It should no more be necessary to write this article than to prove that there were Jews killed in the World Trade Center on 9/11. And yet the mythology refuses to die. Just last week, two well-educated and well-known writer acquaintances of mine remarked in passing on the "fact" that those who serve in the U.S. military typically have no other career options. America's soldiers, they said, were poor and black.
They don't mean this to denigrate their service—no, they mean it as a critique of American society, which turns its unemployed into cannon fodder. Especially today with high unemployment, the charge goes, hapless youths we fail to educate are embarking on a one-way trip to Afghanistan.
Once again, they must be reminded that those who join the military are among our country's more capable and would be among the more qualified in the civilian sector.
Funny enough, the charge is true of our enemies:
One of the little discussed tragedies of Islamic terrorism is the fact that most of those it attracts are the least capable recruits. Islamic terrorism is not only an act of extremism, but also of desperation of those who have few other prospects. It's an international organization because Islam, in general, has not been amenable to taking advantage of new technology and economic opportunity, except for cable TV and the Internet. That's why the Moslem world has lagged so far behind the rest of the world in the last century.
Of course, in a sign that they are at least consistent, these Progressives have an explanation for that, too: the jihadi organizations are filled with society's outcasts who have no other place to go in our awful American-designed global system.
