Having attended Catholic parochial school as a child, I and my classmates were constantly reminded by the good Sisters of St. Dominic to "mind our place". Translation: Remember where you are in the social pecking order.
This was meant to teach us that as we grew up we would begin to establish the individual role we would play in the makeup of our society and that once our station in life was determined we should not overstep the bounds of our position. Of course, this deterministic view of one's fate was not all that surprising coming from religious teachers who themselves had to mind their place in the strict hierarchy of Holy Mother the Church.
We Americans boast that we are a class-less society. And that unlike our British cousins, we do not judge a person by their family background or what school they attended. Of course, this is a load of crap. We are as class conscious as any Englishman or any other culture grounded in class structure. We just lie about it. Oh, we may not put too much stock in one's family background or the schools one attended but we have plenty of other social yardsticks by which we categorize and pigeon-hole our fellow citizens.
The single largest determinate of social ranking is of course money. One may be as common as dirt, as the Brits say, but if you've got money, you may be sneered at behind your back but you'll still be kowtowed to with the best of them. And there other things as well, like our homes, cars, clothes, jewelry, etc. But they all stem from the first...money.
The one place though where the concept of rank is overt and is strictly adhered to is the military. The military could not function without such a system. Just imagine a private in the heat of battle refusing to obey an order from a superior. That's why the penalties for disobeying orders are so harsh. The lives of others depend upon knowing one's place and duties and not stepping outside those bounds.
One of the wisest provisions of our great American Constitution was the imposition of absolute civilian rule over the military. And it is served our nation well for the last 225 years or so. We impose that rule lest the most powerful armed force within our society decided that their might would make right. And we have adopted dozens of other rules and regulations regarding the place of the military in our society. It is actually the only place in our country where, for example, one's first amendment rights can be legally infringed upon. We have no desire to live under a military dictatorship like so many other countries have. That is why we put such harsh restrictions upon political involvement from the lowliest private to the highest ranking officer.
That is why I am deeply troubled over the appearance yesterday on a television news show by Admiral Michael Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. During an interview with Chris Wallace, the admiral made what to my mind were several overt partisan political comments and observations which were not his place to make. Compounding this breach of military discipline was the fact that he made these remarks on Fox News which is nothing more than the propaganda arm of the Bush White House.
I think the various Armed Services committees and sub-committees in both the House and Senate should be called upon to examine the behavior of the Chairman and that some form of reprimand or punishment should be meted out. It is obvious that the admiral never had the benefit of being taught at an early age to mind his place.