This one's from someone who signs his message "Greg"…
Bill Maher is silly, is not that clever, and in the past has had some flat out offensive things to say. I hope he keeps revealing himself.
We don't go to war, or not go to war based on whether it's popular or not.
We don't have a draft. This president will not have a draft. I'll even predict (or be glad to make a wager!) that the the next administration won't have a draft, either.
Your friend — the one that didn't value the lives of certain people? He had, I'm sure you'd agree, an uncommonly stupid point of view. No one I know that supports what we're doing in the Middle East sees things that way. If anyone does see things that way, that kind of opinion is so ridiculous we shouldn't allow them into the discussion.
Our all-volunteer force has faced shortages before, and we'll be able to deal with it again.
We're going to be in Iraq for years to come, and I hope all of our troops do their jobs over there as best as they can.
This is not the kind of thing that people can really debate but I do find Bill Maher (generally) clever. I don't know which things he's said that you found offensive but I don't think it's possible these days to say anything of substance about important topics without offending someone. Some of the things for which he's been blasted were, I thought, unpleasant to hear but true. Which is not to say I agree with everything the guy says…but you'd be a pretty sorry topical comedian if you never get anyone upset. Either that or you're Mark Russell.
No, we don't enter into a war based on popularity polls but the will of the American people is never irrelevant to the workings of government, nor is it unrelated to the conduct of a war. If and when it's perceived that extending the war in Iraq will cause an elected official to not get re-elected, something will change.
Barring some unexpected world crisis, I don't think we're going to see the draft reinstated…but I suspect we are going to see a number of programs and laws that will pressure young men and women into military service. A friend of mine has been predicting that the Bush administration will soon invoke "ways to raise taxes that they can argue are not technically tax increases." I hope that's not so, and I hope we're not about to see ways they can press people into military service that they can argue do not constitute a draft. But I have the fear we are. We're already seeing soldiers having their tours of duty extended beyond what was planned, even if it keeps them in Iraq past the date they were scheduled to leave the Army. It's not exactly a draft but it is a move towards involuntary service. (Come to think of it, I wonder if the shortfall in recruiting has something to do with that. If I were thinking of signing up, the fact that they can just suddenly extend my tour of duty would make me think twice.)
I agree that we'll probably be able to increase volunteerism and I hope we do it, at least in part, by paying soldiers better, giving them better medical care, etc. It always struck me that we could improve our military by making some very minor cuts in what we spend for hardware (or even just trimming military pork) and diverting that money to the people who actually fly the planes, drive the tanks and so on. Someday, if I get a moment here, I'll tell the story of how, many moons ago, I expressed this view at a political seminar and it prompted an outburst of near-apoplexy on the part of Bob Dornan, who was one of the panelists.
Anyway, you're right: We're going to be in Iraq a long time. I'm pretty confident our troops will do the best job they possibly can. Wish I was as confident about the people giving them their marching orders.