Bad writing alert!

Actually, it's just one sentence of N. Joseph Potts' Reaping Cannon Fodder that I can't understand. There is, at the very least, an element of specialized information left out that might make it more understandable. I guess I'll have to include a couple 'graphs for context, and tell you, so you don't think it's worse than it is, that the first paragraph is about the recent increase in the minimum wage. I'll highlight the sentence that bugs me:

Of course, ideas, even from the Democrat opposition, are not wanting. Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) would be quite pleased to have the Republican administration institute a draft — before the next election, if you don't mind. And the Republicans rather do mind taking the blame for any such proposal, which would have to at least appear to draft the sons and daughters of congressmen, campaign-fund donors, and loyal voters impartially along with young men and women who were brought into this world in order to qualify their mothers for AFDC (Aid to Families with Dependent Children) and everybody else.

Then there's the nonstarter of competing on the labor market for the needed human input, the same way Wal-Mart, McDonald's, and supposedly even the federal civil service have to do. Now that would be a pretty pass! The world's most-formidable engine of destruction and coercion offering monetary inducements to join in its merry games and, no doubt, end up getting drafted anyway, not at the time of induction, but at the time at which the serviceman or -woman was scheduled to leave the military.

Can anybody explain what he's saying there?

There's a slap at the training of our volunteer soldiers in the article with which I take some umbrage, but I do agree with the economic analysis that the quality of the final product will be diminished when the quantity is increased. Mostly as a result of accepting lower quality recruits, though possibly also because quality training facilities and personnel will not increase quickly enough to keep up.

If you can handle sentence structure more prolix than my own, he goes on to hint at the Administration's dark conspiracy in raising the minimum wage:

No, raising its own minimum wage was far too expensive for the military to consider. And the increase in costs such a move would entail would make world domination look like an even worse deal than it already appears to be. Only the private sector, which is already paying for everything else, could afford such payday extravagance.

Could there be something else besides a draft or pushing up the number at the bottom of the butcher's bill to bring the young'uns flocking in at the gates to augment the mighty host required to defend America? Why … yes! Why not snatch the laurels of altruism from the opposition's brow and boost the number of "volunteers" all in one, magnanimous stroke? Simply diminish the private economy's ability to compete for the hungry, young prizes!

So there is, after all, a purpose for the minimum wage. He does make it clearer as he goes on, that that purpose is not one that "liberals" and liberals would support. Except for Charlie Rangel.