Tuesday, October 19, 2004

The Draft - Not Exactly

As I have said before, there will be no draft for this war. Whoever becomes president would not want to risk getting shot by an irate parent or college student.
what will happen, though, among other things, is a slow attempt to pull more people ino the military.
While most people talk about increasing enlistment by offering more generous pay or benefits to soldiers, what no one has yet mentioned (except me, see prediction 3c), is the reduction of benefits to non-soldiers, that is, the reduction of non-military financial aid programs. If all Pell Grants, federal scholarships, aid programs, etc. are cut, and then other federal funding of colleges, tuition will rise and students will have a harder time paying for college. And guess which program will be the only one to be expanded? You guessed it, ROTC.
Not that I mind the idea of cutting federal aid to education, education is not the function of the federal government.
But a move like this, if it does happen as I predicted, would show a great deal of cynicism on the part of the administration (whether it is a Kerry or a Bush administration).
And of course, we'll probably beef up our forces with Kurdish death squads.

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