Political Courage

Joe Klein has a piece in this week’s Time magazine entitled, “The Courage Primary.” You need to read it.

I don’t know what set other people off about it (it’s #2 on Time’s “Most Popular” list behind a Father’s Day story) but for me, it was the section on “National Service.” In one way it’s just another (good) idea on how to bring back the unifying effect of the draft (modified) but it’s also a history lesson.

”The Roman Empire began to falter when it started hiring out major functions of the government, like military service.”

I was reading a book just the other day about the problems with re-instituting the draft (we’ll get to that later) but arguing the problems isn’t the point of this article. The point is to argue about the possibilities. Go read it. You’ll be glad you did.

Don Brown
June 17, 2007