For socialists, that's a remarkably egotistical view of the ethics of national service. What about your oath? What about the men you trained with, who were depending on you to look out for their interests as their CSM? Even if you were staunchly opposed to the war, don't you have duties to your word, to your comrades, to the country you swore to serve?
Amazing.
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That's how socialism works. It's a commitment to Society as an abstract concept, one that only exists in the future. In service of achieving that Society, they must subvert or destroy all current forms of bourgeois society, which are (in their minds) inherently oppressive and obstructive. So, they are not expected to have any particular loyalty to the family, the church, the military unit, the nation, or any other forms of bourgeois society that form a wall between them and their grand Society. In this interminable time between the advent of capitalism and the coming Revolution, there is no particular injunction against joining current social groups for two reasons: they have to in order to advocate for the Revolution in those groups, and there is no choice -- all current social groups are tainted by industrial capitalism, so they must join them, but they do so as spies (agents of change, in their minds), joining the system to undermine it and bring the Revolution closer. In this paradigm, clearly, Walz believed he was more valuable pushing for the Revolution in Congress than serving in Iraq (a capitalist imperialist war in their minds), so that's what he did.
At least, that's my take on it.
In this paradigm, clearly, Walz believed he was more valuable pushing for the Revolution in Congress than serving in Iraq....
I think you're overthinking it. If Walz thought he was more valuable to The Cause in Congress than in the Guard--at the time, he had no idea of Austin and Milley undermining our combat capability from the top--he would have left the Guard much earlier.
Walz welched on his school commitment and on his commitment to his unit because he was that afraid of going into an actual danger zone.
Eric Hines
"Duty is the sublimest word in the language; you can never do more than your duty; you shall never wish to do less." --Robert E. Lee
That's the real reason these losers want Lee cancelled.
“The Four Feathers.”
Eric, I think a lot of things w/ Marxists are underthought. I doubt he actually thought in the terms I describe, and if he had he might have been embarrassed. But that is Marxist culture, and while I doubt he ever consciously thought about the Revolution (a term they don't use anymore) or any of that, he does seem to be of that culture, and that is why I think he felt no particular loyalty to stay.
"I have to do what's best for ME"--even if that means violating an oath after taking pay. Hey, I needed the money! No one told me I was supposed to get shot at!
I doubt he actually thought in the terms I describe, and if he had he might have been embarrassed.
Tom, you're more generous than I am (but that's a low bar). I agree he wasn't thinking in those terms; I think, though, he was thinking about the safety of his own hide and how that was so much more important than his oath--and his honor--and the lives of the men and women he was supposed to be leading.
How else to explain his insistence--on his Governor Web site--that he retired at a rank higher than the one he actually retired at, and his insistence that he carried "weapons of war" in a "war zone?" All while eliding the fact that he quit the program that got him a temporary promotion before completing that program, much less serving out the commitment that entry into that program committed him to?
Eric Hines
Good points, Eric.
I think a man who is quite scared of going to war may yet go if he feels a strong loyalty to the men he's trained for war with and has a strong sense of not wanting to let them down. Likewise, he may go if he has a strong sense of duty to his nation. I think Marxist culture erodes both the ties of loyalty to comrades in arms and duty to nation. So, yes, you're probably right that he was concerned mostly about himself, but Marxist culture made that easy for him.
Why does that "left-wing fellow" think Walz was "against" the war? He didn't resign from the Guard under protest, when it became clear this was a "forever" war. He was happy enough to claim the status of "veteran" when it was convenient. When he went to Congress, he would vote against the authorization to use military force (AUMF), whenever a bill that would clearly never pass came up-- yet never once voted to rescind funding for the war pursuant that AUMF, nor even voted for putting restrictions or time limits on use of funding that AUMF. When he was governor, he never objected to Minnesota units being activated and deployed. He voted for everything, and its opposite too.
Walz was against HIMSELF going to war, certainly, but I can't find any detectable principles in his behavior when OTHER PEOPLE were deploying to war, or OTHER PEOPLE paying for wars-- even when those people were directly under his military authority (either as Battalion CSM or as state governor).
--Janet
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