Isn’t it customary after every war for the president to give such amnesty?
Heavens to Betsy, there’s a world of difference in the way that Milliken gave his arguments and the ranting styles of Koch and Zell Miller. Old Zell looked like a raving maniac at the convention and his heckling of Kerry crossed way over the lines of decency. Milliken was more like- “here’s what we Republicans used to stand for and here’s where the neocons are going” .
Didn’t President Ford start the ball rolling with a partial amesty?
Yes he did. But it wasn’t an unconditional amnesty.
Draft dodgers in foreign countries had to present themselves and reaffirm their allegiance to the United States. All of them, domestic and foreign, were required to work in public service jobs for two years to earn their amnesty.
This is positively draconian compared to what Carter later offered, and it still angered many Americans, especially veterans.
BTW, deserters actually were required under this proposal to serve on active duty in the same military branch they deserted for two years to earn their amnesty.
You can see why so many of them waited until Carter gave them a better deal. I think society would have been better served, though, by having these individuals earn it rather than have it granted with no repercussions.
Unless one thinks, as I do, that the Viet Nam war was dishonorable and illegitimate, and the proper response of a patriot would be to resist such a war. Your insistence on penance presuumes a wrong committed, a point I, and many like me, are not willing to concede.
Try and remember, Moto: we were right.
And it had nothing to do with the fact that Nixon’s crime was authorizing and then covering up an illegal break-in of his rival party’s headquarters in order to rifle through their files to give himself a little edge in the upcoming election, as opposed to Clinton lying under oath (not necessarily perjury…that’s still debatable) in a trial that would never have come to be if the Republican Noise Machine hadn’t been trying desperately to find something, ANYTHING, to pin on him since the day he accepted the Democratic nomination in 1992. Not everyone liked Nixon, but I seriously doubt than ANYBODY hated him as much as the Congressional Republicans hated Clinton.
Anyone who thinks that the Clinton impeachment was not a wholly political act, motivated by personal antipathy toward the man, should note that the investigation began with a major land deal with rumors behind it of inappropriate handling by the Clintons (which would have made a major legitimate scandal), then when nothing could be found there was expanded to include, apparently, every human being the man ever came in contact with. The fact that one of those trial balloons (so to speak) led to him lying about a completely private act with no connection to his power as president doesn’t make him equal to Nixon.
Has the United States EVER been in the right when it came to war?
Were it anyone else, Bricker, I wouldn’t need to pose the question: are you seriously expecting a response, or is this an empty rhetorical device, intended to demean your political opposition at no risk?
Protest was certainly an available and legal option. Desertion from the military or failing to appear when drafted were then, and remain today, crimes.
I don’t have much respect for people who took such drastic steps. Sorry.
Were you? I’ve met some boat people in my day who would disagree.
I’m genuinely curious as to your views. Was the US on the side of the angels in the Spanish-American War? WWI? WWII? Korea? I’d like to know if you take the position - as some do - that war is inherently wrong.
Moto, I’m apparently experiencing the opposite path that you are. I’m also a Republican, but I’m one who’s becoming increasingly disillusioned with his party. I consider myself a moderate Republican (part of a dying breed). I’m one of the people who’d like to believe the Republican party stands for things like sound economic policy, minimizing government interference in private lives, and a strong national defense. But nationally, the Republican party seems to be increasingly taken over by people who only pay lip service to these principles.
Both parties have become addicted to government spending (and admittedly most voters who ask for a decrease in government spending really mean they want the government to spend less on other people). But the Democrats can at least assume the mantle of honesty on this issue; they’re willing to pay for the spending they want. “Tax and spend” may be a lousy economic policy, but it’s a lot better than “spend and borrow”.
The Republicans are increasingly willing to allow the religious right to enact their personal beliefs into the lawbooks. I’d like to see the Republicans embracing the principle that the government has no business legislating morality and that liberty means letting people make their own choices.
On national defense, the end of the Cold War means we need to learn how to fight different kinds of enemies. Terrorism cannot be effectively fought without genuine international co-operation. The United States is strong enough that we can get away with ignoring world opinion, but that’s no reason to scorn world opinion. Anything action we take unilaterally would be stronger if we were working with allies. And we’d be wise once in a while to adopt a little humility and consider the possibility that we might occasionally be wrong about an issue and another nation might be right.
On the specific issue of war, supporting the troops should mean more than waving a flag and sticking a ribbon on your bumper. If we’re going to send American troops into combat we should commit the resources to protect them and let them win. The current war in Iraq is being run on the cheap for political reasons.
But I think the thing that I’ve become most disillusioned with in my party is the growing attitude that the only important thing is winning. Too many people seem to believe that power, not principles, are what’s important. Winning the election is proof that you were right and the other guy was wrong, regardless of what means were used to achieve that victory. This very thread seems to be based on the premise that Bush’s victory was proof that the Democrats were too “weak” or “stupid” or “disorganized” to run a winning campaign. Nobody stops to ask if maybe sometimes victory comes at too high a price.
What the Dems need to do – and almost certainly are not doing --is getting their wealthy supporters to buy up some radio and TV stations and developing an actual, viable liberal media. The Repubs have figured out that he who owns the playing field will win the game, when that game is political debate.
It does not matter what values Dems hold, or what their message is, if they continue to let the Pubbies frame the debate.
Well. more like Dems need to get rich guys without shame to buy up media outlets - Ted Turner’s pretty liberal, but I guess just blushes at the thought of having a couple of hours a day devoted to some Democratic shill who’ll just put talking points memos in his or her own words. On radio, I’m not sure there’s any good equivalent - but having a Rush LImbaugh type and several clones who will trumpet the party line regardless of evidence would help.
What’s Michael Moore done or said that’s anywhere near that un-American?
Or are your extremists OKIYAR?
C’mon, RTFirefly, that’s not a fair question. We’d have to have someone like Josef Beria or Goebbels on our side to dump, to have an equivalent to Ispoop.
I remain perplexed. How to describe the organized massacre of our fellows as anything but inherently wrong? Clearly, WWII was forced upon us, war was declared, there was no option. But what of Grenada? What of our various and numerous incursion into Central America, on behalf of some of the bloodiest monsters in Christendom?
Your pointing to the Spanish-American War is perhaps insightful. It is difficult to judge whether that was the most blatantly hypocritical excercise in international thuggery we’ve ever committed, or the war with Mexico. Have you done any reading about the SA War as it relates to the Phillipines? How we allied ourselves with a nativist group of freedom fighters in their fight to secure independence from colonial Spain, and then betrayed and persecuted them at our earliest opportunity? I recommend In Defense of General Funston by Mark Twain as a good starting point, he lays the matter out with the searing wit of aggrieved and indignant humanity.
It was a war of blatant imperialism and naked aggression. Surely you know this?