Listening to the garbage coming from the media these days, it’s easy to assume the Army is fighting this war on multiple fronts – from lands as far as Iraq and Afghanistan to places much closer than you may think. The percentage of Army recruits that require conduct waivers has increased from 4.6 percent in 2004 to 11 percent this past fiscal year, reported USA Today. Currently, 13 percent of Army recruits need waivers. Also, the amount of Army recruits who’ve graduated with high school diplomas dropped from 91 percent in 2001 to 79 percent in 2007. I’m sick of hearing stories like these – stories that demean our troops – being considered newsworthy.
Many tried to claim this story meant the Army was facing a downward trend in recruitment goals and continued to verbally assault the men and women sacrificing their lives to serve this country. Just put “Army conduct waivers” and “CNN’s Cafferty File” in any search engine to read some of the cowardly comments written about our troops. Soldiers with conduct waivers are allegedly scraped from “the bottom of the barrel” as one blogger put it. Another called them “undisciplined, unruly sociopaths with criminal records. They are misfits [who] will eventually have to come back to civilian life – after they have been trained to kill and destroy their targets.” These people ignore a few important facts about this story from top military officials. First, most waivers involve misdemeanor offenses. Second, conduct waivers don’t hurt the quality of recruits entering the Army because waivers are only granted after reviewing community recommendations. Third, recruits with waivers generally make better soldiers than their peers. About 71 percent of Army conduct waivers involved misdemeanors, according to The Associated Press. Despite this information, hecklers persist in demoralizing our troops for no other reason than advancing their own political agendas. If we can forgive Bill Clinton and Barack Obama for smoking marijuana or George W. Bush for drinking too much, shouldn’t we give a second chance to the people willing to fight so we don’t have to? Discipline problems will continue to carry over to the military until average citizens begin to take more responsibility and change their own behavior. As long as society excuses so much disturbing behavior, we can’t expect any less from the military. They’re the ones performing exceptionally every day by displaying exemplary behavior through selfless and heroic service. A Nov. 6, 2007, AP report explained that some waivers were required for things such as criminal records, low aptitude scores and even tattoos. Tattoos. Further, Lt. Gen. Michael Rochelle confirmed in the same article that many recruits who required waivers were arrested for “youthful indiscretions,” such as minor fights – even if they weren’t convicted. Navy Adm. Mike Mullen is convinced that increasing waivers won’t lead to more disciplinary issues in the military, according to the AP. In the same report, David S. C. Chu, undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, noted the increase in waivers might be a generational problem. Chu said our legislators and government leaders aren’t held to anything near the same standard. I also wonder what percentage of ordinary Americans have ever committed misdemeanors – whether they were caught or not. Speaking about the current conduct policy involving drug use – including one-time marijuana use – Chu had this eye-opening comment: “Not to be cheeky about this, but [if] we apply that standard to our legislative overseers, a significant fraction would need waivers to join the United States military,” he said. Stories such as these – from senselessly reporting a rise in conduct waivers to the New York Times article reporting the amount of war veterans turned violent criminals – create an almost inevitably negative view of the media. When top Democratic officials like Jack Murtha, D-Pa., shamelessly condemn innocent American war heroes while ignoring the facts of the case and fabricating details in the name of politics, the political divide becomes unavoidable. This is what leads people to label the mainstream media “liberal” – it’s not just Fox News. I’m one of the people who has trouble understanding how someone won’t support the mission but can claim to support those who voluntarily carry out the mission. I understand, of course, that these people probably have the best interest of the troops at heart, but I’ll never be convinced that stories such as these don’t work to demoralize American soldiers.
—-Contact Daniel Lumetta at [email protected]