Charles RangelAccording to Representative Charlie Rangel the U.S.A. is the Land of Lack of Opportunity.

He’s declaring that it is a lack of options in America that induces young men to enlist in the Armed Services. Nevermind that we currently have a record low unemployment rate.

Nevermind that statistically the members of our Armed Services are better educated and come from higher socio-economic levels than their peers in the American population.

Don’t let the FACTS get in the way of your talking points. It’s sound bite politics. Say it enough times on enough television shows and people will take it as fact.

(CBS) NEW YORK Congressman Charles Rangel said most enlisted soldiers join the military because they do not have the “option of having a decent career.”

Speaking with Fox News reporter Chris Wallace on Sunday, Representative Rangel voiced his belief that soldiers in America’s armed forces join only for lack of a better choice.

He said, “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.”

Rangel also said of American soldiers, “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.”

The Congressman also continued to press for the return of the draft, saying “I have been advocating a draft ever since the President’s been talking about war.”

Last month Senator Kerry told students at Pasadena City College that, “you know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.”

His words were seen by Democrats and Republicans as demeaning to enlisted men and women, implying that they enlist because they do not “make an effort to be smart.” However, the senator later apologized, calling his statement a “botched joke” on President Bush.

It still all boils down to the same contempt and disrespect for our Men at Arms. I have to give Rangel credit for being a little bit smarter than his comrade Kerry. Rangel is a master politician and is playing his cards very well.

So what is his game?

All of these arguments bolster Rangel’s plan to reinstitute the draft. We know that Rangel’s claim that the Armed Forces are populated with a bunch of illiterate, unsophisticated ‘youngsters’ who are only there because they have no other way to better themselves is just plain not so. We also know that his claim that he wants to reinstitute the draft so that all ‘youngsters’ have to serve, even the middle and upper classes, is not true. In fact, just the opposite is true.

There’s a method to his madness.

He is appealing to the lowest common denominater. If he can continue to put out his sound bites and convince ‘the people’ that only the unfortunate are having to fight this war and that the war is ill-conceived, then he can continue to push public attitude against the Republican President.

Whether or not the draft is instituted is irrelevant to his goals. If he keeps making these noises and gets enough publicity for it, he will energize the youth to turn against the war. Turning against the war is turning against the Republican party in the political world.

So far the protests have mostly been people in their 60s reliving the 60s. I guess they’d like to have a few people in their 20s join them.

Or maybe he’s not that conniving. Maybe he’s just appealing to his own district for votes.

Bottom line, Rangel is playing politics with the security of our nation.

tiara tip to Theodore’s World. I have to agree with her on this:

I really wish the GOP would stand up and denounce idiots like Rangel point blank. Oh well. I guess being a eunuch is so much better. Funny how the only person who had the guts to call the Democrats out was another Democrat, Zell Miller.

I can’t tell you how many times I have thought that a lot of this nonsense could be stopped if the Republicans would speak up. But they don’t and we are left with the spin from the far left.

Beth at MVRWC has a good suggestion.

Yeah, that’s what this country needs–a congressional study on military demographics. ‘Cause of course, all the data that’s out there must be lies if Charlie Rangel doesn’t like what it says. Maybe there needs to be a Congressional examination of his head.

Blackfive has an excellent post that is a must read.

But he could not be more wrong. His impetus for proposing the draft he says is to shift the burden of defending America from the poor, minority community who are economically pressed into service to the rich, white community which has been shirking its duty and using the black man as cannon fodder to line whitey’s pockets. His basis for this policy change is also demonstrably false, but if he is sincere in this contention then I would have to question his sanity.

CrosSwords demands an apology.

I can’t speak for each and every person who enlists, and unlike Mr. Rangel, I don’t have the hubris to even try…but the men and families that I have spoken to in my son’s units in the past tend to have enlisted for the same reason my son did.

Mr. Rangel, like Mr. Kerry did, has insulted our troops. It is time for an apology from Mr. Rangel. I don’t think we will get one…but my son, and every person who has enlisted deserves one. Be a man, Mr. Rangel, and admit that you were wrong. Don’t try to pawn this off as a botched joke.

For those of you who wish to ask Mr. Rangel to apologize, you may call him like I did. His Washington office number is 202-225-4365. His New York office number is 212-663-3900. If anyone has his e-mail address, I would be happy to add that to the list of ways to contact him.

More at: Flopping Aces, Urban Grounds, Captain’s Quarters, Below the Beltway, Wizbang! Hysceince, Hot Air, Michelle Malkin, Jeremayakovka, Conservative Thinking, Stop the ACLU

Linked: Is It Just Me?, Conservative Cat, Third World County, bRight & Early, Wake Up America, Right Wing Nation