A gelding from New York won Saturday's Kentucky Derby (Brits note: rhymes with kirby). Funny Cide, not the favorite in the race, came home a good ahead of the opposition. What was disturbing at Churchill Downs was the traditional presentation of the roses to the winner. They have customarily been brought by the jockey's assistant. This year, a member of each of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines did the honors. The respect and support of the troops is giving way to an uncritical acceptance of military values that is bad for any country.
The individuals involved, Army Sgt. George Avila, Navy Yeoman 1st Class Christopher Menifee, Air Force Tech Sgt. Rarchar Tortorello and Marine Sgt. Brian Melton, deserve much more than this recognition. Volunteering to kill and be killed so that people back home can drink beer and watch game shows takes a certain quality that is beyond admirable.
However, the military also has a code of conduct that is contrary to that of civilian society, and there must be a firewall between the two. When civilian society adopts the rules of the military, the result is an ugly Hilterism/Stalinism that brings barbarism to new lows. By the same token, the military cannot function using the rules of civilians.
By all means, support the men and women in uniform, those who "stand ready to do violence" as the rest sleep peacefully at night. Give them the good seats at the ballpark (better them than an Enron criminal), but draw the line in the sand. The code by which they live, the laws by which they are governed are unique to their circumstance, and those norms have no business in a civilized civilian culture.