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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JBTFD who wrote (521350)	1/8/2004 4:38:12 PM
From: Bill	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

What does that have to do with Bush having the support of 95% of the military? For cripesakes, they'd have to offer those guys $100K to re-enlist under Clinton!

To: JBTFD who wrote (521350)	1/8/2004 4:57:54 PM
From: Thomas A Watson	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

duhhhhhh, America is the land of the free and of opportunity and the military is competing with a robust growing economy. ONLY 10k The President is far more popular that I thought. Today my child was promoted to Captain.

To: JBTFD who wrote (521350)	1/8/2004 5:05:17 PM
From: Kenneth V. McNutt	Respond to of 769667

<< Is that why they are giving $10,000 bonuses to those willing to re-enlist? Because they are so happy with the status quo?>> Re-enlistment bonuses have been offered for at lest 50 years. Nothing new. These bonuses are offered to those with badly needed(at all times) highly skilled Military Occupational Specialties(MOS) to compensate for the higher wages they could demand on the "outside". You will see(in the Air Force)an enlisted man with up to nine stripes on his uniform. They were referred to as Super Grades if my memory serves. It is a lot less expensive to offer bonuses for retention than training a new enlistee which can take years as many of these specialties require at least a college degree or equivalent education. Unfortunately, many of these highly trained men and women left the services during the Clinton administration as the wages, bonuses and re-enlistment offers failed to keep up with the private sector offers. Although Congress, many years ago, passed a law to reduce the out flow of skilled military personnel by making their wages and benefits on parity with their civilian counterparts with similar skills the Clinton adminstration paid little attention to the law and allowed the parity to descend to a minus 13% between the two groups, the largest disparity since the law was passed. He partially balanced the budget on the backs of the military many of whom were on welfare and food stamps during Clinton's tenure. Ken PS Many Naval and Air Force Flight Officers(pilots) also left the sevice as the budgets were so tight they could not get in enough flying time for lack of fuel to maintain their skills and spent most their time sitting around or doing the interminable paper work. Not a life for a high flying "A" type fighter pilot, Air Force or Navy.