Keeping SS Threatens Women

 BS"D 

Fighting to Lose -- Will GOP Devotion to Jimmy Carter's Selective-Service Legacy Kill American Women?

November 21, '21 / 17 Kislev, 5782 / Parshas Vayaishev (v.2)

by Binyomin Feinberg, formerly, a contributor to The Jewish Press

On Thursday, November 18th, the ranking Republican member of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee, Senator James Inhofe (R, OK), spoke vibrantly for about 20 minutes on the Senate floor about the NDAA, the yearly "must-pass" National Defense Authorization Act (https://www.c-span.org/video/?516182-1/senate-session).  He spent much of the time lauding the importance of passage of the mammoth legislation, heavily-loaded with member-items (apparently a reference to favored funding proposals).  In the final segment of his speech (approximately 2 hrs., 19-20 minutes into the video) he declared his opposition to NDAA's inclusion of the now-infamous provision to expand Selective Service to women. That provision mandates a potential female military draft. [From a Jewish perspective, that is something that is absolutely prohibited, involving Torah violations of the highest order.]

"... Get ready for that fight, because that fight's coming..." he proclaimed. However, by "a fight" he means promotion of an apparently futile amendment to remove the objectionable language his own Armed Services Committee inserted. This is dubbed a "Direct Strike" [or "Strike-Out]" Amendment. This occurs in the backdrop of an unusually late session, in which the GOP will likely get only one opportunity to bring an amendment to a vote.  Time is indeed short; earlier Thursday, Senator Schumer (D, NY) stated he plans to finish this process next week, before the Thanksgiving recess (about 21 minutes into the video https://www.c-span.org/video/?516182-1/senate-session).]*

* Update: Schumer scheduled a final vote on the NDAA for Monday Nov. 29, the first day of Chanukah. Chanukah is eight-day Jewish festival which celebrates the miraculous victory of the saintly Maccabees over the Jewish Hellenists and antireligious Greek edicts (some of which clearly fall short of the female military draft policy, on the neo-barbarism scale).

Moreover, Senator Inhofe, who served in the military in a peacetime draft in the late 1950's, is pushing his legislation in the presence of more viable legislation, S.A. 4161, Selective Service Repeal. Notice his body language in promising a "fight."  Now, if he would be intent on a fighting to win, one would expect that the effort would be laser-focused on forcing a vote on an amendment that actually has a fighting chance of garnering enough BIPARTISAN support in this Democratic dominated Senate to pass. A game-plan for victory would not be predicated on promoting his amendment to remove the offensive language. That's simply because very few, if any, Democratic senators would support his amendment. 

Additionally, a revealing number of Republicans are known to be positioned or even ensconced on the wrong side of the issue. Even in the Senate Armed Services Committee itself, reportedly 8 out of 13 REPUBLICANS voted to include women in a potential military draft. [This one fact says much about the actual orientation of the contemporary GOP.] Additionally, all but two REPUBLICAN Senate Committee members voted for the final package bill, despite it's inclusion of said female expansion - which, in any lucid legislature, would be a poison-pill (cf. https://www.rollcall.com/2021/07/23/conservatives-riled-up-over-registering-women-for-draft/). So how does the esteemed Senator expect us to believe that his amendment - to remove the very language inserted by eight of his fellow Republicans - will pass in this Democratic dominated Senate?

In contrast, S.A. 4161 (sponsored by Sen. Wyden), clearly has a fighting chance. It is an amendment to repeal Selective Service altogether (akin to S. 1139, a stand-alone bill with bipartisan support).  SS Repeal is a policy that has long had much Democratic support.  Although this amendment too, at this moment, may not have enough openly-declared support yet, the very tangible potential for passage is clearly present - if the GOP would only get behind it.

So why promote losing legislation when there is an alternative that has a real fighting chance of passage?  Specifically, why should a leading Republican push an amendment that requires swinging resistant Democrats - something quite impractical - when they could  alternatively promote legislation that really just needs Republicans themselves to get their own act together, which is doable, provided willingness?

Conventional wisdom may answer that the senior Senator, who remembers the end of WWII, is more dedicated to preserving Selective Service than preventing the drafting of women [and the expansion of Selective Service to purposes other than replenishing troops lost in battle]. Some may also suspect that some Republicans may actually wish to fight to lose - in order to leverage the passage of including women in Selective Service - and the fear of any future female or "national emergency" draft - as a campaign issue to take back Congress next year. However, neither of those calculations would be seen by much of the Republican base as justifying laying the groundwork for forcing women into the exploitive military environment. How much more so is that the case in regard to the specter of forcing women into actual combat, facing violent male enemy troops, and the possibility of capture, with all the unspeakable abuse that entails.

The choice is clear. The Republicans will have to choose: Kill Selective Service, or require women to register for any military or national emergency conscription that may be activated at ANY point in the future. As one conservative women's organization put it, IF the issue comes down to that choice, their message is clear: "Kill Selective Service, don't kill our daughters" (or granddaughters). And Republican devotees will have to choose whether they're going to tolerate the GOP sacrificing their daughters and granddaughters on the altar of Jimmy Carter's aborted attempt at one of the closest things to legalized human trafficking.

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The "Grand Bipolar Party:" Why the Republican Devotion to Selective Service, the Lingering Legacy of Leftward-Listing Jimmy Carter?

The Selective Service was initially instituted by President Woodrow Wilson. It was eliminated by President Ford (on March 29, 1975, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/proclamation-4360-selective-service-registration). It was reinstated by President Jimmy Carter on Wed., July 2, '80 [the 18th of Tammuz, 5740 (Parshas Pinchus), at the beginning of the three most tragic weeks of the Jewish Year] (https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/the-state-the-union-address-delivered-before-joint-session-the-congress, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/registration-under-the-military-selective-service-act-remarks-signing-proclamation-4771, https://www.archives.gov/federal-register/codification/proclamations/04771.html).

If anyone is concerned about having a mechanism in place to expedite a military draft in a real emergency - America already has that - without recourse to Selective Service. It's called the computer. In the current age of high-tech, the Department of Defense has access to the technology to expedite a draft if G-d forbid it would ever be necessary.  Why this superfluous, outdated relic of the logistical limitations of the pre-Computer Age has garnered so devout a Republican choir is an interesting question. This question is particularly fascinating in light of Mr. Carter not being at all venerated by the GOP base, for a range of reasons, including statements like this, which he made on occasion of the reenactment of Selective Service:

"The freedom-fighters ("Mujadeen" - Ed.) in Afghanistan, who are striving for the liberation of their country, deserve the admiration of the entire world, and their courage and persistence in fighting for freedom is the greatest single deterrent to the Soviet aggression being successful."

[Many conservatives would probably cite President Carter's attitude embracing the cause of the Afghan Mujadeen (followed by administrations of both parties) as leading up to the events that made both attacks on the World Trade Center possible - in turn leading into America's 20-year military campaign in - and heartbreakingly chaotic flight from - that same country.]

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Some Additional Reasons to Repeal Selective Service:

° (Simplest first: ) Repeal will save taxpayer money.

° Far, far more importantly, instituting and maintaining Selective Service is perhaps the most effective means to manipulate the American People into eventually forcing women into combat. Americans would not directly agree to drafting women. However, they would possibly be open to the notion of requiring them to sign an ostensibly harmless form for a theoretical draft. Once the Selective Service requirement would be extended to women, it's just a matter of time before draft. By that time, it will most probably be too late to step back from established law, without monumental efforts, if then.

Quite evidently, this was the thinking of Carter himself in reinstatement of Selective Service. At the time, he sought, and failed, to require women to register as well. Leaving his legacy in place exposes women to that unprecedented threat year after year, as this year's looming catastrophe demonstrates. Allowing the NDAA to pass as it is would constitute a tragically ironic case in which Republicans play a pivotal role in passing revolutionary policies Carter failed to enact. 

° In Torah terms, drafting women  would be categorized as an antireligious edict, inasmuch as it would seek to compell Jews to violate the Torah prohibition against the conscription of women. Accordingly, a system geared towards advancing that antireligious edict would itself earn the status of anathema. This would be one of several  specifically Jewish arguments against maintaining Selective Service.

°  Projecting weakness globally:

It's important to listen, carefully and analytically, to the entire speech of Senator Inhofe. Ironically, his speech is one of the strongest arguments to end Selective Service (which he apparently very strongly supports) - from a strictly military perspective. His dramatized description of looming military threats from powerful adversaries (Russia) and belligerent enemies (e.g. North Korea), even if partially overblown (particularly regarding Russia, which is quite apparently not interested in a hot war with the U.S.), is all the more reason to end Selective Service now.

That's because, if Congress fails to eliminate Selective Service now, the NDAA will pass, as is, including women. That itself will erode the taboo of forcing women into the Armed Forces, and even into combat. It will also contribute to robbing military women of their cherished status as deserving the dignity reserved for women for thousands of years, by men of all walks of life. The natural consequences of degraded attitude is degraded conduct. That will translate into normalization of mistreatment of women who volunteer to enlist. Americans will thus be stuck with the escalation of exploitation of women in the U.S. Armed Forces, even before any draft is invoked, G-d forbid. Those skeptical of this gloomy projection are invited to learn what is already happening in the U.S. military, by reviewing the extensive materials posted at the site of the  Center for Military Readiness (a conservative advocacy organization specializing in military and social issues), e.g. https://www.cmrlink.org/issues/full/are-military-social-experiments-increasing-sexual-assaults-on-men-and-women.*

* If one reads nothing else there, read page 6, for an insight into the mentality being foisted on America:

"... Commissioners also debated a cultural question: If military policies conveyed the message that violence against women was acceptable – provided it happens at the hands of the enemy – would that be a step forward for civilization or a step backward? [12]

"The commission’s debate followed testimony from instructorsfrom the Survival, Evasion, Resistance & Escape (SERE) program, an intense Air Force course that trains potential prisoners of war. The instructors told the Commission that gender integration in the combat arms could succeed, but only if the nation became “desensitized” to the reality of combat abuse and violence against women. [13]

"That disturbing argument proved too much for most commissioners. “Good men,” said commissioner Kate O’Beirne, “protect and defend women.” [end of quote]

Many readers may be wondering if a government that chooses to  desensitize its people towards combat abuse and violence against women is a government worth fighting and dying for. Even in ancient Sodom, 3,800 years ago,, to "merit" that type of public desensitization and consequent abuse (e.g. death by burning), one had to contravene their wicked laws against feeding the poor (e.g. see Beraishis Rabbah 49:6 on Gen. 18:21).  Currently, Congress seeks to impose a fate not that divergent, albeit indirectly, against those young women whose only crime is being a draft-age female.

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In the final analysis, the message that expansion of Selective Service to women would send to America's many enemies worldwide - both actual and latent - is that we're being led by bipartisan weakness (political and cognitive), and consequently barreling towards military-readiness vulnerabilities unprecedented in recent decades. Senator Inhofe correctly waxed eloquent about the dangers of broadcasting weakness to enemies of America. However, allowing the NDAA to pass in current form - including expansion to women - would accomplish exactly that. The inclusion of women in a future armed conflict may be shockingly worse than what Americans have become accustomed to in recent decades (https://www.military.com/daily-news/2021/10/28/army-expects-fierce-close-combat-next-war-despite-advanced-tech.html). And the disadvantage of such toxic messaging would outweigh any micro-advantage that maintenance of Jimmy Carter's Selective Service legacy may ostensibly provide.

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In the merit of opposition to this Hellenistic proposal to register women for Selective Service, perhaps we'll avert the specter of needing a draft (see VaYikra / Leviticus 18). Allowing passage of the cruel mandate to force women into the exploitative military environment - and into brutally "unequally" deadly combat scenarios - will - without a shadow of a doubt - not bode well for meriting the Divine Protection that America truly needs. When those who seek to save women from this manifestly faulty Republican battle-plan inform the GOP that they will score them accordingly, based on their actions, not their patriotic rhetoric or staged fencing bouts (http://daattorah.blogspot.com/2021/11/demonizing-dems-enables-gop-on-female.html), then they will have hope of success, G-d willing.