Take My Son
The Bogus Son-Daughter Donation
By Daniel Muniz
It is time for liberals and anti-war activists
to end their mindless dribble on whether or not we would support a
war if we had to send our own sons and daughters to fight in it.
This argument has zero merit and no value in deciding if the Iraqi
war is a just war. There are actually more philosophical arguments
that can be employed but those require thinking and logical
reasoning which is not what the anti-war activists have in mind.
That is why the pointless emotional plea is among their favorites
since no thinking is needed and it can buoy the thought of our
servicemen dying for our country.
But the reason that this argument has no worth
is very simple.
We maintain a volunteer military. People in
the service are there because of their own free will. No one is
obligated to be a part of the military even though Democrats insist
that the president still maintains a secret draft plan that he has
yet to implement. The anti-war activists are trying to imply that
there is an uneven sacrifice in wanting a war but not having your
own children fighting in it. In other words, you must be a hypocrite
because you don’t have your own child fighting in this war. As a
result, your positions are invalid.
First of all, let’s take a look at the very
basis of this “children’s” argument.
The same anti-war activists are not going to
use this polemic for the firemen and policemen that rushed into the
World Trade Centers. Every fireman and policeman volunteered for
their jobs and tragically, some of them had to pay a terrible price
for their service to us.
But nobody expects us to have our own children in the fire or
police departments so that other people can be saved times of
tragedy or emergency. An activists still counts on the cops and the
fire department to show up to their residence during an emergency
even though he or she may not have their own children employed in
that type of hazardous work.
And this son-daughter donation is silly
because you are entitled to an opinion and a vote regardless of
whether or not you have grown children who can fight a war. And the
very basis of our freedoms is your right to express that opinion and
to exercise your right to vote. And even if you don’t have a child,
your vote still counts in the ballot box.
Should exclusively elected representatives who
have grown children who are capable to be in the service be the
“only” people in congress who are allowed to vote for the Iraqi war?
After all, this son-daughter donation is about grown children
fighting a war.
Nonsense! And the activists know this but it
is far easier to use an argument that does not involve thinking but
instead, relies only on emotion.
Michael Moore easily trapped Bill O’Reiley of
the O’Reiley Factor with that argument. O’Reiley could not counter
with a suitable answer so he just offered himself to fight in places
like Fallujah. A few days afterwards, even O’Reiley admitted that he
was outwitted by Moore.
But the point is that this argument does not
deserve a suitable response because it is not a real controversy.
Regardless of the background of a president, don’t we all expect for
our armed forces to execute every decision from our
commander-in-chief?
Of course we do. We do not anticipate the
Joint Chief Chairman to say to our president: “I can only respect
that order when you have Jenna or Barbara in uniform.”
In fact, perhaps the authority that liberals
cherish the most is civilian control over our military, especially
when it comes to people who loathe our armed forces like Bill or
Hillary Clinton. But this type of warped logic truly assaults the
civilian control that this republic has over our military.
Although I may sympathize with Gen. Douglas
Macarthur over Korea, President Truman exercised his greatest
responsibility as commander-in-chief by firing him. In our
democracy, civilians give direct orders to soldiers and everyone
expects them to be obeyed. And if we don’t like the decisions of our
civilian leaders, we can vote them out of office. And that is
perhaps the greatest strength of our country.
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