According to Gateway Pundit the new site Change.gov said this as of November 7th:

As of today, November 10th, though apparently changed the 8th it says this:

The Obama Administration will call on Americans to serve in order to meet the nation’s challenges. President-Elect Obama will expand national service programs like AmeriCorps and Peace Corps and will create a new Classroom Corps to help teachers in underserved schools, as well as a new Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, and Veterans Corps. Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by setting a goal that all middle school and high school students do 50 hours of community service a year and by developing a plan so that all college students who conduct 100 hours of community service receive a universal and fully refundable tax credit ensuring that the first $4,000 of their college education is completely free. Obama will encourage retiring Americans to serve by improving programs available for individuals over age 55, while at the same time promoting youth programs such as Youth Build and Head Start.

In a December 5th, 2007 post to his website, still available, said:

So when I’m President, I will set a goal for all American middle and high school students to perform 50 hours of service a year, and for all college students to perform 100 hours of service a year. This means that by the time you graduate college, you’ll have done 17 weeks of service. We’ll reach this goal in several ways. At the middle and high school level, we’ll make federal assistance conditional on school districts developing service programs, and give schools resources to offer new service opportunities.

I’ve pointed this out to Tim Zimmermann given he recently said that:

Mandatory service simply does not make any sense. It is not a good idea, there is no infrastructure for it, no public support for it, no leadership support for it, and no money for it. Frankly, it is not something I spend a lot of time worrying about….

I agree it doesn’t make any sense hovever Barack Obama and Rahm Emanuel think otherwise. It’s intelectualy dishonest to make these changes without an official announcement of policy change. It’s also dishonest to act as if this is not effectively mandatory. It’s the same trick used by the federal government to get the drinking age to be 21 and there be state laws for seat belts to be worn while driving. Only one state disobeys the federal government. New Hampshire. And that’s only for the seat belt request. Should a state refuse they will see their income tax dollars go out of the state and not come back in. At least a significant portion of it. It’s even worse in this particular case given the government mandates children attend school, continues to tax those who home school or use private schools, and not only would a school not receive federal funds but you can guarentee the local tax payers would continue to be taxed by the federal government at the same rate. If the locals don’t wish to pay higher local taxes and no reduced income taxes they’d have to comply meaning the children would be unable to graduate without doing the national service. Therefore it’s mandatory. And given the requirements for private and home schools imposed by the State it wouldn’t be surprising if they mandated national service for those children too.

Be the Change Inc YouTube channel

• McCain says he doesn’t support mandatory service.
• McCain says that if Target would have ran things during Katrina it would have gone better, there wouldn’t have been trucks of ice in Maine. If he really believes private organizations would do a better job than why would he advocate the federal government deal with natural disaster?
• McCain claims the reason the military is having a hard time keeping member and gaining more is because it’s not big enough. What?
• The guy from TIME is saying the US government should have mandatory service. McCain dodged the question asking if the US should have mandatory service for all and allow people to go into none military service.
• McCain says he would sign the Kennedy / Hatch Serve America Bill. Said he “love”s Ted Kennedy.
• We should send people to countries which don’t like us… but not money.
• McCain’s hero Teddy Roosevelt.
• Bring ‘all people are created equal’ to the world. Not necessarily military but in other ways. America is exception because of it.

• Obama gets a standing ovation several times longer than McCain’s.
• We believe in individual responsibility and ability… but also mutual responsibility.
• How to get more people into service? Start early with kids in school.
• He won’t have to pander to the union to get his national service plans through like Clinton did.
• The government should encourage voluntarism.
• Every student will get a $4k college credit by “giving back.”
• Big government suppresses private charity/voluntarism is an “old argument.”
• We have to have government. We have to have a FEMA that works. We need to encourage young people to serve so when they get older they are trained to work for those government programs.
• Government should expand the avenues of service.
• To keep more people in the military: restore peoples belief in service, inspiring people
• Universities which keep off ROTC should let them on campus
• Should provide full scholarships for math and science teachers and then make them go work in depressed communities.
• One of the primary aspects of his presidency would be to increase avenues for service in the nation.
• I want every young person to know that they won’t reach their potential unless they work with others.
• American voluntarism is what makes America great.
• Obama likes Teddy Roosevelt too.

All done. Check out the YouTube channel for the interviews.

Russell Kanning has his driver’s license “violation” trial.
The judge harasses the press.
Ian presses for answers from City Government

Links to related videos will be posted here when they are available (entire trial and city manager interview):

(no links ready yet)

If interesting I’ll post the entire trial and city manager interview when available.

http://nhunderground.com/…

I showed up in court today, so the thugs didn’t have to come to my house and break down the door and accidentally kill anyone … or go to the wrong house and hurt others.
The judge found me guilty of driving after suspension of driving priviledges in NH
He fined my 300 bucks … he asked when I would pay it and then said I could do “community service” and I said I could probably do that.

Yes … I am free … and I did do some driving today.
coconut … have that video on my desk by morning
I will have to find out where I can do my community service. There should be someplace where I will be helping people and not empowering the bad guys.
They didn’t get any money out of me.
I cost them money.
We had pizza.

coconut had filmed the ordeal and when released I’ll post that here. From other reports on NHUnderground.com Russell agreed to 30 hours of service at $10/hour to pay off the $300 fine. I understand the compromise of service to jail but in a way it seems to be a step backwards philosophically. When Russell was sentenced to jail for nonviolent, statute crimes he was acting under his own volition and the government people aggressed against him in order to place him in their jail. In this case he’s agreed to community service so he’s not harmed and/or thrown in jail again but this decision is made under duress. He’s going to be nonviolent regardless as that’s how he is and if he defended himself he’d likely be seriously harmed so by agreeing to community service he’s submitted to their tyrannical ways actively vs previously just continuing on and putting all responsibility on them. Not that I wouldn’t have done the same nor am I ignoring the fact he showed up to court at their request. Just pointing out the differences in approaches.

There is also this dilemma. If you go to jail you aren’t giving them the resources the government needs to survive. No wealth transfer to them. They have to expend resources in order to deal with you. While with community service, assuming you get to choose, you’d be creating wealth outside the system. Likely fighting the system for as long as possible to the point before they imprison you and then agreeing to community service, again assuming you get to choose it, would be the best route. You’d drain some government resources, bypass possible acts of violence, and create wealth in the private sector. You’d still be bowing down to the aggressors as pointed out above but in almost an agorist fashion helping bleed the beast.