So – anyone blow a gasket at the latest “protection” provided by our supreme leaders?

Anyone (US citizen or not) can have all electronic or print media confiscated without cause and held for an indefinite amount of time when coming into the country.

Did I mention without probable cause?

http://tinyurl.com/5w4728

This makes me crazy. Hello, fourth amendment?

Gah. I keep trying to respond further, but I'm descending into rants, so I will stop while I'm ahead.

This makes me crazy. Hello, fourth amendment?

Gah. I keep trying to respond further, but I'm descending into rants, so I will stop while I'm ahead.

http://www.nationalserviceact.org/

and this

http://www.bethechangeinc.org/servicenation

It looks all nice and "yay us" on it's surface. But several large corporations such as Target and Coca-Cola are teaming up with the government to institute a mandatory national service for anyone between the ages of 18 to 42 years old. They call it voluntary because they claim you can choose which part of the government you work in once they draft you, but you won't be able to avoid it without going to jail. Oh, they want to get you for two years.

Draft, anyone?

Interesting...

Yeah. When I first heard this I thought it was some crazy mountain man talk, but once I looked into it, I was astounded at what I read. What's scary is that both Obama and McCain support this.

I think that a few other countries, such as Sweden and Israel, already have conscription, don't they? I actually support a year or two of mandatory government service, though not necessarily military service. The government already garnishes your wages by 20-25 percent; I don't see this as a much larger infringement.

The laptop thing, on the other hand, is total bullshit.

Can I choose to be President, fire everyone, and hire y'all?

CPF - Would mandatory government service be economically feasible? I'm not being contrarian - I really wonder if that would work here.

My husband wants to load his computer with stuff that's "out of the pay grade" of the people doing the search and seizures. It's too bad he's a civilian now- that would have been funny.

Turns out the Constitution IS just a piece of paper.

It's a good question, mamawho, and I don't know for certain; that's one of the hesitations that I would have about it. I would only support it if one had the option to choose the capacity in which s/he would serve--go, Peace Corps! And I'd have to trust the United States of Hysteria not to revoke that latitude upon the inception of such a program, which would be my other hesitation. I've a friend in foreign service who's just had to put the adoption process on hold until she completes a year-long assignment to Baghdad (sucks speaking Arabic sometimes).

And service in the Peace Corps precludes one from serving as an officer in the military. I've always found that to be odd.

DaddyWho just turned down a job that would have had him in Baghdad often. We're SO over that kind of work.

I'm personally against the mandatory service period because I have been in school my entire freaking life to earn the right to try to get the job I want to have. The idea of delaying that a few more years (and thus the opportunity to have a child or earn a living or both) is just insane to me.

I'm personally not entirely against the mandatory service period, but I think there should be some hefty benefits to it, like a huge honkin post-secondary tuition relief or something.

Flexibility would also be cool... like if you had to serve 3 years, but could do 2 of them from 18-20 and then break the third up to summers or something.

Then again, I have strong eastern european roots, and a very rules/order loving personality :-)

Wookie - yep. If tuition were reduced/waived for the service, then HELL YEAH! Otherwise I tend to think somewhat like McGlory on the matter. There has to be a carrot.

I think mandatory conscription is completely out of the question. It's slavery. What if I don't want to do it? Will I be put in jail? Nevermind the fact that it's unconstitutional. What if I already have a job? Will I be pulled from that to go do my mandatory service? What happens when I'm done with the service. I've been gone for two years. You think my old job is going to hire me back?

Giving tuition benefits and the like will cost the taxpayers so much more that we would hardly have any take home pay.

I don't understand why people think this is a good idea. So what if other countries do it. Does that make it right?