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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bread Upon The Water who wrote (130925)	2/16/2010 7:30:08 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 542239

We just disagree about the methodology to do this. Pretty much. Not sure that the word, "just," fits in there. I suspect that we have an entirely different perspective on how to do it. But agreeing on the goal is something to cheer. You think, apparently, it has to be a voluntary participation otherwise it won't/can't work (money aside that is). I'm not suggesting voluntary participation although voluntary participation is certainly better than forced participation. I'm not suggesting participation at all, not in any government service program. If people want to offer their service to the community or directly to their fellows, there are lots and lots of opportunities to do that. Where there aren't canned opportunities that suit, the individual can create his own. We encourage them in various ways to do so. I don't see how UNS, particularly military service, gets us to our common goal. A century ago there were big wars that required lots of cannon fodder and we had drafts to supply it. A product of that was a sense of sacrifice and contribution, which was valued by society because it was of real value because there was a real threat. You can't replicate that in this century. It was great serendipity at the time but that was then and this is now. I can understand nostalgia for it but it was a confluence of events that can't be manufactured. If we want to change our attitude, we have to make up our minds to change our attitude. Probably that won't happen short of hitting bottom. As we're sliding toward bottom, politicians will continue to aid and abet the slide by responding to those whose expectations aren't being met. We will have to flat run out of the ability to print more money before that will stop. We would hit bottom if we threw a boatload of money at a mandatory military service program. Ironically, it's more likely that such a program would help by getting us to bankruptcy sooner and forcing us to reflect on how we got there, not by creating a value of sacrifice that restores us.