"Facing recruiting shortages brought on by the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has decided to accept a greater number of recruits who score near the bottom of military aptitude tests, the secretary of the Army said Monday."
The Army fell short 7,000 recruits under it's goal for active-duty soldiers in 2005, so it now will be accepting double the number of low IQ recruits.
Just what we need: more stupidity in the armed forces.
"The Army would also ease the service's requirement that at least 67% of every recruiting class be made up of recruits who scored in the top half (50th percentile or above) on the aptitude tests. The new threshold would be 60%".
Which brings to mind a George Carlin quote:
"Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that." -- George Carlin
How low can they go? The Army is dumbing down for 2006, although "Recruiters in 2005 accepted more individuals whom they might have rejected previously."
But, of course, the official Army stance is that their new, lowered standards have nothing to do with the increasing reluctance of volunteers to sign up to be shot at in Iraq.
How stupid does the Army think we are? As an example, I offer this Army spokesman, demonstrating a classic talking-from-both-sides-of-his-mouth technique:
"Harvey denied Monday that the Army was in the midst of a recruiting crisis, pointing to a series of new initiatives -- including increasing the Army's advertising budget by $130 million and putting 3,000 more recruiters on the streets -- that he hoped would reverse the downward trend."
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-recruit4oct04,0,2086091.story