Its law now

[Joe_in_RP]

Times are changing. These laws are just zipping through in the new administration.

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WASHINGTON (AP) - Calling on Americans to volunteer, President Barack Obama signed a $5.7 billion national service bill Tuesday that triples the size of the AmeriCorps service program over the next eight years and expands ways for students to earn money for college.

"We need your service, right now, in this moment in history. ... I'm asking you to stand up and play your part," said Obama, a former community organizer in Chicago. "I'm asking you to help change history's course."

Oh its historic alright. Included in this law is the authority to make national service mandatory. No exceptions.

Just keep your eyes open.

[carolaa]

I didn't see anything in there about mandatory service.

[Joe_in_RP]

HR 1388 specifically targets Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA) and the National Civilian Community Corps (NCCC) which Congress expects will reach 250,000 participants by 2014. From school-based service learning programs to focusing on severely economically depressed communities, the GIVE act sounds good until you get to part about the mandatory service requirement for youth. How can volunteerism be mandatory? The Future explains:

Section 6104 of The Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education Act requires that a commission be established to investigate, “Whether a workable, fair, and reasonable mandatory service requirement for all able young people could be developed, and how such a requirement could be implemented in a manner that would strengthen the social fabric of the Nation and overcome civic challenges by bringing together people from diverse economic, ethnic, and educational backgrounds.”

Of course I imagine cadres of youth working on environmental projects such as tree planting; however, I can’t get on board with the involuntary servitude. It’s even scarier when you consider Obama’s chief of staff Rahm Emanuel coauthored The Plan: Big Ideas for America that calls for compulsory service for Americans ages 18 to 25:

Here’s how it would work. Young people will know that between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five, the nation will enlist them for three months of civilian service. They’ll be asked to report for three months of basic civil defense training in their state or community, where they will learn what to do in the event of biochemical, nuclear or conventional attack; how to assist others in an evacuation; how to respond when a levee breaks or we’re hit by a natural disaster. These young people will be available to address their communities’ most pressing needs.

In fact, Obama and Biden ran on the idea of required community service for our youth:

Obama and Biden will set a goal that all middle and high school students do 50 hours of community service a year, and will establish a new tax credit that is worth $4,000 a year in exchange for 100 hours of public service a year.

http://redgreenandblue.org/2009/03/23/hr...oung-americans/

Just goggle mandatory service. Their are many people writing about it. Of coarse 90% of Americans will never know until its to late. We talked about it here last month. People thought I was overreacting.

[carolaa]

That looks like a lot of speculation.