[Adm.Lee]

[QUOTE=Raellus;43244
There was a really interesting article in TIME magazine a couple of months ago about the U.S. military becoming more insular over the past decade or so. Real wages for members of the military have risen faster than the national average. The proportion of Republicans vs. Democrats currently serving in the U.S. military has been skewing further and further right. The military is currently not a representative cross section of the rest of the country. More military men and women hail from the south and midwest than from other regions. The military is, in effect, one very large red state.

I guess I'm just afraid that Heinlein's political ideal would in fact lead to a martial society and/or fascist or feudalistic state. Any civilization/state in history that has based citizenship/voting rights and office-holding on military service has gone that route, except maybe for Athens.

Instead of military service being a prerequisite for voting rights, make it any public service job- a year in the peace corps, teaching in public schools, working for a free clinic, etc. [/QUOTE]

From my readings, the rightward (and evangelical Christian) shift among the services has been a slow increase since the '70s (i.e. the shift from conscription). I don't know that it is correctable, or needs correcting, but it should preclude something like military service before voting rights. Now, if conscription had remained in place, my opinion might have been different.

Either way, I prefer the idea of national service of some kind before voting rights* . I would prefer it not to be purely military service, not least because my own medical history prevented me from serving. Teachers' Corps, service jobs, big infrastructure projects, doctors to rural or urban clinics, whatever.

*Perhaps just before Federal voting rights? A high-school diploma/GED gets you the right to vote in local and state elections, but service is required before rights to vote in Federal elections? Just thinking out loud.