I think people should wait to have kids until they can afford them.
Interestingly, I recently talked to a guardsman who was deployed last year. He’s back to his regular job, working in the IT field for the State of Michigan. I asked if the state held his job open (yes) and whether they paid the salary difference (some companies do this for activated guard employees). He said that due to the nature of his job and the additional pay he earned for the risks, he was making better money while he was deployed. I was surprised–I thought that was unusual. Perhaps it is.
I agree with Zebra’s point–helping out the military family means, to me, mowing the lawn, babysitting, taking over dinner occasionally. I do have a lot of questions about military pay, and would generally support it being more generous, but I don’t think that has much to do with what Bush was exhorting citizens to do.
Let’s look at the question from an institutional POV, rather than from the POV of what you’d expect of individual servicepersons.
Our volunteer force isn’t going to be composed largely of single 18-20 year olds, and that’s by design. They want lots of re-upping, because (a) a well-trained, experienced force is a more efective force, one that will take fewer casualties in wartime (like now); and (b) it reduces the recruiting load. So the folks who are running this show know that they’re going to be bringing in kids out of HS, and they’re going to try to encourage all those kids (except for the occasional bad apple) to stay with the service as long as possible. So they know they’re going to have 18 year old unmarried kids turning into 21 year old married men and women, turning into 23 year old parents, because that’s what people do as they get older: they get married and have kids. And in the demographics the military recruits heavily from (i.e. no college education), these changes are going to happen more rapidly than in the civilian pop as a whole.
So the military should be expecting that their enlisted men and women are going to be married with children by the time they’ve been in the service a few years. Accordingly, the compensation (however that’s designed) ought to suffice for that.
I gotta agree with you on this one - I was investigated by the Office of Special Investigations for an off-base drug bust that involved some of my friends. I faced an article 15 because I wouldn’t give out their names and what sorts of things they did for fun. I consulted a military lawyer and was told in no uncertain terms that I did not have the right to remain silent, did not have the right to silence to protect myself from self-incrimination unless I declined the article 15 and requested a courts martial, and further had to tell the investigator exactly what he wanted to know. I talked, and was thankful I didn’t know anything that hurt any of my friends.
You had a rather bad lawyer then, Gomi.
I agree. The UCMJ does not supersede the Constitution, although there can be limits put on stuff like speech and assembly. You do always have the right to remain silent. In fact, Article 31 says exactly that:
It’s the military equivalent to the 5th Amendment and works in conjunction with it.
I think some non-military folks in this thread a failing to distinguish between Non-judicial punishment persuant to Art. 15 of the UCMJ and a Courts Martial. For the former you may be required to incriminate yourself, if you choose not to accept the non-judicial punishment and maintain your silence, you go to a Courts Martial and may invoke your right against self-incrimination. So no **monty ** his lawyer may not have been that bad.
As the poster above just showed, nobody may be required to incriminate himself.
Monty, you are wrong. If you want to avoid a full court martial your commanding officer may require you to make a full confession. Granted if they then decide to proceed to a court martial anyway then that confession may not be introduced into evidence at the court martial. But for purposes of Art. 15, it may be required and used.
So while you may not be required to incriminate yourself, if you refuse to make a confession you may loose the opportunity to proceed under Art. 15.
Actually, Airman and I are right and you are refusing to acknowledge the evidence presented to you. The investigation occurs first and then the decision is made whether to dispose of the case via NJP or Court-martial. In no event can someone be required to incriminate himself.
Get back to us after you actually read that particular chapter of law.
You are NEVER required to take an Article 15. Never. If you know that you’re innocent you may proceed to an Article 32 investigation where you will be cleared. You may not like your circumstances in the meantime, but I’m sure no innocent man likes jail in the civilian world, either.
An Article 15 is, in loose terms, a plea bargain. An Article 32 is a grand jury investigation. The military justice system is just like the civilian justice system.
Unless one is in the Navy or the Marine Corps and is assigned to a vessel. In that case, one is required to accept the NJP. There are only two good things about that, IMHO: (1) it’s not a court conviction, and (2) one may appeal the punishment but not the decision.
Yeah, Robin just reminded me of that. Oops.
Airman, I never suggested that anyone was required to accept an Art. 15. But if you reject it and Proceed to an Art. 32 investigation and it determines that charges are warranted then the case proceeds to court martial. I have never seen an Art. 15 offered subsequent to an Art. 32 investigation.
Monty, my comments were directed at your statement about Gomi’s lawyer. If an Art. 15 was offered in lieu of court martial and Gomi wanted to accept rather than risk a full blown court martial then his lawyers advice may not have been that bad.
No one can force acceptance Art. 15. But it is often prefered to a court martial where the consequences ore significantly greater.
I did not mean to start a pissing match so [/hijack]
That’s because the investigation precedes the decision of how to dispose of the charges. The investigating officer recommends to the commanding officer (1) NJP, (2) court-martial (and possibly at what level), or (3) drop the case.
If the lawyer advised his client that said client does not have the right against self-incrimination, said lawyer is worthless as a lawyer.
Well, there are those Sailors and Marines embarked on vessels who are required to submit to NJP, but other than that, yes, when offered, the accused may decline NJP and demand trial by court-martial.
Fair enough.
just to finish off this hijack…
I should say that the lawyer did tell me I could avoid incriminating myself if I was in a courts martial, but not when fighting an article 15.
I should tell the whole story. This is not a sea story - this happened to me directly in 1992 on Spangdahlem Air Force Base, Germany.
A group of us hung around together (about 10 of us). Some of them went to a party off-base, and a smaller number of them were doing acid without the knowledge of any others. The guy who sold them the acid was earlier busted by OSI with a kilo of pot he was trying to smuggle back from Amsterdam (he was pretty stupid). The rest of us a) didn’t know that the few were doing acid, and b) didn’t know the guy smuggling the pot. An OSI agent was at the party and busted right away those doing the acid. Pot Smuggler guy tried to incriminate all of us (he knew most of the group even if he wasn’t friends with most of us) to reduce his sentence, so we all got investigated, even the ones not there that night. Since it was a serious charge (potentially facing a prison term), I sought legal advice, as well as the others, and were all told that we had no right to silence, no right to protect ourselves from self-incrimination unless it went to a courts martial, and had to give evidence against our friends if we had any. We were further told that if the investigator found us “uncooperative” we would face an Article 15. So I cooperated (easy because I didn’t know anything) and was found to have no involvement (easy because I didn’t have any involvement) but the onus was on me to prove my innocence, not the other way around.
I also know that a lot of free expression rights guaranteed to civilians, such as wearing of religious medals or yarmulkas or rights of free expression as military members are specifically prohibited from some public statements.
So the statement that military members have different rights than civilians is right on.
So, you’re saying the lawyer advised you of things contrary to what the UCMJ actually provides. That shows you had a poor lawyer.
I’m glad for you that you didn’t get creamed for stuff that you had no knowledge of and thus weren’t participating in.