FWIW, The Times is a center-right publication that’s somewhat more factually accurate in their reporting than the New York Times is. So it’s kind of a big deal for them to admit that there just isn’t any evidence other than extremely suspicious claims about any widespread, systematic sexual violence.
Not just the poors though. You’d have to cut infrastructure spending, Social Security, Medicaid/Medicare, criminal justice, food and drug administration (you know, the people that make sure food is safe?), everything that makes our country more or less functional. This isn’t something that the 1% would be fine with; it’s more like the .1%, or .01%, because even most of the very wealthy people would end up getting badly fucked by the kind of cuts you would need to have in order to add that many people to the military without instituting oppressive taxes.
I think that saying that the current military budget would triple if there was mandatory conscription is actually being incredibly conservative. If you look at military spending as a percentage of GDP when the US last had something even in the same county as mandatory conscription–World War II–the US was spending over 40% of the GDP on the military.
I can’t imagine most people in the US being okay with that kind of loss of necessary gov’t function combined with insanely high taxes unless the US was also involved in an existential war.
measures to remedy what they see as a “crisis” facing the all-volunteer military.
This is accurate. All branches of the military are having problems meeting their recruiting requirements, because kids in general in the US are no longer fit enough to make it into basic training in the first place. So while there are enough raw people that have the mental aptitude that are trying to get in–but just barely–so many of them are unable to meet the physical requirements that the military lacks the personnel that it needs.
He described the concept as a common “rite of passage,” one that would create a sense of “shared sacrifice” among America’s youth.
Okay, yes. This is potentially correct. However, you’re also going to see a lot of resentment. So perhaps you won’t see the esprit de corps that you might want.
he says leads to “unnecessary delays” and “unwarranted rejections” for some people with disabilities or other conditions who otherwise want to serve.
I was one of those people that might have been an “unwarranted rejection”; I scored quite high on the ASVAB at the time (I think 96th percentile in the mid 90s), but was disqualified because I was on Prozac. Now I would be disqualified because I’m on the autism spectrum. (I was then too, but hadn’t been diagnosed.) I might have done well in the military. I might have hated it. But I never got the chance to find out.
Only 1 percent of the U.S. population serves in the armed forces, Army data shows.
Okay, see, here’s a huge problem. Mandatory military service would mean expanding the military by 100x. Even if you only served 18 months or 2 years as a conscript, that’s an ENORMOUS amount of money that has to be spent by the gov’t feeding, housing, clothing, training, providing healthcare, and paying (since you kinda gotta pay the troops) for so goddamn many people, and that assumes that they entirely cut all post-separation benefits for anyone that is conscripted (e.g., no VA for people that become disabled, no GI Bill, etc.) The infrastructure spending alone for that, and the number of new bases that would need to be built, is staggering. Right now we spend 3.5% of our GDP on the military. Even if we went low-tech for all the soldiers that were conscripted, you could expect to see that number triple, easily. That means that you’re either doing massive deficit spending, cutting everything else that taxes are spent on, or raising taxes by a lot.
Finland, Norway, and Sweden all have mandatory military service, and are notably democratic and socialist compared to the US. Switzerland and Austria as well.
The serious argument about felons being allowed to vote is that voting is a civic duty, and you want felons to re-integrate into society. If they have tons of restrictions following them around for the rest of their lives, they’re always going to be a little bit outside. Feeling like they’re stuck outside of society makes recidivism rates higher, so restoring the right to vote is an important step in rehabilitation.
It would take a lot of people having felony convictions to be able to seriously sway an election, but given the racially polarized way that the criminal justice system is often applied, I think that’s probably happened.
Likely killed by indiscriminate Israeli bombing. They don’t know where hostages are being held, so any bomb could be the one that kills hostages, and they clearly don’t care.
“Taking away the mayor’s law license is meant to discourage lawyers from representing clients like President Donald Trump or anyone else who is willing to take on the prevailing political establishment,” he added.
The majority of attorneys that have represented Trump in his civil and criminal trials have not been disbarred; only the ones that are committing crimes have been. The biggest discouragement to lawyers had been Trump’s unwillingness to pay the legal bills he owes, coupled with Trump’s unwillingness to follow legal counsel.
The bylaws also prohibit going shirtless or in a bikini in areas away from the beach, a ban that was introduced several years ago in Barcelona to little effect as offenders are mainly tourists who fly home without paying the fines.
That’s easy to solve. You confiscate the passport until the fine is paid. Or arrest them and hold them without bond as a flight risk. The last time I got a speeding ticket–about 15 years ago, I think–I was in Ohio, and driving home to Illinois. The cop took my license, and said they’d mail it back once I paid the fine.
Quick edit: I’m not talking about cash bail here; that’s a separate issue. Bond can be refused when a suspect is deemed to be unlikely to show up for court, such as the suspect being a foreign national. This happens regularly, and isn’t particularly controversial. A person that is a citizen and resident of a foreign country is very likely to skip out on criminal penalties, therefore they shouldn’t be permitted to leave without paying their criminal fines.
I go to 2-3 shooting matches every month; I’d go to more, except that ammunition prices are expensive. I talk to people. I’m not some kind of closet leftist; I wear this shit on my sleeve. (Quite literally in the case of some of my morale patches.). I see the stickers, patches, and shirts that other people are wearing, and I hear them talking; their politics are clear. I expect that the next 2-gun match I’m gonna hear a lot of people angry about Trump rule 34.
Going to shooting matches as someone that’s pretty far left on most issues is like being in enemy territory. On the rare occasions that I get to make it to a match that’s mostly populated with people that are on the political left, I feel like I can finally breathe.
Prove it. Just because it is a catchy doesn’t mean it’s true.
You’ve cited the proof yourself. The wealthy have made sure that voting is just as hard as they can possibly make it in areas that aren’t poor, or won’t vote for the interests of the monied class.