Slaney, Cohen: Capuano should cosponsor student privacy bill

Slaney, Cohen: Capuano should cosponsor student privacy bill
By Dave Slaney and Leslie Cohen
Fri Nov 16, 2007, 11:18 AM EST

http://www.wickedlocal.com/cambridge/news/opinions/x9499523

Cambridge - If a war is worth fighting (that is, if that war is absolutely necessary to defend this country against military attack), the armed forces will not lack for volunteers. But when the U.S. government wages war solely in order to strengthen its control over a significant proportion of the world’s oil supplies, it is not so easy to find young Americans willing to kill and risk being killed for such a cause. Therefore, the U.S. military is now resorting to increasingly deceptive, manipulative and high-pressure recruiting tactics to fill its quota for Iraq. People who truly believe that our country should not engage in unnecessary wars will presumably want to do nothing to enable the U.S. military to fill such a quota, both in order to stop the war in Iraq and as a way of putting pressure on our government to resort to war only for self-defense and only when all other means of self-defense have proved useless.

How, then, to explain the position of our congressman, Iraq-war opponent Mike Capuano, who — unlike half of the Massachusetts congressional delegation — has refused to cosponsor the Student Privacy Protection Act of 2007 (HR 1346)? This bill would bar the release of students’ names and contact information to anyone, including military recruiters, unless parents consent in writing. (Under the current law, student information is automatically given to military recruiters unless parents refuse in writing.) Why does Mike Capuano want to help the military sell a needless and catastrophic war to our kids? Why does he want to make it easier for recruiters to reach our kids with their bribes and dishonest sales pitches?

Apparently, Mike Capuano defends his refusal to cosponsor the Student Privacy Protection Act at least in part by arguing that giving recruiters access to all high school students will result in a military that more closely reflects the population. But the current law promotes just the opposite, since parents with more education are presumably more likely than others to know that they can prevent recruiters from targeting their kids only if they instruct the school, in writing, not to give out their children’s names.

To level the playing field and give all of our children a truly equal chance of not being tricked into becoming cannon fodder in an unwarranted and therefore immoral war, we would need to give every child equal access to college and career opportunities. While that is unfortunately unattainable in our present political climate, the least we, and Mike Capuano, can do is try to keep every child’s name and contact information out of the clutches of military recruiters.

Kids who are truly determined to go to Iraq can easily find a recruiter without any help from their school—or from Mike Capuano.

Dave Slaney and Leslie Cohen are representatives of Cambridge United for Justice with Peace.