Not to mention the Designated Hitler rule …

That too.

I don’t see the problem here. Hitler liked children and dogs: could he have been so bad?

Would this be the Mickey Mao Club?

Are these people really shitting their shorts about everything, or just pretending to shit their shorts about everything?

The sky is falling! also.

Weren’t these idiots constantly up in arms whenever we made a Hitler reference about Bush?

I guess Godwin Violations are okay if you’re conservative…

(OT: Hey Gavin, do you think you could give the Calvin and Hobbes strip featured in this post some appropriate Photoshopping? Kthx.)

Oooh! Uniformz!! I love a boy man in a uniform!

And we all know who’s going to design those, don’t we now? Hmmm?

Oooh! Uniformz!!

Will there be hats?

Of course, Alex Jones is a completely dependable source of information.

Great hyperventilating comments section at that link, with wall-to-wall exclamation points.

i bought those military manuals and i’m gonna use them!!

Look out, America!

Hitler Youth Bill deserves to be more than a supporting character and if you ask me, he should appear in his own graphic novel.

i bought those military manuals and i’m gonna use them!!

I knew those Paladin Press gift certificates would come in handy someday!

PeeJ,

These guys have got you covered.

Ov cose dere vill be hats! Hyu don’ run an army viddout nize hats! Wot are hyu, schtupid?

While the wingnuts may have gone hyper, there is truth to their allegations here. Rahm Emanual and then-head of the DNC wrote a whole book about mandating youth service 2 yrs ago — I heard Emanuel defend it on C-Span.

Not. Good.

Oh, they’re just trying to Pol us a Pot.

This is very concerning. We frogs join all you concerned republicans.
the frogs | Homepage | 03.27.09 – 6:23 pm | #

The thing about compulsory mandatory volunteerism for absolutely every post-pubescent is that it would apply to politicians’ kids and, you know, the Texas Air National Guard isn’t that big.

I prefer the old pic of GP. The one that shows him looking into the Ark of the Covenant.

BWAHAHAHA

Inflate that tire, bitch or there will be armed feds at your door.

During last year’s presidential campaign, Republicans mocked then-candidate Obama for suggesting that proper tire inflation would reduce the need for oil and should be part of an energy-conservation plan. But now the suggestion is becoming a regulation in California.

Oooh! Uniformz!!

Yes, uniforms.

compulsory mandatory volunteerism

Calling George Orwell; George, you there?

Don’t worry, Mona.

I’m sure you’ll look great in your brand new brown and black uni.

Oooh! Uninformz!!
You missed a letter.

This is the book where Rham and Bruce Reed declare that everyone from age 18-26 owes 2 years of involuntary servitude to the govt., wherever it wishes to deploy them.

Sincerely, I had no idea so many liberals would look benignly on such a porposal.

Yeah, Mona, Obama’s totally revving up those ovens for you. And he killed Vince Foster!

The Israelis have mandatory service. Don’t these people love Israel?

Scott et al, don’t be asshats — that oven shit is what I expect from the right. The fact remains, that Rahm Emanuel is strongly in favor of coerced govt service for those between 18-26. This is not a wingnut fantasy.

The Israelis have mandatory service. Don’t these people love Israel?

Well, that’s where it gets confusing. Don’t forget that there’s this whole anti-semite wing of the nut brigade. Seriously, I don’t know why there aren’t more stories about rightie’s heads asploding.

Scott et al, don’t be asshats

…said the libertarian, and we laughed and laughed.

The Israelis have mandatory service.

I am not an Israeli, and do not wish to be one. Conscription in time of a war like WWII is a hard enough constitutional issue. Institutionalizing it, uh, no.

I thought the people here were liberals/leftists?!

personally, I think mandatory national service for everyone between the ages of 18 and 26 is a fine idea. i can get behind rahm on this one.

If any of these people ever had a problem with the draft, I must’ve missed it.

Rahm et al can be for mandatory conscription until they’re blue in the face, doesn’t mean it’s likely to happen. Sounds like more Paulian conspiracy theory crap than imminent policy.

I agree. We should let the liberals try to bring back the draft. While also trying to fix the economy. And overhaul health care. I always loved a nice slapstick.

I thought the people here were liberals/leftists?!

And you thought this was a good thing, or a bad thing, as a libertarian?

And now you find that what you think we should think is not all that, so your opinion is different in what way?

*Spock voice* Most illogical.

Rahm Emanual and then-head of the DNC wrote a whole book about mandating youth service 2 yrs ago…

Absolutely! This is NO JOKE!!!!!!!!!

And DON”T FORGET Bill Ayres’ MASTERPLAN for MANDATORY Weather Underground Preschool Gulag Indoctrination Centers where TODDLERS will have hallucinogen-soaked MIND-CONTROL CHIPS inserted in their PINEAL GLANDS by former Khmer Rouge folk-singer CADRES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Not to mention the concealed X-RAY GUNS that Joe the Plumber was designing for Barney Franks’ WEINERMOBILE!!!!!!!

(I’m still working on getting the stuttering caps-lock effect down.)

But seriously, is that the real Mona or is that just D.N. Nation imitating Mona?

Me:I thought the people here were liberals/leftists?!

You: And you thought this was a good thing, or a bad thing, as a libertarian?

In my experience, liberals/leftists and left-libertarians such as myself were nearly congruent on civil liberties.

To learn that so many here think the federal govt may/should coerce young adults into government-directed labor is really a surprise.

Gateway Pundit is epic stupid. Probably the worst in the wingnutosphere.

Rahm Emanual and then-head of the DNC wrote a whole book about mandating youth service 2 yrs ago

You may want to reevaluate what “whole book” means and then find some toilet paper. Or reverse the order of those two things.

Hey, give Mona a break, she is not a doctrinaire liber-ninny, & you might be able to have a conversation w/ her.

But Mona, we’re mostly mockers here (I damn well am, & shouldn’t presume to speak for other mooks) (also troll infestation has made all edgy) so a statement like that is going to result in a pile on.

For what it’s worth, I think a draft would be an excellent thing to keep the Yankee pig-dog appetite for (generally one-sided) war every five or so yrs. a bit more under check. And make it less likely that a (semi-)professional military would employ weapons on Americans that would make all the keep “the gov’t. honest by being armed” weasels into literal jelly.

The Frenchies used to require two yrs. service, whether in the military or swabbing bedpans, other public good things, etc., if you were a C. O.

And then there’s Rep. Mark Foley’s body of work mandating youth service….

Hey, try the veal!

Rahm Emanuel’s book enthusiasm notwithstanding, I see almost zero likelihood of a conscripted volunteerism for youth unless it’s in the context of exchanging voluntary service for scholarship funds, etc. That’s why I don’t much care about it. It’s more empty communitarianism bullshit.

LIBERALS, I’M CONCERNED ABOUT ALL THIS COERCION. CAN’T WE SIMPLY CHOOSE THAT A IS A?

Hey, give Mona a break, she is not a doctrinaire liber-ninny, & you might be able to have a conversation w/ her.

She’s been a combination of ninny and scold here before sticking up for her a-guy-at-the-government-did-something-bad-therefore-government-doesn’t-work fool John Stossel.

If only we could outsource all goobermint functions to the likes of Halliburton, and take off all the restrictions on free market capitalism and let Wall Street do what it does best, then the sky is not even a limit anymore, baybee!
~

…I see almost zero likelihood of a conscripted volunteerism for youth unless it’s in the context of exchanging voluntary service for scholarship funds, etc. That’s why I don’t much care about it….

Exactly.

My interest here is not HR 1388, which I’m pretty sure don’t mean shit. Instead, my interest is in watching the paranoid right go into spittle-flinging freakout overdrive over mundane proposals or offhand comments, which they do on a daily basis.

She’s been a combination of ninny and scold here before sticking up for her a-guy-at-the-government-did-something-bad-therefore-government-doesn’t-work fool John Stossel.

Yes, I have defended John Stossel a time or two, but that has not been the bulk of my contributions. I’m truly sorry you regard me as otherwise a “ninny and scold.” If people of not quite the same ideology cannot exchange views reasonably, then left blogs may as well be run by Karl Rove.

then left blogs may as well be run by Karl Rove.

Nice little bit of passive-aggression there.

BTW, as far as I can tell, there is no Section 6104 in that House bill. In fact, the word “mandatory” appears exactly twice:

‘(3) YOUTH ENGAGEMENT ZONE PROGRAM- The term ‘youth engagement zone program’ means a service learning program in which members of an eligible partnership described in paragraph (4) collaborate to provide coordinated school-based or community-based service learning opportunities, to address a specific community challenge, for an increasing percentage of out-of-school youth and secondary school students served by local educational agencies where–

‘(A) not less than 90 percent of the students participate in service-learning activities as part of the program; or

‘(B) service-learning is a mandatory part of the curriculum in all of the secondary schools served by the local educational agency.

(Note, this definition of “Youth Engagement Zone Program” is what GP – and the dolts he cribbed from – read as a mandate for all secondary school curricula to include service-learning.)

The other use of the word “mandatory”:

‘(a) Prohibited Activities- A participant in an approved national service position under this subtitle may not engage in the following activities:
[…]
‘(7) Engaging in religious instruction, conducting worship services, providing instruction as part of a program that includes mandatory religious instruction or worship, constructing or operating facilities devoted to religious instruction or worship, maintaining facilities primarily or inherently devoted to religious instruction or worship, or engaging in any form of religious proselytization.

There you have it. Unless those sneaky Congresspeople hid it as an acrostic reading down the section headings or something, I’m thinking this must be tinfoil hat territory for the bedwetters.

Why should liberals be against requiring public service as part of citizenship? Peacetime military conscription showed that involuntary service isn’t unconstitutional (and that was in support of a standing army, which some libertarians might consider unconstitutional or at least counter to the Founders’ intentions). If liberals support tax supported education (they do) and tax supported public safety (they do) and tax supported sanitation (they do), why wouldn’t they support national service in pursuit of a better America? This is hardly a new idea. During the 60’s many of us who opposed the military draft argued that conscription should offer alternatives to those who felt the war was morally wrong.

This is yet another example of wingnuts hating our country. And wanting someone else to do the work.

Dan Someone beat me to it. (Damn my pokey DSL!) Neither “Section 120” nor “Section 6104” exists in this bill, and the only references to “mandatory” are precisely as he quoted them. The first one describes a kind of LOCAL, ALREADY EXISTING program that can be funded under the bill, and the second one, of course, talks about “mandatory religious instruction” as something prohibited under the new federal program.

It never ceases to amaze me how these assholes just make shit up and hope no one will notice.

Yes Simba B. If one commenter said this about you: Yeah, Mona, Obama’s totally revving up those ovens for you. And he killed Vince Foster

And another said this:
She’s been a combination of ninny and scold here before sticking up for her a-guy-at-the-government-did-something-bad-therefore-government-doesn’t-work fool John Stossel.

It’s is just “passive-aggression” to call it Rove-like.[eyes rolling]

It’s is just “passive-aggression” to call it Rove-like.[eyes rolling]

I’m sorry I hurt your feelings, Hitler.

I could totally go for some ninny-scolding right about now.

If people of not quite the same ideology cannot exchange views reasonably…

You do understand, do you not, that the core purpose of this website is to exchange poop jokes?

Mona is probably here to try to pick up gay men. She’s funny that way.

Ov cose dere vill be hats! Hyu don’ run an army viddout nize hats! Wot are hyu, schtupid?

I zee vhot hyu dit dere! Lonk liff ze Heterodynes!

Don’t be so mean to Mona, she serves a higher porpoise.

And we’re all just following orders, you know.

Also, we’ll be just as bad as Karl Rove when a Governor is sent to jail on our orders after extensive judge-shopping, more than a handful of US Attorneys are fired for not indulging in right-wing political purge with enough enthusiasm, and when the country is lied into a war based on deliberately skewed intelligence. Then there will be the torture, the sending persons overseas to be tortured, the signing statements saying we’ll break the law ’cause we’re the Decider.

Until then, Mona, when the pea under your ten mattresses keeps you awake at night worrying about the Liberal SadlyNazis, we’re just goiing to keep mocking your concerns.
~

Ok folks, Q & A time.

http://www.govtrack.us/users/questions.xpd?topic=bill:h111-1388

That link leads to a gold mine of stupidity.

Are there penalties for NOT volunteering? My sons plan on joining the military and are going to ROTC. Will this count as “volunterism” or will there be an additional burden placed on their time?

What will this do for religious volunteer services? If the government ends up effectively requiring volunteerism, wouldn’t the establishment clause be construed to preclude recognizing religious institutions as fulfilling governmental requirements? Could this potentially make religion socially irrelevant, and could that even be the intention?

My question: All of my information comes from a millionaire paid millions to frighten me. Are there any other parts of this bill that can be twisted for use by that millionaire? Hasn’t shown up yet.

If people of not quite the same ideology cannot exchange views reasonably, then left blogs may as well be run by Karl Rove.

That is EXACTLY who I would choose as an example of someone who’d run a left blog.

Jeez, and I thought lefties could get paranoid…

Sincerely, I had no idea so many liberals would look benignly on such a porposal.

Porposal? I thought they were dolphins.

Either Karl Rove or David Schultz.

who knows, with scarey shit like forced service for young people, America could soon become just like other frighteningly oppressive nations….

Like Israel.

“Service-learning programs” as a mandatory part of the secondary school curriculum? Is this anything like the “Good Citizenship” programs we had when I was a kid back in the 50s and 60s? Where we went out and picked up trash along the river and in the public park? Or repainted the community rec center? Or spent time helping take care of indigent old folks at the county hospital? Kinda like what we did in the Boys Scouts?

Yeah. I can see how the wingnutz would equate that with the Hitler Youth.

Like Israel.

Or South Korea!

Is this anything like the “Good Citizenship” programs we had when I was a kid back in the 50s and 60s?

No, they are death camps for Cheeto-devouring patriots.

No, they are death camps for Cheeto-devouring patriots.

Or death cabs for cutie.

Or South Korea

or Norway

So if I read Dan Someone at 3:22 correctly, there shall be an optional scheme whereby certain parties collaborate to provide a “school-based or community-based service learning opportunities, to address a specific community challenge”.
— Such a scheme shall be called a ‘youth engagement zone program’.
— It applies if service-learning is part of the curriculum (and is pursued by at least 90% of students).

IS THAT ALL??!!
Now in my day, a compulsory youth brainwashing scheme actually MEANT SOMETHING.

Nobody seems to have noticed, so I feel it’s my duty to point this out. An awful lot of red-staters have been seen lately in a BLUE snuggie. I think they may be trying to infiltrate.

It’s probably a good bet that if I was involved in a “youth service program” as a teen I wouldn’t have spent so much time and energy smokin’ dope and listening to Sabbath so loud. Just sayin’.

(“smokin”, of course, is a euphemism for “selling and partaking”)

I was reinvesting the profits. Capitalism rocks!

I think a draft and mandatory service would be a great idea (with generous exemptions for alternate service). I’d prefer a military that reflected the entire county and not just the poorest and wingnuttest portions. With an all-volunteer military there is a much greater danger that it will start to see itself as special and somehow above civilian leadership. That is never healthy for a democratic government. Make the military into a reflection of society as a whole and it will see itself as part of that society. Make it separate from society as a whole and it will see itself as separate, and as better. The founding fathers were deeply suspicious or a professional standing military but at the same time, some existing defense structure is needed. the question then becomes how best to deal with the conflict between the need to make a civilian democratic government strong and to still have a professional military. I think the current system is the wrong way to go.

There is also a question of justice. How, as a liberal, can I justify basing the defense of society as a whole with a structure built at leas tin part on taking advantage of the poorest members of that society who may chose the military because it’s the only good opportunity left to them? Should not the wealthier families of society also share in that burden in some way besides paying taxes?

Of course there would need to be trade-off in exchange for those 2 years, probably free college or other training. Serve 2 years in the military (or alternate service) and get your choice of 3-4 years of college or equivalent technical training…..

and for those who are wondering, I am beyond draft age and yes, I considered joining the military when I was 18. (I had some notion about flying helicopters) I even took some aptitude test the recruiters gave in my high school. However, I flunked the eye part of the exam. Without my glasses I was (and still am) legally blind. I served my country, but as a civilian employee, for 14 years.

Jeez, and I thought lefties could get paranoid…

Oh, they can – the Right has no monopoly on crouched-under-the-desk gibbering. Try the comment sections at Democratic Underground (and, on a really good night, Firedoglake).

Mandatory homework without just compensation is slavery/fascism!! I propose a general strike by all schoolkids against the tyranny of mandatory homework. also, Wolverines!

A libertarian is someone willing to rationally and carefully freak out about right-wing kook theories.

Two years of military service were mandatory for 18 year olds up until, I think, the all-volunteer army. I remember all they guys going directly from high school into the army when I was (so much) younger. Many democratic countries have required service, but certainly don’t call it “volunteering”. I think it’s a great idea, but everybody should get a few bucks while doing it, like in the military.

It certainly grows a boy up, as I recall my own female excitement at seeing the big muscles on the guys who came back from service. This was just before Viet Nam, of course, when everything turned sour and guys came back angry or crazy, so the muscle-up wasn’t as appealing.

Mona should get a grip and talk to some sensible (I suggest Greenwald).

Mona should get a grip and talk to some sensible (I suggest Greenwald).

Yeah? He’s a friend of mine. We talk on fone, do email, and have had dinner together. He does not find me “not sensible,” a point I make only because you recommend the benefits I would ostensibly derive from exchanges with him .

Yeah? He’s a friend of mine. We talk on fone, do email, and have had dinner together. He does not find me “not sensible,” a point I make only because you recommend the benefits I would ostensibly derive from exchanges with him .

Then why do you come around blathering about the horrors you find on teh web logs of the demonstrably infirm? I mean I get you’re into the glibertarian thing, but (i) frothing about things that are not happening detracts from the message, and (ii) the existence of too many adults means your dream will never happen anyway. Sensible–perhaps a new dictionary?

No, they are death fat camps for Cheeto-devouring patriots.

Now, that’s something that’d terrify them!

Hell, a two-year stint of paid national service (as is the case in most *GASP* European countries) would be a great idea. Hell, give every 18-20 year old EMT/disaster-relief training, a taste of military training, and a variety of conservation/maintenance tasks, and the whole country would benefit. Such a program would reduce regional rivalries/preconceptions, and provide some important life skills to teh y00ts of the nation, and would probably be a source of lasting friendships and fond memories for the participants.

I mean I get you’re into the glibertarian thing,

Except, of course, I’m not into it, and employ the term “glibertarian” about as it is used here. Do catch up.

National service program? I imagine it would be well-regulated… national service, sounds vaguely familiar… I wonder why the wingnuts are in such a tizzy over this. I mean, have they read the Bill of Rights?

Hell, a two-year stint of paid national service (as is the case in most *GASP* European countries) would be a great idea.

Yes, some complete govt control of a young adult’s life is a great goal; but I’m “Hitler.” And a “glibertarian.” And laughable. And Rham Emanuel’s notion’s of taking liberty from adults, why, to object is to be no better or intelligent than Gateway Pundit.

Got it.

Yes, some complete govt control of a young adult’s life is a great goal

Toilet paper: a wise investment.

Yes, some complete govt control of a young adult’s life is a great goal

It’s clear Mona’s never been anywhere near a military base.

It’s clear Mona’s never been anywhere near a military base

What is clear is that you lack all understanding of voluntary submission to a necessarily hierarchical and authoritarian internal system. Coerced service of adults in the military on an ongoing basis, or wherever else Big Brother would send them for “universal service,” is, you know, like, different.

Gateway Pundit is a moron and widely known to be so. But what Rahm Emanuel and Bruce Reed propose is closer to being subject to the actual criticism GP makes.

But what Rahm Emanuel and Bruce Reed propose is closer to being subject to the actual criticism GP makes.

Thank you, for demonstrating point (i) above, what about the paranoid delusions and flapping about things that aren’t happening.

Just because your manner is calm and collected, and appears superficially intelligent, doesn’t mean you’re not as much a bedwetter as the regular targets here. You just have command of the English language, is all.

Thank you, for demonstrating point (i) above, what about the paranoid delusions and flapping about things that aren’t happening.

But which would happen if Obama’s Chief of Staff had his way. How very paranoid of me, especially given that more than a few in this thread approve of Emanuel/Reed’s proposal.
Just because your manner is calm and collected,

Thank you.

…and appears superficially intelligent, doesn’t mean you’re not as much a bedwetter as the regular targets here.

Yes, concern for all civil liberties constitutes classic “bedwetting.”

You just have command of the English language, is all.

Again, thank you.

Saying that you are the one of the most tolerable libertarians most of us are aware of is not really a compliment, but I understand you have to take what you can get. You’re basically a libertarian without Asperger’s. Nonetheless, take the uncomfortably weird dweeb stereotype out of the picture and it’s still a juvenile ideology.

Oh, and les, about this:

Then why do you come around blathering about the horrors you find on teh web logs of the demonstrably infirm?

My point is about a book written by several prominent Democratic principals, not some nutjob blogger. Emanuel (is he “infirm?”) was interviewed about it on C-Span, and vigorously defended national, universal service as advocated in his book.

You’re basically a libertarian without Asperger’s

Very fucking cute. My youngest son has Asperger’s, and it is not a term to flippantly toss around — you have no idea what it is like to deal with that.

you have no idea what it is like to deal with that.

What is it the kids say these days? Oh yes, fail. I believe you have failed. Thanks for playing, better luck next time.

Just so we are agreed, Simba. Aspeger’s is a hell of an effing joke.