OBAMAS PRIVATE ARMY IN HEALTHCARE BILL EVERYBODY PANIC!!!1

Some people are getting antsy about Obama having a 6,000-man (or 300,000-man, depending who you ask) private army written into law as part of Obamacare, and the references to his proposed non-military military force just come all to easily. The reason you can't trust Fox as your only news source is the reason you can't trust any one source: they can't cover it all, and won't get it all right. Mike has a link to a somewhat more cool-headed evaluation of this language.

The new law does have some language that may sound ominous to those who have never been part of it, but as a former member of the Individual Ready Reserve I feel qualified to comment.

When you sign up for the U.S. armed forces, you sign on for a number of years of service. As far as I know it is 8 for most people, 10 years if you get a 'free' college education out of the bargain. The most commonly-known part is the Active Duty portion. You are a Sailor/Soldier/Marine/Airman for 4 years or however long your enlistment is supposed to last. Then the balance of your 8 years is "inactive duty" as part of the Reserve Corps. You are a member of the Individual Ready Reserves during these years. This is 99.995% a technicality, and almost everyone is allowed to start a 'normal' civilian life with no worry of being re-activated. I knew exactly one person in the Navy who was held beyond his EAOS*. That man was very, VERY unhappy about the situation. I understand the actual shooting warriors have a higher percentage because you can only find so many people willing to kill for a living (for what the Army pays).

Here is my take: This bill law has a provision allowing the President to re-activate some members of the IRR against their will during a time of actual or threatened emergency, for up to one year. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. of them will HATE the President for it, if he calls them up for anything short of a gen-u-wine WAR, and most will hate him even then. NOBODY wants to be called back against their will. I know a man who got a phone call that started out with a vague reference to him going back to being an Operator. He doesn't know how the call would have gone, because he went "ghost" for the next few years until Uncle Sam declared him to be a full civilian.

Getting out of the military is very often compared to the end of a prison sentence. Consider it. Really think about this next sentence for a minute. People who get out of the military, get out for various reasons that are good enough to have them willing to completely abandon the life they know, all their friends, and the only place they have to live, to risk it all starting a new life doing anything else. Making a person like that go back and stick his dick out for the Nation again, causes hurt feelings. Trust me on this: raising an army by calling up the Reserve Corps would be a HUGE mistake for a President bent on tyranny.

This is more nanny state nose poking. When the President thinks the local yokels in flyover country just couldn't possibly handle whatever situation he thinks is emergent, he can call up some military members from the IRR to help out. They will hate it. They will be as disloyal as they can be without going to jail. They will have poor customer service. They will NOT be herding you into detention camps if you don't want to get a flu vaccine shot.

Calm down. Wait for the actual alert to go out. No Fort Sumters. Besides, this really is a very mild provision compared to forced volunteerism on the part of your schoolchildren as part of a civilian force loyal to Barack Hussein Obama that is ALSO already the Law of The Land.

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*End of Active Obligated Service (date): the day you are transferred from Active to Inactive status in the Personnel office and given a different ID card. NOT technically a civilian yet!