An Army of One-Issue Voters

Marines, soldiers, sailors, and airmen hold radical opinions, sometimes crazily  contradictory opinions.

Many men and women in uniform I have known are one-issue voters.  So many soldiers I met in Iraq voted their guns.  There was no issue beyond guns that could sway them. The NRA rating of the candidate was like the score of an olympic gymnast.  That rating said winner or loser, loudly and finally.

People of Faith in the military tend to be radical. I knew one-issue anti-abortion voters in uniform, and I knew one-issue women's-right-to-choose voters in uniform who were really strong in their opinions.

One of the funnier categories for me was the libertarian soldier. I could understand libertarian soldiers when there was a draft, or in their first enlistment, but I have known many career soldiers who professed belief in small-government and were against socialism in any form--except their own lifelong government health care and VA benefits.  I knew one sergeant who was a libertarian and also a lobbyist working to get more money from the state and federal government for the National Guard.  He saw no contradiction. The money was for defense. That's good, he said.  It never occurred to him that every lobbyist thinks their own cause is good.

Because I served in the draft era, I have been a one-issue voter all of my life.  I won't vote for a draft dodger. I will vote for a person who chose not to serve, but not for a man who let someone else serve in his place. Since 1992 I have had a choice for President just once, in 2008. In that year, a combat veteran ran against a man who reached his 18th birthday long after the end of the draft.  I really did think about that choice in 2008, until John McCain nominated Sarah Palin as his vice president. The possibility that she would be President put me squarely on the other side. In every other election, there was at least one draft dodger running, so I voted the other candidate.

I voted today. The draft-dodger President said the vote today was about him. So I voted against him.