In the military, particularly those in the Army, Marines, and Navy (not the Air Force, they have higher standards, and therefore only take a certain number each year), there is no surprise that a disproportionate of enlistees are from low-income areas. Regardless of the belief by some that people wanted to join the military to develop leadership qualities and improve self esteem, one fact of the matter is that many join for economic security. They essentially join because they know that they would receive a consistent paycheck and benefits that they know would not be available if they were in the private sector. Because this is the case, it is logical to conclude that in a political context, enlistees, military personnel and those who depend on military dollars will have no trouble supporting egregious funding for a military industrial complex.

In this political season, Obama has made it known that in order to fund his vision of a new "green" economy, the money has to come from somewhere. That somewhere is the military. He has said on the stump that he would support veterans, but some veterans with conservative leanings are skeptical.

Yet, they shouldn't be. The money from the military that Obama is speaking of is not the money needed to run the day to day operations of the military. It is the pork. The Bush administration shelled out billions in wasteful spending to companies who leeched on to military projects like parasites. This money, Obama believes, should be directed towards a better health care system and educational opportunities for veterans. Also, he wishes to use the money to assist those soldiers in transition to obtain the skills needed to participate in the green economy when those soldiers are released. Let's be honest, only a small percentage of enlistees actually retire from the military. Most enlistees do four years and that's it.

Obama's plan is similar to Bill Clinton's in the sense of how the money will be distributed. I remember when I was in the military during the early-90's, and the mantra during that time was "Fraud, Waste, and Abuse". The military was obsessed with controlling waste, even down to the toilet paper. My civilian supervisor would whine if I used too much paper, or lose too many pencils, or use too much ink. We were ordered to be succinct with memos, only the basics, no unnecessary rambling, which meant they were written of half-slices of paper. We were also given limited packs of paper every three months. If you ran out before the cycle, you were SOL and then written up. However, in the long run, it worked out fine. Frugality became a character trait.

With such a fairly solid military plan offered by Obama (no plan is pitch perfect) , what is the fear that continues to run through the veins of many right-wing, die-hard soldiers and sailors who out-and-out oppose him, even though his plan is in their best interest? And certainly a plan better than McCain's, if he has one.

The fear they have is simple: they don't really believe that they can compete in the private sector.

I noticed this when I was in the military. The people whom I worked with, if asked, were usually near or at the bottom of their class come high school graduation time. Some were ordered by the court to join the military. Very few were honor students. If you had been an honor student in school and was now in the military, you were most likely an officer. But the NCO's and enlistees were C and D students who felt they don't have the credentials or the smarts to go to college, to earn a degree, and to be hired by top private companies. They also don't believe they have the fortitude to run a small business either. They decided to settle for military life.

With Obama as president, they know that the economy will shift, which means more schooling or training. But for some absurd reason, many career right-wing veterans are resistant to book learning. They are just not good at it, which is one of the reasons they would try to demean college-educated people with words like "elitist", "egg-head", "arrogant" and for heaven's sake, "liberal".

Of course, I'm not speaking about all. There are some who do go to college, but those who stay in the military rarely get beyond an Associate's degree.

They also fear being trapped in cross purposes between the college-educated whom they feel inadequate against, or the immigrant crowd whose jobs for which most of them qualify for seems beneath them. This fear keeps them trapped in such a precarious middle. They question their identity, "Am I good enough?" when referring to the college crowd, and "Shouldn't I be better than them?" when it comes to the immigrant. So, instead of confronting these psychological truths, they hang on to the military where it is safe. They even get to a point where they convince themselves that the military was all they ever wanted and couldn't see themselves doing anything else. So they accept accusations of elitism about Obama, cast a spurge on his "soldier-killing, unpatriotic" plan, turn their ears toward Rush Limbaugh, and listen to rhetoric.

It is rather sad, though.