The Draft: Rangel's Rightful Humiliation

Put that in your pipe and smoke it.


October 7, 2004 -- Not that it's likely to stop the Democrats from spreading rumors to the contrary, but the House of Representatives ?- by an overwhelming bipartisan vote ?- has put the lie to any claim that the military draft is coming back.
The House, voting 402-2, rejected Rep. Charles Rangel's bill to reinstate the draft, which was suspended in 1973. The legislation would have required all men and women ages 18 to 26 to perform two years of military or civilian service.

Rangel himself voted "no," albeit bitterly, calling it all "a prostitution of the legislative process."

How so? Well, he said: "All we hear on the Internet and around the country is that after the election they" ?- meaning the Bush administration ?- "are going to have the draft."

The problem here is that it's Rangel who actually wants to bring back the draft ?- though not because he thinks it would aid America's armed forces.

He thinks it will undercut support for robust actions in the War on Terror.

Which is just how Charlie Rangel would like it.

What he's saying, despicably, is that the president and Congress have no concern about war casualties ?- as long as other people's children are doing the fighting.

But the fact remains that Kerry-Edwards surrogates like Max Cleland and Howard Dean are going around the country stating flatly that President Bush has a "secret plan" to bring back the draft.

Even though no one in the administration favors reinstating the draft.

No one in the Pentagon wants it, either: Modern weaponry and tactics are too complex for untutored conscripts.

No wonder the Rangel bill had attracted only 14 co-sponsors.

Now the issue has been put rest.

Plain and simple: The only person in Washington who wants to see the draft restored is Charlie Rangel.

But not enough actually to vote for his own bill. Hypocrite.