Americans revere veterans almost as much as they distrust federal bureaucrats, yet increasingly they are the same people.
That's from a worrisome Economist article about
veteran hiring in the federal workforce. Government should be geared towards providing effective services to their citizens, and their workforce practices should be oriented towards that end. There's no reason to believe that being a veteran makes one a better employee, and this sort of politically-driven meddling in bureaucratic institutions is at the heart of
political decay.