Republican politicians like to brag about the fact that America has a total volunteer army and are against a draft. Most of the brave men and women who joined after our country had been attacked, felt a new sense of patroitism as I did. I have witnessed this first hand as many friends joined the army after Sept. 11th. It's sad that the administration's rush to war in Iraq and subsequent failures,probably have eroded that sentment in our country.

Richaed Cohen

I am a child of the draft. There is nothing remarkable about my story. It's similar to George Bush's and millions of others' - down to, and including, years spent not attending National Guard drills and getting an honorable discharge anyway. But no matter how prosaic my story is, it stays fresh in my mind because there was a war on - Vietnam - and it was one I did not support. On Tuesday, the House of Representatives stomped all over a bill sponsored by Rep. Charles Rangel (D-Harlem) to revive the draft, killing it 402-2. The bill was brought to a vote by the Republican leadership in an attempt to end rumors President Bush might revive the draft if reelected, and so it never got the serious consideration it deserved...read on

But one reason we're in Iraq is that not enough of us had to weigh whether the cause was worth risking our lives or those of our loved ones. It was a war that concerned others, not us. It encouraged Pentagon theorists to think about armies as if they were chess pieces.

An optional war was launched because we had the option to do so: a tool called a standing professional army. No one much had their routine interrupted.

I do not necessarily favor restoring the draft. I've been through one myself and it's no fun. But I have to wonder about a system that asks so little of us that we can make war for mythical reasons, conduct it ineptly and issue one justification after another. It makes me wonder which is worse - an unnecessary draft or an unnecessary war?