misunderstanding two separate lines here but, MANDATORY SERVICE, in the context of "Starship Troopers" service was only MANDATORY if you wished to become a full citizen and vote, if not you could skip it, as apparently many did, and remain a non voting "taxpayer".
Universal conscription of all able bodied Males. was pretty much universal in Europe prior to 1914, when a young man hit a certain age (18-21 depending on country) he served roughly 2 years (again it varied by country) then remained in the reserves for several years. This was how the European nations were able to field armies of well over 1 million troops in less than a month, (Aug 1914) While it was the Rail system that actually put them on their nations borders, it was conscription and the reserve system that supplied the numbers of trained and equipped troops.

"If we are ever attacked by big drooling bugs, spitting acid based saliva and space Herpes, than we can call the "Starship Troopers", otherwise leave it alone and let the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force and the Coasties do what they do best!"

If you read the book carefully the "Starship Troopers " were the space going Marines, that's why they were transported by the "Space Navy", at one point there is a "historical" reference to the "Wet Navy".


 "If he abandons the military as Clinton did, he will never see another term!"

I don't know why that would make any difference, people had the example of carter's abuse of the military and still elected Clinton, for that matter, they had the examples of our lack of preparedness prior to the Spanish American war, WWI, WWII, and Korea, but they still elect a$$holes who want to cut defense spending.

[Big Frank]

If After Osama Obama abandons the military like Clinton did, he'll probably be re-elected like Clinton was.

2-3 months of basic training would straighten out a lot of the snot-nosed teenagers that the country is full of today. I still think 2 years of mandatory service with NO exception for anyone, for any reason, would be a good thing. They don't need them on active duty? FINE, put them in the reserves instead. No free country can maintain a large standing army. Only monarchies and dictatorships, etc. can do that. If, God forbid, we need to mobilize a large force then we have the manpower to do it and they've already been trained.

In The Cat Who Walks Through Walls how was the kitten able to walk through walls?
He wasn't old enough to have learned that he couldn't.

[m25operator]

For Rastus, Farnhams Freehold is about a father and his grown up children who are together when TSHTF, nuclear strike and they all go down into the shelter he built for just such an event, He has food, water, radio's, arms and ammo, after the dust settles they go out to see whats, what and wind up in a fairy tale. In the beginning he is being told how stupid his plan was.

Any one seen " Blast from the past " now that's a shelter

[tombogan03884]

Haven't read that one. Need to check the library.

[Ocin]

and remain a non voting "taxpayer".

"No taxation without representation"

Wasn't that the credo that started the American Revolution?