Excerpt: "Apparently, potential recruits aren't buying whatever it is the military is selling these days as reasons for signing away one's freedom to federal bureaucrats for a period of years. After all, the military is the only job that one can't quit at any time, so any intelligent person will think long and hard before signing up. There are many reasons for the recruitment problem. The decline in mental and physical fitness is real, and many young people are disqualified from a military job even before applying. Many others are put off by what appears to be an overtly politicized and partisan military. Pentagon leaders appear to be doubling down on ideological crusades more and more. Even while it faces a recruiting crisis, the military still refuses to provide back pay to service members who were forced out for declining the experimental covid vaccines. Unquestioning compliance with vaccine mandates, of course, is a cause near and dear to the current administration. Then there are the "woke" crusades in which military brass use drag queens as Navy recruiters and create recruitment ads tailor-made for LGBT personnel. ... But there are other more deep-seated problems as well. There is growing evidence that the American public no longer reveres the military as it once did. Moreover, it is more abundantly clear than ever that military service has nothing to do with defending the United States or its people. "