A change I would be willing to believe in

I Twittered about this a few moments ago, but not all readers follow me in Twitter: The President of the United States should not salute.

I'm watching the Inauguration Parade, and a Marine Corps band went by, and probably the drum major saluted the President and the Marine General standing next to the President at the time (the cameras were focused on the reviewing stand at the time, so I couldn't be sure), and the General saluted and the President saluted.

The President is a civilian. Civilians don't salute. The President should not give a military salute.

(Coincidentally, as I type this, the President and an Admiral are saluting a Navy band that is just now passing in review.)

"But," I hear some of you say, "The President is Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces." YES! That's right! He IS the Commander-in-Chief -- and in our system, the military is subservient to the civil government, and the Commander-in-Chief is a civilian. (That was quite revolutionary at the time it was written into our Constitution.)

Mr Reagan started this President-saluting business. And all the Presidents since have felt the need to go along. Mr Obama should be brave and stop it. It's bad for our republican form of government.

You didn't see Ike saluting while President, and he had more claim to do it than anyone.

They used to make fun of Mr Clinton for his sloppy salutes -- he didn't know how to salute, because he was a civilian, and had never learned how, and he should not have tried, and no one should have expected him to do it. But he was probably afraid not to do it, because people would have said he was disrespecting the armed forces. I think the opposite is true.

As with most things, we can blame this on John F Kennedy. His refusal to wear a hat, the better to show off his Blagojevichesque mane, ended the centuries-old fashion of men wearing hats. When men wore hats, a civilian man saluted another person by tipping or removing his hat, or putting his hat over his heart as FDR is doing in this photo. Once men quit wearing hats, there was no common way for a President to return a salute. So we drifted along for a while, until Reagan started snapping a military salute back.

I propose that the President put his hand over his heart, as civilians do to salute the flag, to return a military salute. Unless Mr Obama wants to start wearing a hat.

Posted: Tue - January 20, 2009 at 03:24 PM

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A change I would be willing to believe in

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