First off, there are way more than 47,000 Army Infantry, by category. What? Are they leaving our cavalry (tanks), artillery, and all other infantry to include only combat infantrymen. Upon further review: I think the numbers given in the article are seriously flawed, to the point of being purposely misleading. I believe they include Inactive and Active Reserve. In the active enlisted component of the Armed Forces, the number are very different. Further, you can see the deployed soldiers numbers, as well. While the numbers may be different when you add the Officers into it, the supposed "myth" that the article was trying to dispell was always about enlisted personnel. The dod.mil facts as of FY2000* (which came out in February 2002) are: <b>Total Combat Occupations for Active Enlisted</b> 16.67% (32,693 out of 132,504) of the Active Duty Enlisted Infantry, Gun Crews and Seamanship "occupation category" in the Armed Forces is black. <b>Army Infantry</b> 17.6% (17,907 of 101,582) of Active Duty Enlisted Army Infantry is black. <b>Marine Corps</b> 16.2% of all the Active Enlisted Marines are black. <b>Deployed Active Component</b> Now, out of the active component, when you count the deployed enlisted members you get: 18.5% (1,824 out of 9,870) of deployed enlisted Army Infantry is black. 18.1% (2603 of 14,333) of all the deployed enlisted combat occupations is black. * see the footnotes for total numbers <a href="http://dod.mil/prhome/poprep2000/html/appendixb/b_30.htm">FY 2000 Active Component Enlisted Members by Occupational Area, Service, and Race/Ethnicity</a> and <a href="http://dod.mil/prhome/poprep2000/html/appendixf/f_02.htm">FY 2000 Deployed Active Component Enlisted Members by Occupational Area, Service, and Gender</a>
<blockquote><hr>Originally posted by MadMax i'm certainly not vouching for the numbers in the article...i don't know. <hr></blockquote> Well, the other way of responding is to say, "Man, I was totally taken by partisan numbers. D'oh. My bad." disclaimer: I have no idea what your political bent is MadMax, and mean nothing personal about your politics; I'm just trying to set the record straight on facts that are easily researchable.
heyp, first off, wow. LOL. MadMax, you convinced so many of us w/ the loaded article, and now you're quick to disavow yourself. Upon being wrong, you should make up some cute comment like "does this help discredit the myth to anyone that the media is irresponsible? does this help discredit the myth that the military isn't disproportionately represented by those that might be socioeconomically deprived?". I'm sure you can come up with something. heypartner, if you haven't already, you should send your comments into USA Today and demand a retraction. I think you officially just handed them their asses.
I'm wondering if the writer of the article was working with numbers newer than FY2000. If you demand that retraction, you may very well find out.
dod.mil has no other numbers. FY2000 report was put out in February 2002. We could believe that the February 2003 report of FY2001 is out, yet not published at dod.mil, yet, but that would be a very extradordiany shift from every other report since Vietnam, and the report still claims that it was always a myth. It wasn't always a myth and never has been one. The article clearly takes a one sentence quote by the highly regarded military specialist, Dr. Charles Moskos, and distorts it. Moskos was saying that rural (poor) whites are more disportioned that any group. Dr. Moskos never said that blacks were not disportioned. Dr. Moskos never rebukes thats; he just says one of the poor classes is the most disportioned. He never states the USA Today headline, "Front-line troops disproportionately white, not black Numbers refute long-held belief." That headline is clearly wrong. The long-held "belief" is fact from the Vietnam War all the way up to a February 2002 report.
you're right...should have been more clever... i think heypartner makes a pretty big assumption when he says these numbers are easily controvertible...he assumes i have the time and the willingness to do that research...this issue has never been that important to me...i saw the story on drudgereport, and linked to it....end of story.
Max, It's also fair to trust USA Today. You shouldn't have to question the media (well, in the ideal world).
I like how Achebe just comes in and piles on when HeyPartner made the point clearly enough. Like Achebe always researches articles he posts on here. I think this may be a case of the headline writer getting a bit excited. Usually writers don't write their own headlines, I believe.
Almost ALWAYS true. Very good point, and it's important to remember. Editors are always trying to sell newspapers, even at the best outfits.
actually i think achebe was supporting my reliance on the article for posting here... i think i should just add my disclaimer now...i don't warrant the truth of anything not published by me! if i post to it, that doesn't make it gospel...it's just argument for the jury...and if someone, like heypartner, can find controverting evidence, then bring it up and let's talk about it. but i can guarantee you, i won't spend my day researching facts behind articles in any news publication. i may argue with them, but i do try to work during the day too...damn those billable hours!
Yep, just post them. I like how HeyPartner said it was easy to find those stats, maybe for him it is! I got a headache with this thread.
Thanks for your kind words MadMax, Mr. Clutch's hatred for me overwhelms his reading comprehension. He's just so exhausted by my intellectual superiority, frankly, he's resorting to ad hominem attacks.
It's because you tell me to stop posting. That's Gregonomics' schtick. And don't accuse me of doing it first or something.