Muscatine

Dave,

  I posted a cute note about you getting "my" job.  And, it seemed to go bye bye.  Anyway, congrats.  See you Monday.  Glad to have you back.  You got a LOT of work out there to straighten out a BUNCH of people.  BEST of luck.  Tom.

Yeah, I think it is true based on what you could get (not what you chose to take).  Current benefits don't meet all the needs, not to mention they are often slow in getting. But we could do some homework on that. 

Also, there is the issue McCain brings up about whether serving one term is enough.  He believes it will discourage re-enlistment.  Others believe getting new recruits will more than make up for that.  I think that part is an honest and interesting debate.

how about if they pay 50% after 1 contract or 100% after 2 contracts or 8 years, whichever comes first? the military pays well enough that one could save up enough money for half of college, especially if they're single and do 2 or more tours of duty, in one contract, but if they enlisted at 17-18 they would be out of college early enough to have another career. re-enlistment is important because, would you rather have an 18 year old that's gone through the 13 week basic training and a month of pre-deployment training go to Iraq, or a 22 year old with 4 years experience 2-3 of them in Iraq? who is more likely to come home?

Tom - It won't be Monday, but I'll see you around.