Keep 'em broke and they'll re-enlist

Crooks and Liars

McCain’s mouthpiece, Lindsey Graham went on Face the Nation and used every talking point to support the war in Iraq, but can’t come up with an explanation why McCain will not support Webb’s new GI benefits Bill. It’s for the welfare of our troops that have been ordered into this nightmare situation in the middle east, and as strong war advocates, you’d think McCain and Graham would be first on the list of the Senator’s who have signed to show how committed they are to our troops. Graham has a lot of words to say about everything else and goes off topic because he doesn’t have a good answer. Supporting the troops is nothing but a talking point for McCain and Graham it would appear.

Keeping the troops in the military is more like it.

WEBB: Yes. Well, there are too many people in the Pentagon who are seeing a good GI bill as affecting retention rather than rewarding service, and we need to get those — politics aside, we need to get to those issues to help our troops.

GRAHAM: We want a wining outcome in Iraq so that when we do leave, we’re going to leave behind a country that’s part of the solution, not the problem. That is why people reenlist. That is why I support this new strategy. The old strategy was failing. The new strategy is producing results, and I hope we’ll stay with it.

WEBB: I’ve got to take 30 seconds to respond to what Lindsey said, because I can’t let that hang out there. You know, people don’t reenlist because of the war in Iraq. People reenlist because they love their country and they have family traditions and they love to soldier. And they’ll fight in Iraq, they’ll fight in Afghanistan, or they’ll serve anywhere they are called upon to serve.

Some guys are natural-born soldiers. Most are not. The 100-year Criminal Occupation of Iraq requires the warmongers to keep a certain amount of soldiers in service through re-enlistment since first time enlistment is understandably way down.

If the soldiers think they've got a shot at some higher education in return for their service, a chance to elevate themselves from the socioeconomic underclass, or just plain poverty and no hope of a better life that drove them into the service in the first place, they'll get out and do it when their enlistments expire. Or after their stop-loss shanghai jobs run out, if ever.

I think McCain and Graham are more interested in supporting troop levels than the troops themselves. After all, they've got more wars they plan to start.