I urge anyone with an interest in this area go to Elaine Donnelly"s website: Center for Military Readiness, www.cmrlink.org/. Elaine has been taking on this issue for more than a decade and has a great deal of the pros and cons. Your IDF questions are answered there.

Another possibility for this is the same the Obama administration is using in the cuts for the Army and Marines, if you don't have ground troops you will not go to war. If you have women in combat roles, then you will be less likely to use them with an America hypersensitive to combat losses magnified by her girls in ponytails coming back in body bags.

I am reminded of a story I read from a SF firefighter who complained that due to physical standards being lowered for women to join SFFD, that men for the most part did the lifesaving. Eventually, this turned to firefighters "taking turns" in that if was the women firefighters turn to "make the rescue" and she could not, or would not, the victim was out of luck.Rationale: Same pay, same risk, diluted mission.

Great post! The University where I have taught as an Adjuct for 20 years, is not an Ivy and has few graduate programs. With 3500 or so full time students, its 2013 budget is $220Million.  Faculty salaries make up less than 1/3 of that amount. That is a lot of overhead.

That area of the University where I teach, with the local part-time students, we have reversed course and eliminated most online programs in favor of tougher standards and more streamlined and focused subject areas taught in the classroom. In the past decade we were giving Un iversity degrees to students who could not write, take notes or present coherently. Much of this was laid out to a lack of "touch" between student and instructor. We decided not to compete with for-profits anymore but will concentrate on providing quality. The student flow is expected to drop in half. So be it. Also, and I think this is a trend, we are seeing more students who have rejected being involved in the mass electronic spectrum: No internet, no Facebook, no e-mail, no Twitter. This puts quite  a roadblock to online classes.

I think cdor has the full measure of this: This is the prelude to justify dumping Biden! They are getting desperate.

Wonderful! We have laughed until our sides ached!

Ditto on the Long/Goldberg/Steyn, Love your books and your idea CJ!

The proposed ban on Farmer's kids under 18 doing certain chores
is such a folly if it were not so sad. I ask again, What is the price we will not pay?

Ditto, bruised ego.

I have written about this in Ricochet twice in the last year. When Rob writes about it, suddenly its news. Good. Actually this idea emanated from Jesse Jackson more than a decade or so ago, but in a slightly different mechanism. He wanted 10% of all 401-ks to be invested in some type of "community assets" pool to be doled out to needy communities. Get the picture.  I think CALPERS did something like this.  The end result is, there is TOO much money here for them not to try to get their hands on it! As RR said, "there is a price we will not pay" but what dear friends will that price be?

The fence might be a better idea than blowing the bridges on the interstates as some of us have contemplated. Rock on!

This is the second post that has been less than kind about the South in the last 24 hours, is this part of the the new Ricochet move to bolster membership?

Thank you for this post. As an old Cold War Warrior this reminds me of the the role that Pravada reporters played defending any action by a Party member. In some ways the Feds are taking on an aura of the Party, that what protects and buffers the politicians and their power. Of course they deserve a few dalliances. Dana is just protecting his main readership, Washington  DC feds.

Just read another quip from that interview on "Future of Capitalism", Barney actually quoted Hayek's "Road to Serfdom", but then in the way only Barney can, uses it totally out of context. Claims the right wants to do away with ALL government, the reason there is no bipartisanship in DC, and even Hayek said that no goverment was disastrous for the any society. The guy still can't deal with reality or the truth.

Seeing how Kaplan University, a for-profit, provides 60 to 70% of the profits for the Washington Post Company, I would imagine the real heat won't come down until after the election.

I agree with all Richard says here. But is the higher ed business much different than any other industry that has headed for a bubble? Higher ed sets pricing subsidized by the government(s), controls costs through adjuncts, convinces the public you can't live with out its products and cheap and available credit to fund it all. Throw in the  captive foundations and Government grants and you have an Industry UTOPIA! However sooner or later, like all industries, what comes around, goes around and it is time to face the music. Public unions, federal work force, and  college employees, all stalwarts of the progressive party and coming close to being out of dance tickets.

Well stated Richard. I wonder to what degree NBC has colluded with other networks who have come out with corrections, but similar apologies. However, my real anger is directed at GE, who has been putting up with this crap for a long time, and Comcast, whose poor delivery of customer service, almost bordering on contempt, is legendary. I never knowingly give any three of them my business and delight in tearing up there marketing material.

My guess is that this situation is in total legal lockdown.  The NBC lawyers are writing all of the statements. Don't be too surprised if we visit George Zimmerman in 12 months and he is not sucking down a rum and cola at his new place at St. Barts paid for with his "private settlement" from NBC.

And the Women in our Country support Obama! Go figure!

Mollie and Conservative Fred, if you really want to be amused by this, read over the Comments Section to the piece. Peggy gets absolutely skewered on this very same issue.

If I ever wanted females to comment about the male bonding experiences I can think of no better than Emily, Mollie and Diana. But I still don't think you get it, and why would you? Males have fought, bled and loved each other for thousands of years. I think some women are  jealous of this bond for a multitude of reasons.

University professors pick on frats for hazing when many of them are pros at hazing for those students and faculty members that don't follow the progressive line. These are today's master hazers. As my Son told me, a recent liberal arts grad of an "elite" university, my entire scholastic career was built on two tracks, the one i showed my professors, and the one I really believed in.