The Hoover High School Debate Club has asked representatives of the armed services to participate in a public forum about recruitment policies on our campus. Given the present realities that military service entail, it is a discussion that merits a public airing. Our youngsters deserve honest answers to questions about what service to their country may involve. They have a right to question whether America's present course and the people who are steering it are worth the sacrifice of their lives. I know that even raising that question flies in the face of some who rigidly adhere to an unquestioning loyalty to our government (not to be confused with our flag), even as evidence mounts that that government no longer acts in the best interest of our nation.
It gets downright ugly when those same people suggest that dissent is un-American or, that it "impedes our war effort." I would ask those individuals to re-read the Declaration of Independence or any of the writings of our founding fathers to confirm the right, if not the duty, of the governed to question those who govern us. A good place to start is a line from the Declaration, which states, " ? governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it?. "
