Did Obama Tell A Lie About Desire To Join Military?
by Big Dog on Sep 7, 2008 at 19:30 Political
Barack Obama must need more sleep and after the week he has had he must need a cigarette. The Sainted One was on This Week with George Stephanopoulos and he made two mistakes. The first one dealt with the smears against candidates and he stated that the McCain campaign had not brought up “My Muslim faith”. I know what he meant but it was certainly a slip of the tongue he does not need because under Islam one may lie to further the religion. How many will see it this way? Fortunately for Obama, George was there to correct him like a good Democrat. Obama went on to say how McCain surrogates had been the ones and completely ignored the fact that Hillary and her peeps were the ones to spread this all over during the primary. That is what ticks me off the most about Obama’s answer.
There is one item that is more than likely an outright lie. Obama was asked if he had ever considered joining the military and he said he had. This little tidbit has NEVER been mentioned during the oh so long campaign and according to the news, Obama did not mention this in either of his books. One would think that might be a big deal. It is likely that Obama is lying about this in order to ingratiate himself with people who actually support the military. The second part of the lie comes in when he said he had to register for the Selective Service when he graduated from high school. There was no registration for the Selective Service when Obama graduated.
The draft and the Selective Service registration were ended by Republican presidents (Nixon and Ford respectively) and the new registration requirement was instituted by a Democrat, Jimmy Carter. Yes, Obama was required to register but he graduated in 1979 and the registration was reinstated in 1980. Therefore, Obama was not required to register when he graduated, as he claims in the interview. He was not required to register until a year later.
Obama claims that he decided against joining because we were not engaged in an actual conflict at that time (though we were in a standoff with Iran over hostages, depending when he thought about it in 1979). I guess we are supposed to believe that the guy who wants a defeat in Iraq was willing to join the service, had we been at war.
It is more likely that Obama realizes his life lacks in military service when one considers the other three candidates. Biden has a son in the Guard who will deploy next year, McCain served and has two sons in the service and Palin has a son in the military who is deploying this week. Obama is the odd person out having never served and having children who are too young to serve (and will never serve anyway).
I think this is a huge lie on the part of Obama. People can defend him if they want but the timeline of the draft registration coupled with the fact that he never mentioned this in his books or during this campaign tells me that it was recently concocted.
Source:
Telegraph UK
Neither the Telegraph or Stephanopoulos pointed out the inaccuracies.
UPDATE: It is possible that Obama made a mistake when he said he registered when he graduated from high school but I find it unlikely he would not know that he registered while in college. Besides, he specifically said when he graduated, not after and he made a big deal about being in Hawaii and all the military bases. Bottom line, if it were true that he considered joining he would have mentioned it in one of his books.
Tags: draft, lies, military service, Obama, selective service registration
I worked vary hard during my time in the 7th Infantry maintaining my reputation as the least ambitious soldier in the U.S. Army.
What kind of cigarette does he need? He is already wacky enough. 🙂
I just ran across this and as Blackfive puts it–”
This is the matter to remember as we proceed forward. The contest to which this speech applied is over: but the principles that lay under this speech are the ones that should move us in this year’s choice as well.”
I never heard this speech that year, and I didn’t believe there were any Democrats who would say this. It goes to the heart of why I can’t stand Obama.
http://www.blackfive.net/main/2008/09/the-greatest-po.html
While I respect John McCain’s military service, in McCain’s day ALL men HAD to go into the military. Many guys went ahead and enlisted, because they knew they were going to get drafted anyway. Enlisting was a way to have some say about what branch of the service they could get into.
But would McCain have enlisted if there was no draft? No one knows that.
McCain’s being in the military was a legal requirement of his generation, and to suggest he would have enlisted without a draft is only a guess.
Considering how wild and selfish McCain was in his youth (his own words), I doubt he would have enlisted without a draft.
JT,
McCain entered the Naval Academy following in the footsteps of his father and his grandfather. He entered sometime around 1954 and graduated in 1958. The armistice for the Korean War was signed in 1953 and the Vietnam War started in 1959 so there was no war while he was in school.
He followed family tradition and went to the Naval Academy. He was not forced to do it (except maybe by family pressure).
Certainly, his two children had a choice because there was no draft and they entered. Some families have a tradition of military service.
Just for the record, I also graduated in 1979. I don’t know when the law for selective service was implemented, but I do know when I turned 18, I had to register for selective service. I turned 18 in May 1979. So, Obama could easily have registered while he was in High School or soon after.
From http://www.sss.gov/FSbackgr.htm
Registration was suspended early in 1975 and the Selective Service System entered into a “deep standby” posture. Beginning in late 1979, a series of “revitalization” efforts were begun in an effort to upgrade the System’s capability for rapid mobilization in an emergency, and in the summer of 1980 the registration requirement was resumed. Presently, young men must register within 30 days of their 18th birthday.
I remember doing this in High School as part of a “graduation” party. However, the facts don’t backup my memory. So (ooh I hate to admit this), the Big O and I both have faulty memory.
That is the same information I relayed in the post. I also, in an Update, indicated that he could be mistaken but he specifically said that he did it at graduation and made a big deal about the Hawaii military bases.
Obama registered but he did it September 4th 1980. His registration number is 61-1125539-1
@Loverher: I graduated in 1979 and joined the Army in 1980. They made me sign up because I had not yet gone on active duty…
I registered in the year 2000. Ha. Oh…anyway…I’ll be quiet now.
@Adam:
You registered in 2000 because you were not born when the rest of us had to do it. Young’un!
It may not have been 2000. Maybe early 2001, right before college. But anyway…