Red-State Army?

[meow2u3]

In Hopewell Township, N.J., the veterans of American Legion Post 339 have put their building up for sale. "Today's vets don't come out," 82-year old Jim Hall told The Times of Trenton last month. The post is down from 425 paying members in the 1960s and '70s to 202 this year; only about a dozen regularly attend.

But it's America that has changed, not vets.

Since 1970, the population of the United States has grown by about 50 percent, from roughly 200 million to 300 million. Over the same period, the number of active-duty armed forces has fallen approximately 50 percent, from 3 million to 1.4 million. A far smaller percentage of the citizenry now serves in the military.

Whereas in 1969 13 percent of Americans were veterans, in 2007 only 8 percent of us were.

Even more important than these general demographic shifts is the change wrought by the end of the draft in 1973. Until then, military service was distributed pretty evenly across regions. But that is no longer true. The residential patterns for current veterans and the patterns of state-level contributions of new recruits to the all-volunteer military have a distinct geographic tilt. And tellingly, the map of military service since 1973 aligns closely with electoral maps distinguishing red from blue states.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/14/AR2008121401815.html


IMO, the army is the only job available for Red Staters. The real jobs were shipped off to China.

[zeemike]

1. Jobs are part of it

But the other part of it is that red state young men are well schooled in the use of violence and the use of guns....it is clearly part of their culture.
And that is why we need an conscripted service, because we need for all americans to participate in the ugly business of war...as a duty, not to become a hero.
\But I guess if your goal is Fascist, you want a red state army.

[hay rick]

2. Hopewell Township

Hopewell Township isn't a particularly representative blue state town. There's actually a wiki entry for this little (pop. about 2000 and probably declining) borough:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hopewell,_New_Jersey

Hopewell is 95+% white and has a median household income of $77,270 (versus N.J. $67,000 and U.S. $50,700). Not a promising demographic for new military recruits.

I occasionally visit a VFW and an AL in a growing and more diverse area on the Jersey shore. Similar story- an old crowd and declining memberships- but not as bad as Hopewell.

[jmowreader]

3. Something else has changed, and it's not just military penetration into society

People aren't joiners anymore.

Thirty or forty years ago, most men belonged to some sort of fraternal organization. It didn't matter if it was the Eagles, the Elks, the Moose, Odd Fellows, Rotary, Kiwanis, Masons, Shriners...most men belonged to one of those groups. A man's night out was to go to "the lodge." Now? It's very rare to find someone who belongs to a lodge.

[DustyJoe]

4. Some Tried to Join

When I was discharged from the Army in 1969 and moved back home I tried to join the VFW a few years later in the 70's. Well I was laughed and derided from the 'real' vets that had won wars and never went back. Guess now that so many of these 'real' vets have all passed on, they need the members. No Thanks guys. I do belong to the national DAV and Purple Heart orgs, but not the local ones.