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Umm…maybe you missed the link in #18. Harvard is a fairly well-known university whose graduates are generally considered to have lots and lots of options. I have to assume from your post that you don’t know anyone currently serving…otherwise you wouldn’t adopt the insulting John Kerry (sorry) attitude with regard to the patriots that currently serve.</p>
<p>Snake, I look at recruitment statistics. The DoD has had to reduce standards so that practically anyone breathing can join up. OK, so there is one Harvard guy. Woopie. Let’s look at the profile of the other recruits, </p>
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<p>And the reason they join? For desperate people, cash is a good incentive.</p>
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<p>Honestly… Special operations forces are the Army’s cutting edge troops. You won’t find ex drunkards or junkies among the ranks of Green Berets or Delta.</p>
<p>But if our freedom is so important to protect, why do we feel comfortable leaving it in the hands of “drunkards” and “junkies” (not to mention other criminals)? </p>
<p>Seems we ought to be looking for more law abiding citizens, what with how important this mission is, and all. Just querying here…</p>
<p>Exactly, brew. And how about Major John OH, a surgeon who removed a LIVE RPG from a fellow soldier’s belly!!! I want to track this guy & use him if I ever need surgery. I think he is far from desperate, or barely breathing.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.army.mil/-news/2007/02/01/1632-fort-hood-medical-soldiers-awarded-for-heroism/[/url]”>http://www.army.mil/-news/2007/02/01/1632-fort-hood-medical-soldiers-awarded-for-heroism/</a></p>
<p>SS, we’re talking the lay army grunt, not your special services or Dr. Major. We’re talking the guys out on the front line, specifically in charge of “protecting your freedom”. Do you like junkies and alchies in that role? Brrrr. Makes me shiver.</p>
<p>If only 7% were considered to have drug and alcohol problems, “including those who may have failed a drug test or acknowledged they had used drugs,” I think the recruits are probably the most squeeky clean group of Americans I’ve ever heard of! Certainly “cleaner” than many other populations, such as CC parents, or college students.</p>
<p>That’s 17%, not 7, which is almost a fifth. Not exactly small potaters.</p>
<p>Allmusic, acknowledging that you have used drugs doesn’t qualify one as a junkie or alcoholic. Not to me, anyway. Maybe that’s your standard, but I think you’d be pretty much alone in that belief.</p>
<p>I feel a lot less safer when alcoholics who killed people as a result of their idiocy <em>cough</em> Teddy <em>cough</em> are in charge of the upper echelons of our government. Anyway, here is a shout out to the D Boys @ Bragg.</p>
<p>The numbers from your post indicate that 1% of the new recruits received waivers for drug & alcohol problems. That is defined, in your post, as having failed a drug test or admitting to having used drugs. This is surely less than the general population. Way lower than the numbers for high school & college kids, too.</p>
<p>Well, since no one I know has had any “misdemeanor” charges, drunk driving, drug use, or other criminal arrests, it seems that I must be in the minority here. Alrighty then. I like being in the moral majority…er…minority.</p>
<p>I think our “protection” should be handled by those who are a little squeakier clean than those drunks (because if you have been caught for drunk driving, most likely those folks have tied it on many, many times).</p>
<p>You really don’t know anyone who has ever used drugs??? Are you being facetious?</p>
<p>Read my post, SS. And reread the quote as to the stats of the new recruits. Nah, no misdemeanors, arrests, etc. at all. (for me and my family/friends)</p>
<p>Allmusic, here is your post:
If 17% of new recruits received waivers, and of that 17%, drug & alcohl problems accounted for 7% of the waivers, that works out to only 1% of the new recruits. That’s a remarkably small number. Yet you refer to the recruits as “junkies and alchies.” I’m just astounded by your logic.</p>
<p>And I am astounded by Allmusic’s naivete!!</p>
<p>Well, Jim Davies in the OP calls the troops “prostitutes,” while others call them “junkies”, “drunks” and other terms of endearment.</p>
<p>…that is called “supporting the troops” in permanent cringe land.</p>
<p>Of course, some malcontents on the left say ‘potato’ while others say ‘patahtoe’; in the end, perhaps they are all trying to say the same thing: they support the troops.</p>
<p>Indeed they do.</p>
<p>Based on AM’s posted statistics, my guess is that most colleges would love to have an incoming class as clean as these guys and gals. Do you have any idea what ridiculous things count as “misdemeanors”? I can give you a personal example: where I live, if you get a parking ticket at a county park, it is handled as a disorderly person misdemeanor.</p>
<p>One of the new waivers is of the military’s previous ban on neck tattoos, which supposedly might indicate gang membership until the brass discovered the NBA. “Permanent cringe land”…I like that. I cringe whenever I hear derogatory comments about soldiers from people who clearly don’t know (or want to know) any. Allmusic, I hate to tell you this, but soldiers have historically been very fond of beer and sex.</p>
<p>Referring to our soldiers as drunks, junkies and “other criminals” is supposed to convince us of the left’s unwavering support for our troops? Funny.</p>