Rangel continues to claim troops are unpatriotic
From yesterday evening on Fox News (via Hot Air):
I want to make it abundantly clear: if there’s anyone who believes that these youngsters want to fight, as the Pentagon and some generals have said, you can just forget about it. No young, bright individual wants to fight just because of a bonus and just because of educational benefits. And most all of them come from communities of very, very high unemployment. If a young fella has an option of having a decent career or joining the army to fight in Iraq, you can bet your life that he would not be in Iraq.
A few folks were willing to give him a pass the last time. Not me, and I knew he'd repeat it sooner or later. To Charlie, our troops are greedy and/or desperate mercenaries who lack the civic spirit to join the military for altruistic reasons.
And we get some insight as to why he feels this way: "...as I did when I was 18 years old". Since the only reason Charlie joined was to escape his own poor neighborhood, that must be why everyone else joins. Very sad.
Maybe the lack of opportunity was what drove him to seek public office as well. You know, 'cause nobody would submit to being interviewed on Fox News if they had a decent career.
I don't like how Rangel doesn't think troops can actually think fighting in Iraq is a good thing, but let's give his argument a little more credit before we assert that he said our troops are greedy. He didn't actually say that, after all. He implied they have no other option.
The argument Rangel is using goes like this:
1. (Premise) We don't have equality of opportunity in this society.
2. (Conclusion) Therefore, people have to join the military, which is the closest one can get to a stable career that provides.
You're not going to like hearing this, because there's a lot of right-wing economic data that says the economy is good, and that there are jobs to be had merely if one wants them. To which I say, hahahahahaha.
Seriously, ask anyone in the 50's or 60's what the labor market was like then versus now. And if you say, "well, that's because those times were more prosperous because of our preeminence over the world," you're ignoring the question of values, and how they define a middle class.
Look at jobs nowadays, and how they cater to our want to be mobile. Starbucks is considered one of the best employers in the country - they pay $7 an hour, usually, starting. But people want to be able to pick up a job and drop it and move elsewhere if they want. You can't have a middle class if people aren't willing to settle. To want to be mobile is to be constantly gambling for fame and fortune - we seem to be doing this without knowing it.
We took our position of unparalled wealth and power, and used it to say we could have even greater freedoms than stable families or a home in the suburbs or going to church. The wealth and power is still there, but oriented towards different goals.
Look, just because Rangel is wrong doesn't mean we should take the low road and say that there's nothing true in what he's saying. We are desperate for stability. But we don't know where stability lies; we only know how to shout at each other, claiming the other doesn't understand where freedom lies. I'm suggesting that Rangel's initial point about equality and there being a lack of options is more correct than we want to think, because the hardest thing isn't having options, but actually being able to see them, and have others think such a goal is worthwhile.