Military grows as civilian jobs vanish…
I am not in the least surprised by this. The military is needed to expand empire, while civilians need to suffer in order to learn obedience. Does anyone in this country study history, or do they just watch Fox/Faux News?
More Americans Joining Military as Jobs Dwindle
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ Published: January 18, 2009Ryen Trexler, 21, is learning about heavy equipment at the Jobs Corps Center in Pittsburgh, skills he will take to the Army in July.
As the number of jobs across the nation dwindles, more Americans are joining the military, lured by a steady paycheck, benefits and training.
The last fiscal year was a banner one for the military, with all active-duty and reserve forces meeting or exceeding their recruitment goals for the first time since 2004, the year that violence in Iraq intensified drastically, Pentagon officials said.
And the trend seems to be accelerating. The Army exceeded its targets each month for October, November and December — the first quarter of the new fiscal year — bringing in 21,443 new soldiers on active duty and in the reserves. December figures were released last week.
Recruiters also report that more people are inquiring about joining the military, a trend that could further bolster the ranks. Of the four armed services, the Army has faced the toughest recruiting challenge in recent years because of high casualty rates in Iraq and long deployments overseas. Recruitment is also strong for the Army National Guard, according to Pentagon figures. The Guard tends to draw older people.
“When the economy slackens and unemployment rises and jobs become more scarce in civilian society, recruiting is less challenging,” said Curtis Gilroy, the director of accession policy for the Department of Defense.
Graphic scenes of horrible deaths do tend to make people hesitate to volunteer for it. At least as long as there is any possible chance of making a living at anything else. Now that the chances of finding work outside of the military is so drastically reduced, thanks to the current economy, people are being forced to enlist. It doesn’t matter if it’s a law, like the draft, or circumstances, like the economic situation, people are still being forced to enlist. That’s wrong, no matter how you excuse it.
Our government needs to stop caring more about banks, corporations, and other bureaucratic entities than they care about the people who elect them to office. It’s like once they’re in office the politicians completely forget that it’s the people who put them there, even if their corporate masters footed the campaign bill.
It’s our votes that put them in and take them out of office, not the companies that “sponsor” them. That’s exactly what it is too, corporate sponsership of politicians. Only they like to hide who is sponsoring them, in case the “people” might think they’ve been “bought”. Like we don’t already know that almost all of them have been bought and sold for a very long time now.
Leave a Reply