'Drawn from all ranks of society without respect to background or privilege or education'

Good to see that at least one history professor was immune to the democrat talking point about GW Bush entering the National Guard due to his families connections.

Gawd - doncha all just get so tired of this incessant stupidity from the MSM? blech

Perhaps Senator Kennedy is reminiscing about the sights of his childhood.

Distant from the mainstream? How about this article:

Military Tops Public Confidence List in New Gallup Poll
By Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, June 3, 2005 – The American public has more confidence in the military than in any other institution, according to a Gallup poll released this week.

Seventy-four percent of those surveyed in Gallup's 2005 confidence poll said they have "a great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in the military - more than in a full range of other government, religious, economic, medical, business and news organizations.

The poll, conducted between May 23 and 26, involved telephone interviews with a randomly selected sample of 1,004 people 18 and older, Gallup officials said. Those surveyed expressed strong confidence in the military, with 42 percent expressing "a great deal" of confidence in the military and 32 percent, "quite a lot" of confidence. Eighteen percent said they have "some" confidence, 7 percent, "very little," and 1 percent, "none."

Public confidence in the military jumped following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and has remained consistently high, Gallup officials noted. The 2002 survey reflected a 13 percent increase in confidence in the military over the previous year's poll. The public expressed a 79 percent high-confidence rate in the military in 2002, an 82 percent rate in 2003, and a 75 percent rate in 2004.

This year's 74 percent confidence level exceeded that of all 15 institutions included in the 2005 survey. Police ranked second, with 63 percent of responders expressing "a great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in them. Organized religion rated third, with 53 percent of responders expressing high confidence, and banks rated a 49 percent high-confidence rate.

Health maintenance organizations bottomed out the list, with just 17 percent of responders expressing high confidence in them. Big business and Congress tied for the second- and third-lowest rankings, with 22 percent of responders expressing "a great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in them.

The Gallup organization noted that public trust in television news and newspapers reached an all-time low this year, with 28 percent of responders expressing high confidence in them.

Perhaps if the liberal wonks would allow the recruiters fair access to the general population (i.e. campus jobs fairs) the enrollment within the armed forces would look more like a cross-section of America--instead of the dedicated, hardworking, VOLUNTEERS we now have.

>military adventurism...manifest in their day by the career of Napoleon Bonaparte

For a historian this guy knows little about Napoleon and the French Revolution. It was exactly the "every man a soldier" attitude fostered by the Revolution and the mass militarization of French society by the introduction of conscription that made Napoleon's adventurism possible.

And lets not even talk about 1914...

I'm still waiting for the Left to define the compensation we should provide to soldiers that will make them upstanding citizens defending our country and way of life.

Too high and our soldiers are mercenaries.

Too low and our soldiers are economic draftees who really aren't volunteering.

As has been said, it's almost as if the Left is setting up a no-win situation for our soldiers.

Kennedy condensed: We (Liberals) threw a hissy fit and took our ball and went home but you guys found another ball and kept playing. THAT'S NOT FAIR! so I'm gonna call you names.

(I posted this on LT Smash's site, too.)

I am almost certainly revealing my ignorance, since I have never served, but I think Kennedy has a very badly stated point, and it is a point that our Founders made, but their solution is so much better than his. The solution? Every man between the ages of 18 and forty-five must own an infantry rifle, like the M-16 or the M-4 and ammunition which he keeps at home, and he is mustered into the militia for basic/rifle training on a regular basis.

Who would run this training? Honest to God drill sergeants.

People would learn a lot about the military, fast. And some people would unexpectedly discover they liked the military and join up.

In this conflict, local militias would search passengers, guard vulnerable points like power plants, chemical plants and dams, taking the pressure off the National guard and the police officers who are disproportionally being called up.

We might call this the Swiss solution, since they are still doing it.

Please, err, shoot this full of holes. I'd really like to hear some feedback from people who aren't just small-l libertarians.

Yours,
Wince

It's simple. Leftists are now advocating the draft so that once it's in place, they can begin protesting the draft. They really miss the 60's and 70's.

Full disclosure: I had Kennedy as a professor freshman year, in an excellent class called History of Democracy. It was just the sort of sweeping, classics-heavy course you so often hear is disappearing from American academia. He was an engaging lecturer who made the material come alive, and I feel truly privleged to have had a chance to learn from him.

My biases thus laid bear, let me be a Kennedy apologist here for a minute. He gave a greatly enlarged version of this speech (I can recognize paragraphs) to the senior class the day before graduation. Live, he went out of his way to praise members of the armed forces and say he wasn't disparaging their service.

Admitting to taking some liberty with the dictionary definition, Kennedy argued that the modern armed forces are "mercenary" in the sense that the costs of their use fall upon, comparatively speaking, a very small number of Americans. Far from degrading the soldiers themselves as Hessians (he repeated the line "these are not the hated Hessians of George III" twice), he encouraged students in the audience to share in that burden by serving.

Last time I heard this piece, David Kennedy was standing in plain sight, telling me to join the army. I think that message may not have translated well to the shorter Op-Ed, but knowing what I do I think some of the commentary on the piece may be a bit overdone.

You can see my original reaction to the speech at my blog here, posted June 11.
http://tsinister.blogspot.com/2005/06/david-kennedy-on-americas-mercenary.html

OK, so Kennedy's concerned that if we aren't collecting peach pits for gas masks and observing meatless, wheatless, and sweetless days, we have no personal stake in our nation's military affairs. He makes a virtue of necessity, it seems to me.

I guess I can just make out his point that when the populace feels the effects of a war effort, it's a more "democratic" way to wage a war. But as Heinlein said, if you want to build an engine, do you attach a bathtub just because you have one handy? The military is not a social experiment.

Follow up: No video that I can find, but there's a transcript here: http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/kennedy-061505.html

Highlights:
"Now I am emphatically not impugning either the idealism or the patriotism of those who serve today. I happen to believe that the profession of arms is a noble calling."

"I recognize that some, perhaps many, of you may find it offensive to call today's armed forces a "mercenary army," and I repeat that I am in no way impugning the motives or the loyalties of those who are currently serving. But they are surely not the members of the citizen-army that we fielded two generations ago—drawn from all ranks of society, without respect to background or privilege or education, and an army mobilized on such a scale that civilian society's deep and durable consent to the shaping and the use of that force was absolutely necessary."

"Stanford is a first-class institution, and the sheepskin you'll be handed tomorrow is a first-class ticket to the rest of your life. My advice to you is don't take it. I don't mean don't take your diploma—of course you should take it. You've earned it and your parents would be aghast if you didn't take it. But don't take the first- or even the second-class route through life. Go third class. Don't be too comfortable. Don't be a bystander. Get out and make things happen. Get dirty. Put your shoulder to the wheel. Make the world move. And don't make the mistake of thinking that military service is something that can be safely left to the other passengers."

There are still valid criticisms: it's not a good idea to change the structure of the military to achieve social goals, and as some have pointed out, an all-volunteer force can be a check on adventurism (Marginal Revolution makes that point here: http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2005/07/the_volunteer_a.html). But the hysterical "he's a crazy leftist who hates America" criticisms splashed all over the place don't look like they hold water.