I’m off to class, but a few quick things that will surely have people stop inviting you to their holiday afterparties this year:
Veterans get the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. That was yesterday. Today, though, is a day off too.
Thus Congress bestows a goodie, and anybody who disagrees is Ebeneezer Scrooge.
Didn’t be get invited to dinner? OK, he was not invited for the office party he did not host.
Meant to write “he,” not “be,” as in Scrooge got invited to dinner. What I also meant to say was that Veterans’ Day fell on a Sunday. Yet we have all these federal holidays on Mondays.
Why not give everybody at the Departments of Education, Labor, Commerce, Agriculture, and Energy every day off? Sure, we’d be paying them for doing nothing, but what is the downside of that?
I’m not sure I grasp the rationale for this post. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that ours is now a volunteer army, a professional army? When I served most of the soldiers either were drafted or volunteered as I did. Some of us, if not all, did it for notions of duty to defend democracy from tyranny. But whatever the rationale for serving, I have to believe that today’s professional soldier is motivated by a sense of patriotism as much or as little as those of past wars who were drafted. Contractors (most of whom are also veterans) notwithstanding, the veterans and active military are fighting wars that their government and by implication the citizens have decided are just and necessary. And yes, the advent of an all volunteer force does make deployment of military force less cautious and more likely. But that should not, in my mind, reduce the need to recognize and honor those who have served us by their bravery.
Well put, Chuck.
On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in 1918, most soldiers were conscripts. Veterans Day gave people a way to feel better about sending so many conscripts off to die in the trenches.
I expect there is not much enthusiasm in the academy for veterans, both the pre- and post-volunteer army veterans. I realize that is not Wintercow’s point.
They can’t all be heroes or there wouldn’t be any MPs, SPs, Judge Advocates, brigs, etc.
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