Rangel: Still Running, Still Pushing the Draft

July 6, 2010

By Richard Sisk

Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) signaled strongly today that he intends to stay put in the House for a while as he argued for his annual going-nowhere bill to restore the draft.

Rangel, who turned 80 last month, told The Mouth he might have considered stepping down from the 15th District seat he's held since 1971 if somebody better was ready for the job.

"If people really thought there was a candidate out there, I could seriously think about passing the baton to a younger person," Rangel said.

But that isn't the case, Rangel said, so "I'm running for re-election, no question about that."

Rangel, still awaiting the final verdict from a long-running House Ethics Committee investigation of his back taxes and travel reimbursements, was set to be out in the heat in front of the old Times Square recruiting station Wednesday to preach against war.

And one way to stop wars, or make the nation think harder before engaging in them, would be to restore the draft, Rangel said.

"I don't believe we should spend another dime for wars in the Middle East," Rangel said, "except to withdraw."

Rangel said he wasn't challenging President Obama's decisions on Afghanistan and Iraq, but he argued that a draft would remind the nation that sacrifice must be shared.

"People who support the war should support a compulsory military draft," said Rangel, a decorated Korean War vet.