That’s Right Nate

John Wayne and George Takei from the classic The Green Berets

First, allow me to say that I was never fortunate to serve in the armed forces.   I was unfortunate to be born to an upper middle class household with a family business that needed looking after.  I knew that the best way to serve my country was by continuing to prosper was to expand the family business so that I could hire more Americans hypothetically, that could even include returning veterans.   I thrilled to reports of the US military in action in Grenada, Panama, and the Middle East, but I always knew that I would never be lucky enough to serve myself.

Much of what I have learned about the horror and glory of war, I’ve learned from war movies.    I don’t there is anything like experiencing the sheer terror of those brave men on the US Arizona who were victims of a surprise attack on December 7th, 1941 except perhaps watching the stunning computer generated effects of Michael Bay’s classic Pearl Harbor movie.   I may never have got the chance to be slapped in the face by Patton, but there was always George C. Scott to teach me what it would have been like.

One thing that separates good war movies from great war movies is the hard fighting men and in some cases women of the film.   When you add a gay soldier to the plot, the movie becomes moralistic and preachy.   Inside of a fierce fighting force, we’re left with an army that’s more concerned with feelings and emotions than with killing and conquering.  It seems that some in Congress think that this is a good idea for our armed forces.  I must ask, have they ever seen a war movie?

In the classic film The Green Berets, John Wayne says, “Out here due process is a bullet.”  That’s what the military is all about.  It’s not pretty, but the actors of Green Beret got it.   There simply isn’t the time in war for the niceties of civil rights.

McCain's program for mandatory service wouldn't be unlike Americorps. Althout participants would be armed and sent to foreign hot spots.

Yesterday at a Town Hall in New Mexico John McCain was taking questions when a woman said to him, “If we don’t reenact the draft, I don’t think we will have anybody to chase bin Laden through the gates of Hell.”  McCain responded by tell her, “Ma’am let me say that I don’t disagree with anything you’ve said.”

Naturally, the left jumped all over that saying that McCain wants to start a draft.  I have no idea how they even came up with such a preposterous notion from what was said.  What John McCain meant is that he was in favor of a youth service plan.  What John McCain would like is a national service program not unlike Americorps, but with guns.  Students would gain a world of useful experiences following college by spending a few years helping in places like Russia, Syria, Iran, or North Korea.  They would meet with locals and be able to use that time to help decide what their future would be like.  This is not the same as a draft by a long shot.

Sure the left will twist this around to say that McCain wants a draft.  Afterall he’s been talking about using military force in 7 different countries around the world over the next 4 years, but there is a big difference between mandatory armed service to your country and a draft.

Yesterday on Fox News, Fred Barnes encouraged John McCain to go after Barack Obama on gays in the military.  It is sad that the campaign has been reduced to this when everybody knows that gays do not belong in the military in the first place.  There is no constitutional right to serve in the military.  Being able to serve multiple tours of duty in Iraq or Afghanistan is above all a priviledge.  As a priviledge, the government has the right to deny it to anybody they want to.  The grand adventure of being a soldier is reserved for those patriotic young men (and now women) who uphold American standards of morality and decency.  When the insurgents attack and a soldier finds himself surrounded by heavily armed militants do you think he wants to see a homosexual with a gun next to him?  Of course not, he’d rather be there alone.

If we were to open the military up to homosexuals they would take jobs away from heterosexual troops.  The homosexuals would naturally stand out at inspections where their uniform would be impeccably neat compared to the heterosexual soldier next to him.  Their barracks would not only be ship shape, but decorated as well.  Straight soldiers would not be able to compete with this and would not be able to ascend to leadership positions.    By all means, let’s put the facts out there and lets see how many people support Obama’s position.

I am happy to see that the United States is not one of the 111 nations that signed onto the cluster bomb treaty today.  While many of our allies in NATO gave into pressure, forward thinking countries including the US, Russia, China, Pakistan, and Israel did not.

“This is a treaty drafted largely by countries which do not fight wars,” said John Pike, a defense analyst and director of GlobalSecurity.org. “Treaties like this make me want to barf. It’s so irrelevant. Completely feel-good,” he said. 

What these vomit inducing peacenicks don’t get is that cluster bombs blow stuff up good.  They complain about the large dispersal area of unexploded bombs that later go off and kill civilians.  Well boo hoo.  Maybe Junior shouldn’t be playing on a battlefield.  What’s the point of fighting a war without explosions

Pike said if other countries insist on shells, rockets and bombs that contain no more than nine submunitions each, the military logic would be inescapable.  “It would just mean I’m going to have to shoot more of them!” he said with a laugh.

John McCain hit Barrack Obama today with two things Obama can’t touch–McCain’s service in the military and his personal recollections of Pearl Harbor.  I applaud McCain for pointing out that while her clearly remembers the cowardly Japanese attack, Obama wasn’t born for another 20 years.  However, I must disagree with McCain’s point about military service.

While Obama was too young for Vietnam there is no doubt that the US could have used him in their invasion of Grenada when we were called to defend our medical students from a Communist revolution.  However, unlike Bush who served courageously in Alabama during Vietnam and McCain, many proud Americans like myself, Dick Cheney, and Rush Limbaugh earned our Purple Hearts not on the battlefield, but in the culture war.

Furthermore, honorable military service doesn’t make one a great American or a great President.  George McGovern earned the Distinguished Flying Cross and Jimmy Carter is the only Anapolis graduate to become President.  Meanwhile Ronald Reagan had no military background.  I’ll tell you which one I would have wanted next to me in a Foxhole.

The real issue though is the GI Bill which Obama voted for today and McCain voted against.  What Obama doesn’t get is if we make life outside the military attractive, who is going to want to reinlist.  As McCain said “At a time when the United States military is fighting in two wars, and as we finally are beginning the long overdue and very urgent necessity of increasing the size of the Army and Marine Corps, one study estimates that Senator Webb’s bill will reduce retention rates by 16%.”   We had better make life outside the military as unpleasant sounding as possible if we are going to retain the soldiers we need.  It wouldn’t hurt to publicize the poor VA medical care or the high rate of suicides among veterans either.

They’re dammed if they do and dammed if they don’t.  The Lie-berals love to criticize the military for the cost of the war in Iraq.  The price tag is a little over $510,000,000,000 though I hardly think you can put a price on freedom.  Still the loony left loves to attack this as wasteful spending.

The Pentagon then tries to find ways to make fighting cheaper.  They get some 23 year olds and have them supply Afghanistan with weapons.  They buy airplane parts from companies owned by the leaders of Warren Jeffs’ polygomous church and in both cases they’re harshly criticized.  However, this week Hillary Clinton hit a new low.

Now Hillary is criticizing the Pentagon because they outsourced smart bomb technology to China.  She points out that the Magnequench Factory in Valparaiso, Indiana is closed and the smart bomb guidance systems are now manufactured in China.  Well excuse me Hillary, but if you haven’t been paying attention outsourcing is good for America.  What’s more we do it with pet food, toys, and a whole bunch of other things. Why not our bombs?  It isn’t like China’s our enemy or anything.