(no subject)

[apocalypsos]

A very nice man at work who voted Bush got into a discussion with me about the election. He was polite as could be, and then he had to go and ask me why I disliked Bush. Halfway through my explanation, right about when I started talking about Iraq and he brought up the non-possibility of a draft and I asid Bush had better stick to that promise and then I mentioned my brother, I burst into tears. And I've been crying on and off ever since.

Shit. I probably should have stayed home and got drunk. *wipes eyes*

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_inbetween_/]

no. no i think they should see some reactions. i might be wrong, but anything to crack the facade. *hug?*

[rpp.livejournal.com]

*hugs*

My brother is in the army (He signed up a month before 9/11. Good timing, huh?) and now I'm terrified they won't let him leave when his time is up in August. He's already served in Afganistan and Iraq, and it kills me to see what the experience has done to him.

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm feeling the "should've stayed home and got drunk" thing too.

[malhablada.livejournal.com]

*hugs*

My brother too, hon. And I've got a cousin already in the military. It's horrifying. And I mean horrifying in the literal definition of the word (causing painful and intense fear, dread, or dismay) as opposed to just 'upsetting'.

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

I seem to remember saying something like, "I don't feel any safer with Bush re-elected. I'm afraid." He looked a little startled at that one, like he didn't get why.

[palmetto.livejournal.com]

I don't have a brother of draft age, but I do have a significant other who was stuck in Bosnia and then Afghanistan, and is now on inactive ready reserve.

We live in fear that one day the phone is going to ring and it's going to be his detailer informing him of the date he has to report for duty.

Last night was not a happy night in my house. Tonight promises to be worse.

[bailunrui.livejournal.com]

Shit! My brother is 17 and never even thought... SHIT!

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

My brother is eighteen, and I consider him my best friend. Nobody had better send that little bastard anywhere near a war zone. Hell, if they tried anything like that, I'd fight for them to send me instead. It's not exactly the most realistic situation that's ever going to happen, of course, but fuck.

[bailunrui.livejournal.com]

My brother is my best friend too and I just forget how old he is sometimes. Not that it helps any other younger men out there, but I think he might be able to get off on a medical condition - he's legally blind and has glaucoma. But still - the chance that he could be sent to war? It sends shivers of fear down my spine.

[phillyexpat.livejournal.com]

My father was legally blind in one eye-which prevented him from being sent to Vietnam. I would say the odds are that if, god forbid, there is a draft, your brother wouldn't go.

[seferin.livejournal.com]

If he gets drafted, have him pretend to be gay. They don't want gays in the military, and so he should hopefully be able to stay alive. *hug*

[jtersesk.livejournal.com]

My brother is 20...and I have an 18-year-old cousin who plans to join the Air Force. *hugs*

[gentleman-lech.livejournal.com]

[hugs]

[sabra-n.livejournal.com]

Don't just worry about your brothers. It's quite likely that any new draft will be universal.

Coming from Israel, that's perfectly ordinary for me. I'm from a 3-generation total military family, the kind that's pretty odd to see in the U.S. nowadays. But if there's a draft here, I think I'd rather serve in Israel. Because if I'm going to fight a wrongheaded war, I might as well do it for the country that treats its soldiers decently.

If it makes you feel any better, that proposed draft would be not only universal but also not completely military- it's a civil service draft. And there's plenty of non-combat positions in the Army. Let's have faith. Under my black shirt I'm wearing a chamsa.

-blue

[marag.livejournal.com]

I don't know if anyone else on Trollprincess' flist knows what a chamsa is, and I'm normally the least superstitious person ever, but I'm eyeing the chamsa that hangs off one of my living room lights and trying to remember where my chamsa earrings are. ::sigh::

[jtersesk.livejournal.com]

I should start wearing my chamsa again...

*HUGS!!!*

[astaria51.livejournal.com]

I don't have siblings, so I can't say I know how you feel. I couldn't anyway. But I will give you hugs, because geez. *HUGS*

On that note, though, my best friend's younger brother will be 18 before Bush is out of office again. Wow. Soon, shit. And most of my friends are around that age. I mean, I'm in college, and this current draft bill doesn't allow college as a get-out-of-war-free card. Nor does it make an exception for women.

So. That's most of my best friends. Right there. Shit...
I'd probably never get drafted, I'm asthmatic and epileptic and depressive. But who knows?

However, the draft bill does allow for the board to place you wherever the fuck they want. In the lines or at home service. Ten guesses where the rich kids go.

[pescivendolo.livejournal.com]

My fiance will be a doctor come May, and doctors can be drafted at practically any age.

Shit. Now I'm crying.

[ceejayoz.livejournal.com]

On the slightly-brighter side, they don't send doctors into the front lines, because they need them desperately on the hospital ships and base hospitals and what not.

It's being one of the grunts without really useful non-combat skills that sucks.

[blacktarrant.livejournal.com]

He's right. They usually send Navy corps-men, who are specially trained for combat field medicine, but are often not doctors.

As the wife of a devildog grunt, I can tell you that each and every one of them brings something to the table, in and out of combat, though to the military that may not mean much. Every time I think of my husband and his friends being in Iraq I could cry, because they're already there. For them it's a matter of pride, as before this they had been one of the few infantry units not to deploy to a combat area. Now they're constantly on guard, and dealing with the reality of it. In the last two weeks they've lost eight of their number, and I have no words of comfort strong enough, in my mind, to offer my husband on the rare occasion he has a chance to call me.

I have a brother who is 20, and cousins who are 16 and 18, and when the topic of a draft comes up, I worry for them. I don't watch to watch anyone else go. And I'll continue hoping with everything I hold dear that none of you have to watch them leave for war either.

[vivian-shaw.livejournal.com]

If I believed in any sort of god, you would have my prayers.

[derryderrydown.livejournal.com]

I come from a military family in the UK. Three cousins are currently in Iraq. It would be four but one left the Army because he was so sickened by the way his troops were being treated. (He'd just got his Majority, as well, which is the point at which the Army is considering you a serious promotion prospect, rather than somebody who's just putting in some time.) The German (I think) troops were on strike for better pay/conditions, when they were already being treated better than his guys and there was talk of lopping benefits for his guys.

[anne-jumps.livejournal.com]

My cousin will be 18 pretty soon.

[ktmobile.livejournal.com]

*hug* One of the Republican Assholes in my office said something about the draft today in an e-mail, and I almost burst into tears, too. My brothers are 19 and 21.

[fairestcat]

*hugs* Yeah, I know so very well how you feel.

[wiesbaden.livejournal.com]

God.

I remember a few months ago, when they were talking about recalling retired Army folks back to active duty. My dad was in the Army for 21 years, as a combat engineer - which I guess would be a fairly useful trade in the rebuilding of a country which is simultaneously busted-up and combat-zone-y - and I remember breaking down and crying pitifully on my friend's kitchen floor. At my heart, I will always be an 11-year-old girl who doesn't want her daddy to leave - flashbacks to the Gulf War, I guess.

*hugs*

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

In my heart, Bryan is always going to be that cute little kid in the icon. I'm sure he wouldn't appreciate it if he knew that, but he's stuck on that account. :)

[wiesbaden.livejournal.com]

Yo, that's simply Older Sister Privilege :)

My 'baby' brother is now 21 years old and a good 6 inches taller than me, but he shall forever be 'Squirt'. He doesn't like it (and lives in fear that I'll slip up and call him that in front of his friends or, god forbid, the Babes), but then, he doesn't really get a say in the matter... :) Mwa ha ha.

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

Older Sister Privilege is the only thing that still allows me to call him Shorty when he's now a foot taller than me. ;)

[ilanalynn.livejournal.com]

I have a picture at my mom's house of me and my baby brother when Jeff was only a few weeks old. It's a really good picture... I think I should have her look for it and send it to me...

[sxyblkmn.livejournal.com]

one of my cousins was serving in iraq

his company got ambushed and he ended up losing one of his kidneys, a chunk of his leg and his right arm from the elbow down

and for what?!

america has really broken my will this time........

[tania.livejournal.com]

*hugs* I'm so sorry. Almost all my American friends voted Kerry, and all of 'em are in a state of shock and despair today. I have a chilling feeling way down in my gut that something terrible is going to happen in the next four years.

If you start hearing the word 'draft' coming from Bush's lips, run like bloody hell. Heck, move over here. We may have asshole governments now and then, but they don't have their fingers on the Big Red Button, and they know better than to try a draft on the Australian people again. There would be an outcry like you've never heard. We are far less conservative over here than the US...

[prettiekittie.livejournal.com]

"Bush had better stick to that promise"

I hope, for you and your brother's sake he does. But, as we all know, he's not very good at that. Remember, Iraq was only supposed to be a one-year war.

[jennimarie.livejournal.com]

I skipped school today and my parents and I went out to lunch. On the TV in the restaurant they had Kerry's concession speech and even though there was no sound I just started crying right in the middle of the restaurant. And I kind of can't stop. I'm so disillusioned and sad. I need to channel this into something productive.

[emerlee.livejournal.com]

I'm so sorry. *hugs* I don't have any military age relatives except one, and he's already in the Air Force in a non-combat job, thank God. But I do have good friends who are guys. I swear, if Bush even thinks about reenstating the draft, I really will go to Canada. I do have a friend up there I could stay with...

[topaz08.livejournal.com]

My son is 20, and the thought that he could be drafted to fight a war that is simply over oil makes me wonder what has happened to this country.

[glitter-ninja.livejournal.com]

I know, I know. Like you, I knew I should have stayed home, so I skipped out on the last couple hours of work. But now I've been crying for 45 minutes myself, ever since the Bush acceptance speech. Those who support Bush and his conservative policies should see reactions like this.

Everyone is stunned right now, but I promise you, if a draft starts, that will be the end of this putting up with Bush crap once and for all. I think Bush's advisors know this.

[secretbutterfly.livejournal.com]

*HUGS* I'm wearing all black today. I don't want to believe this.

[ampersand.livejournal.com]

Wearing black today too. I hope it doesn't come to what I'm afraid it'll come to.

[dawning-star.livejournal.com]

My brother is 21 and the only male in our family that can carry the family name on. He's the single most important person to me. I'm absolutely terrified.

[laurelin-kit.livejournal.com]

*hands you a tissue* I'm so scared that the rest of my boys, my wonderful, stupid boy friends, are going to get it into their head that it would be cool to be a hero and go off and die. And one of them is already doing it. He's enlisted, gotten transferred out of my school and into a regular, non-college-prep school and is leaving after training to go be an interrogator on the front lines. We've never been heart-to-heart, but he's been in love with me for forever, and I don't want him to die.

[zeelee-penguin.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I started crying today in english class while trying to ask a Bush supporter how she could support a man based on his 'values' when his lies have killed thousands and thousands of people.

I'm sobbing now. *hugs you tight*

[the-swordman.livejournal.com]

I know it's gonna sound stupid but I just can't imagine you breaking in tears, you're like my online witty american super heroine.

*hugs* on the house, for you and for everybody who needs one.

[illmantrim.livejournal.com]

*huggss you and smiles*
never be ashamed of tears my friend.

[musyc]

My brother is 25 - the only thing that would keep him out of the military in case of a draft is his heart murmur, and I'm not even certain that could do it.

My coworkers stayed out of my way for the first three hours of my shift today - the only one brave enough to speak to me got to watch me cry. (Luckily, she's also my roomie, so she's seen it before.)

[ilanalynn.livejournal.com]

I have:

~a brother who will be 21 this month who is my best friend.
~a husband in the Air Force
~a cousin in the OR National Guard who is in Iraq
~another cousin who is graduating from Air Force BMT tomorrow.

Fortunately, the job my husband has is not at all one that will get him deployed to scarey places. This makes me very happy.

Oregon has the most National Guard troops in Iraq. When I was back home, I heard almost every day of another of our troops being killed.

I don't know what my other cousin will be doing in the Air Force, so I don't know if she'll get deployed or not. She has two kids under the age of four.

My baby brother is my best friend in the world (damn now I'm crying) and if anything happened to him, that would be it. I really don't know whether I'd just shut down or whether I'd get angry and try to kill the world. I don't even want to think about it.