Obedience is certainly a question, but the way Boddi says he goes about thanking soldiers suggests not so much the extolling of obedience as a virtue as Boddi's own uniform fetish:
Boddi says, "You better believe I never miss an opportunity to thank people in uniform" (at <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo- talk/Week-of-Mon-20051121/025564.html>); and "I thank soldier in uniform (active duty) and people I know to have recently served" (at <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of- Mon-20051121/025653.html>).
Just because some men are in uniform, however, doesn't necessarily mean that they are doing "hard, shitty things that most people are unwilling to do" (at <http://mailman.lbo- talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20051121/025564.html>). For all he knows, the men in uniform that he meets may just as well be back from Japan, Germany, South Korea, etc., pushing paper at work and visiting brothels in off hours. On the other hand, the sort of people that Boddi doesn't get around to thanking -- homeless, unemployed, etc., OUT OF UNIFORM -- may well be combat veterans who have served as honorably as they could under the circumstances, whether in just or unjust wars.
<blockquote>The number of newly discharged U.S. veterans collecting unemployment insurance has nearly doubled in the last three years despite a sharp decline in the overall number of Americans claiming jobless pay. Some 2,000 new veterans have joined the benefit rolls each week so far this year, driving the total number requesting unemployment aid to 29,341 in early August, Labor Department data showed this week.
That is nearly double the 14,957 veterans collecting jobless benefits in August 2002.
(Andrea Hopkins, "More U.S. Veterans Claim Unemployment Insurance," Reuters, 30 August 2005, <http://www.ngwrc.org/index.cfm? page=Article&ID=2045>)</blockquote>
Yoshie Furuhashi <http://montages.blogspot.com> <http://monthlyreview.org> <http://mrzine.org>