home » archives

Previous Week:
Oct. 10 - Oct. 16, 2004
Next Week:
Nov. 07 - Nov. 13, 2004

Bad Dog No Sushi

Whoa - - - now it's official. My son Luke designed Sushiacrossamerica.com and I just arrived back from Delaware via Philadelphia on Prepaid Legal Business.

But that's not what I'm here to talk about tonight -- - - no no no ---
I came to talk about the draft . . . not the one coming thru the poorly built windows, but the one that took place in the late 1960's thru the early '70's.
This was about ten years before I ate my first piece of sushi.

i dropped out of college as a result of spending more time smoking pot and philosophizing (sp) than I spent in class, thinking about class & doing assignments for class (combined.) So I left school in January of '71 with a draft # of 128.

Here's what happened: The day after I saw the film "Catch 22" based on Joseph Heller's novel I went before my draft board in Manhasset, NY to appeal their refusal to grant me status as a conscientious objector. Now I don't truly understand how a bunch of strangers who never met me could determine that I was not conscientious and not an objector to the war. Everybody who knew me would have said I was very conscientious and anyone who thought the war in Viet Nam was a good idea and told me that would assure you that my being an objector was a very mild way of putting it.

So remember I came to talk about The Draft. I think kids today would be a lot more concerned if the Draft still existed. We - me and my compadres growing up - were forced to consider the merits of the Viet Nam War because unless we stayed in school like good boys they planned on sending our asses over to a country far away where people ate rice and objected to foreigners coming over and telling them how to run their country.

After careful thought and research I decided that shooting people I didn't know who had an unlikely chance of ever getting close to our shores was a Bad Idea - not simply a bad idea, but A Bad Idea - in fact a Very Bad Idea. And what complicated the situation was the fact that they would be shooting at me too - with real bullets.
As a result of my hippie - peacenik stance I was ridiculed by patriotic Americans and even called chicken, but I'll tell you that not one of those people who called me chicken would step outside man-to-hippie and fight me one on one ---- Because they knew I could kick their ass and was not afraid of fighting for something I thought was worth fighting for - like the satisfaction of kicking their asses.

But I am getting off track. Eventually Senator Fulbright filibustered the Selective Service Act and Nixon and his warmongers couldn't draft anyone else. (Note: the Viet Nam War had grown increasingly unpopular and not many people were volunteering to go so the govt was drafting more and more young men.) Until Congress reconvened on September 19, 1971. I had taken psychiatric steps to guarantee I wouldn't get drafted after that, but once the Draft was reinstated the Pentagon announced that they were going back to ZERO and drafting everyone who lost their deferments. They never got back to 128 (they got to 125 -whew!) and i didn't have to test my shrink's letter designed to show/tell that I was crazy, anti-authoritarian, sexually confused and volatile. I beat the Draft.

But that's not what's important. What is important is that the Draft forced many people to take the war seriously.

For Way way too many Americans the war in Iraq is not real. Yet for Iraquis it is very real. Over 100,000 of them have died. Most Americans don't personally know anyone who has died there (some do though all too painfully.) It's not that real to us (YET)

But I beseech you --- Learn from history. War doesn't solve problems. It postpones them at best and complicates them at worst. Are there exceptions to my statement ---- yeah WWII.

Learn from Viet Nam. Learn from the Draft.
Americans re-elected George W. Bush and we have brought shame upon our nation for doing so. Don't kid yourself. Today --- we don't deserve sushi. Bad dog.
December 26, 2005 12:07 AM  []  []
Previous Week:
Oct. 10 - Oct. 16, 2004
Next Week:
Nov. 07 - Nov. 13, 2004


All contents ©2004, Mike Melia. ♦ Site design by Luke Melia.