Calling Paul Q. Chickenshit: Your country needs you.

Regarding the weaselly Republican chickenshit we met back here, let's remind ourselves once again what he said:

If I was asked by my country to join the military in order to preserve these great traditions we share, I would do so in a heartbeat.

Well, if that's the case, I'm not sure you can get asked any more plaintively than this:

WASHINGTON - The Army, already likely to miss its recruiting goal this year, may have even more trouble filling its ranks next year, the service's chief of staff said Thursday.

"We've got enormous challenges," Gen. Peter Schoomaker told the Senate Armed Services Committee...

Pentagon officials repeatedly asked committee members Thursday to stress the importance of military service.

"It's very important that you and your colleagues use your considerable influence to explain to the American people and to those that are influencers out there how important it is for our young people to serve this nation at a time like this," Schoomaker told the senators...

The appeal to lawmakers is part of an administration effort this week to ask adults - parents, teachers and coaches - to encourage the younger generation to sign up.

On Tuesday, President Bush urged more people to enlist. A day later, Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said parents should let their sons and daughters who want to join the military follow their patriotic instincts...

The services have added recruiters, boosted enlistment bonuses and reworked recruitment strategies. Bills in Congress would add other incentives.

So, Paul, what part of the above begging for recruits don't you understand?

AFTERSNARK: There's some real entertainment value in reading some of the comments at Paul's site. Here's a gem from one of his defenders, "Lady Jane":

This is insane. Paul does not have to join the military just to validate his support of the war. After all, would you all volunteer to be aborted (or euthanised) just because you support abortion (or euthanasia)? There are many ways to support the war, other than joining the military.

I'm not going to bother responding to that middle analogy since there are levels of insipid illogic even I won't waste my time eviscerating. But let's consider Lady Jane's contention that there are other, equally valid ways to support the war effort, shall we? Are there really? If you read the salient parts of the excerpt above, I'm pretty sure that everyone in the chain of command is being pretty unambiguous as to what they want folks like Paul and Lady Jane to do. Sign up. Enlist.

I don't see these leaders asking for volunteers to do, oh, canvassing. Or putting together care packages. Or giving public rah-rah speeches. No, what they clearly want is those young Republican lads and lasses down at the recruiting center and, after that, humping that pack in 135F temperature across the Iraqi desert. I don't think there's much room for misinterpretation there, do you?

And, if you're really curious, there's the bonus of following the link to read a little about "Lady Jane", where we learn:

I graduated from GU with a degree in history, a minor in English, and my teaching certificate. I have a dog named Dani. I absolutely love to study and read about the time period in English history called the Regency. I'm a very Conservative Republican and enjoy being active in the party. I also like to watch movies. My favorite actor is Ioan Gruffudd (Yo-an Griffith) from Wales. I absolutely love tea (especially Twinings) and having a proper Tea.

Yeah, I'll bet dodging bullets and trying to avoid getting a limb or two blown off by IEDs would really cut into that "proper tea" time, wouldn't it? I'll bet a bunch of these folks would have preferred some proper tea rather than what they ended up getting.