Dude, Where's My Country_ - Michael Moore [105]
9. A Liberal Paradise
There are roughly 1.4 million men and women active in the military today according to the Department of Defense, “DoD Active Duty Military Personnel Strength Levels, fiscal years 1950-2002.” Even during Vietnam, from 1965 to 1972, only 2,594,000 Americans served, as reported by David M. Halbfinger and Steven A. Holmes, “Military Mirrors a Working-Class America,” The New York Times, March 30, 2003.
Even at the dawn of the unending “War on Terror,” a poll of college students from the Americans for Victory Over Terrorism, released in the May 2002, found that 21 percent would evade the draft completely, while 37 percent were only willing to serve in the military if that service took place within the United States. Spokespeople for the Army and the Marines have said that September 11 did not bring an increase in recruitment, and cited internal research from the Marine Corps that showed the war has had a “neutral to slightly negative” effect on recruitment, according to Joyce Howard Price’s report, “Marines, Army view war as recruitment aid,” published in The Washington Times, March 31, 2003. David M. Halbfinger, in the article cited above, states that personnel numbers for the military have dropped 23 percent in the last decade.
For the poll numbers on Americans’ view of health care, see the following: Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and The News Hour with Jim Lehrer Uninsured Survey, May 16, 2000; and Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation/Harvard School of Public Health, February 12, 2003. International comparisons on health-care costs come from Robert H. LeBow, Health Care Meltdown, published 2003. For an extensive report on the numbers of Americans who do not have health insurance, check out “Going Without Health Insurance,” from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Families USA, March 2003.
Support for racial diversity, and our views on race in general, can be found in Will Lester’s “Poll finds black-white agreement on diversity, disagreement on how to get there,” Associated Press, March 7, 2003; Riley E. Dunlap’s “Americans Have Positive Image of the Environmental Movement,” Gallup News Service, April 18, 2000; the Pew Global Attitudes Project Poll, June 3, 2003; the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption’s poll conducted by Harris Interactive, June 19, 2002; Washington Post/Kaiser Family Foundation/Harvard University, “Race and Ethnicity in 2001: Attitudes, Perceptions, and Experiences,” August 2001.The rise in interracial marriages over the past two decades was reported by Cloe Cabrera, “Biracial marriages on rise as couples overcome differences,” Tampa Tribune, January 1, 2000.
For more on our views of the women’s movement and abortion rights, see: Riley E. Dunlap, “Americans Have Positive Image of the Environmental Movement,” Gallup News Service, April 18, 2000; ABC News/Washington Post Poll, January 21, 2003; NBC News/Wall Street Journal, January 28, 2003; Pew Research Center, January 16, 2003; Gallup/CNN/USA Today Poll, January 15, 2003; and ABC News/ Washington Post Poll, January 21, 2003. For statistics on abortion, visit the Alan Guttmacher Institute online at www.agi-usa.org. The increase of couples living together without getting married, and in many cases not having children, was reported by Laurent Belsie, “More couples live together, roiling debate on family,” Christian Science Monitor, March 13, 2003.
Reports on the public’s views of the criminalization of drugs, the sentencing of nonviolent offenders, views on how to deal with crime in general