National Guard misses recruiting goal!

Normally a headline like that would be all over the liberal media. It would be further evidence of how evil the war in Iraq is and how the military is on the verge of a total meltdown. A google search shows hundreds of news articles that have done just that over the last few years.

ABC News' Jonathan Karl and Luis Martinez report: Already stretched thin by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army is having a hard time finding new recruits.

It is the second consecutive month the service's enlistment effort has faltered amid the American public's growing discontent over the war in Iraq

The military, after suffering one of its worst years on record for recruitment, has implemented a number of new tactics and approaches to recruiting.

The Iraq War began to have an impact on recruiting in 2005, when the Army missed its goal for the number of recruits. In 2007, for the third year in a row, the Army did not meet its benchmark for the level of educational attainment of recruits.

Like Bush’s poll numbers, the mystery is not why Army recruiting numbers are so low but how they manage to score at all. Who would sign on to this catastrophe?

Note-no quotes from the AP, I can't afford them.

So why isn't the current headline about the Guard being reported? Two reasons. First, the active Army and the Army reserve both made their recruiting goals. And second, the reason the Guard missed their monthly goal is that they are so far ahead of their yearly pace, that they had to slow down so they don't recruit too many soldiers! From the Army Times-

So far this year the component has recruited 44,466 soldiers, 109 percent of the year-to-date goal. The goal for the year is 63,000.
As of the end of May, the Army Guard had a budgeted end strength of 351,320, according to the National Guard Bureau. The component’s actual end strength was 359,288, 2.3 percent more than the authorized level.

Translated from military jargon, the Guard had to slow down the pace of recruiting last month to avoid going over the total number of soldiers allowed by Congress.

Here in Minnesota, the news is even better. With three months left in the fiscal year, the Minnesota Recruiting Command has already made it's yearly goal.

So the Army announces it is doing great in recruiting, and the media is quiet enough to hear a pin drop. It only adds to the deafening silence you hear when it comes to good news from Iraq.

Why am I not surprised?