◼ The elitists meeting in Aspen are concocting their latest effort at social engineering. - Bruce Chapman/American Spectator
...In the midst of rising public distrust of government and, especially, distrust of the Obama Administration, Administration backers and their allies are launching yet another plan for major expansion of government and Washington’s control over people’s lives....
Compulsion is not very popular in peacetime, so the obligation to “volunteer,” according to Aspen leader Gen. Stanley McChrystal (Ret.), only will be “socially mandatory,” the way many high schools and colleges these days require performance of “service” in order to graduate.
I put the word “volunteer” in quotes here because “mandatory” service, however it is constructed, is only considered voluntary by Orwellians. Real voluntary service is a touchstone of our culture, but this is something else and almost contradictory, a kind of social engineering by the federal government. One distinction is the incentive of money. The new corps — some greatly expanded combination of existing government agencies — will be “modestly paid.” As a reward for a year’s service, participants would receive something over $12,500 (the AmeriCorps rate today for 11 months) and $5,000, one understands, to help reduce college loans.
The taxpayers, who have so little else to do with their money anymore, will foot the bill.
