What is the worst part about being a service member or veteran?

CPT, I think you will find the majority of city and county employees in smaller cities and more rural counties to be good civil servant and working for less that the norm in salaries, a tradeoff for job security. When you get to more densely populated cities and suburban areas the attitudes are frequently quite different. The more people in the area, the worse the attitude frequently.

I can relate to your statement and totally agree.

sorry so off base I was one of those public servants you want to look down at also a vet. I didn't go into it for a paycheck and sure as hell didn't get one while working at it(FLA 1988-1998 started 8k ended 18k). But Y did receive a life saving award, saved well over 30 lives in my ten I did start a trend of law enforcement getting EMT certified because more times than no the patrol man is first on scene, when medical help in an hour away. All due respect sorry that's pure horse manure . If you cant walk a mile in my shoes then you have no right to judge. In my job i faced nepotism that promotion was only if you married into a family, faced daily corruption and abuse. In the locker room , Then went out to work a 8-19 hr day. My days off were not my own they were the days i sat in court. When i got out after ten i turned in 8 months of vacation time accrued. a month for each year. I never got to take a vacation because man power was always short. If you have zero concept of what your talking about its easy to throw doubt whole lot harder when you sit thru you hundredth holiday sitting in a cruiser patrolling knowing the best you'll see is leftovers or a compressed turkey roll when you get in. Both have the same morality we all try to save the world in our own ways , The lesson of it all is you cant save the world , you have to settle to fixing your own tiny sliver of it. We both wear boots for the same reason we walk thru piles of horse manure from people who just don't have one clue what the other does.

Agreed. My job at the VA is as close as you can get, in my opinion.

That is a wonderfully lengthy career, Sir. Thank you for your grit in service.

Although I agree with your statement, The Mission always comes first, no matter what.

SSG Scott Bregi - The mission is what is at hand!

It is the family as much as immediate access to "beans and bullets" on the battlefield that provides the Warrior Fighter the strength to support there "foxhole buddies/shipmates" (their immediate family of sorts) in the near term in the heat of the battle, and to know that what they are doing means something to them in relationship to their family back home. It is the family, a wife, children, parents, a grandmother along with your adopted family in the field that sustains you! So, family and mission are not separate, they are linked.

Therefore, senior leaders who dare to care yet demand individual accountability for preparedness to carry out the mission are those for whom I seek to serve! Always have!!!