But how the heck do you objectively and scientifically measure good citizenship anyway? Cripes, if there actually was a fail-safe way to do this, we might have our working voting test!

We keep coming back to that basic question, don't we? I don't know the answer, only the general principle that the narrower the restrictions, the more likely they are to produce a poor result, because we don't know how to construct effective criteria.

I would observe, anecdotally, that the effect of military service has depended on the circumstances, especially in times of war. WWII vets came back with a good attitude, in that there was consensus that they fought on the right side for a just cause. They came back proud to take responsibility for their country. Many Vietnam vets, in contrast, came back bitter and disillusioned, and permanently resentful of the leaders and system that sent them. Most of them were conscripts under the age of 21, and having had no say in their fate certainly contributed to their attitude.

Conversely, the sloppy peacetime military of the '50s, and again in the '70s, no doubt left those who served in it less likely to take it, and the country, seriously. That kind of military rewarded evasion of responsibility, gaming the system, and generally doing the minimum work possible to slide by.

(BTW, I recommend you go back and read "Starship Troopers" again! How long has it been since you read it, and how old were you at the time?)

Well, Pops, I last read the book when the movie came out (a couple of years ago?), in advance of seeing it, to refresh my memory. I must've been about 45. The movie was an abomination.

In the natural course of things, it'll rotate out of my library again in about ten years. I think that's plenty often.

--Robert