I have largely stayed away from the controversy surrounding Roy Moore’s predilections toward much younger women 30 years ago. I will admit I find it disturbing that he was prolific enough in his quest for teenage girls to have had a reputation as a creeper among the high school students in town, but I haven’t seen any current allegations of harassment or sexual assault, unlike the Frankenpig, who as of this writing, is refusing to go away despite allegations of inappropriate behavior by now two women, and John Conyers, who has apparently been protected by a twisted Congressional system, created to shield abusive Congressional slime. But hey, people of Alabama, you own him. Vote your conscience.

I do, however, think several reports about his time in the Army and subsequently law school give us a fascinating glimpse into the kind of person Roy Moore is. Insecure. Constantly seeking validation. A stickler for regulations – not because he has particular respect for said rules, but because they provide an opportunity to wield authority over others.

I will say up front I am not a psychologist. I have taken a few profiling courses in grad school, so I think I’m able to at least make a semi-educated assessment about the kind of person Roy Moore is. My mission is not to convince anyone to vote for or against him. There’s plenty of crawling slime on the Hill, and as far as nasty swine go, Moore will probably be at the bottom of that disreputable pile of rectums. That said, I’ve always thought it was important to examine the whole person, and I write this knowing there will likely be some flaming going on.

Bring it.

Picture it – my last deployment in 2007. I’m wearing ACUs sans top, because it’s hot as balls, and I’m leading a detail to unload a truck. Cover is off. I’m standing at the back of the truck when a snotty Captain walks by. I continue unloading, when he stops and stares at me.

Snotty Captain: Sergeant?

Me: Yes, Sir?

Snotty Captain: Were you not taught to salute an officer when he walks by?

Me (takes deep breath, ready to quote regs about not saluting while on detail, and about how Snotty Captain is an affirmation-seeking douchebag): …

My NCOIC (comes over, grabs my arm, and squeezes, whispering): Not worth it. Just salute the asshole.

I saluted the Snotty Captain with a clenched jaw, and immediately changed the salute to the one-finger kind when his back was turned.

Yes, military regulations and customs and courtesies exist for a reason. They promote discipline and esprit de corps. I get that. At the same time, exceptions, such as ones that say individuals engaged in work details, do not salute, exist for a reason. Mission first. No one needs to stop their work or drop a box on their foot, trying to salute a Snotty Captain, who desperately needs the affirmation. The individual in charge of a work detail, if not actively engaged, salutes and acknowledges salutes for the entire detail, but the caveat there is “not actively engaged,” because again – MISSION FIRST.

This applies even more to the battlefield, where no one will drop their rifle, jump up, and render a salute to an officer whose genitals are so inadequate, that he’s compensating by forcing everyone to acknowledge his officer-ness. Let’s forget the fact that it’s dangerous for the troop. It’s also dangerous for the officer himself, since the enemy has this penchant for shooting officers once they’re recognized.

Roy Moore, while serving in Vietnam, apparently didn’t get the memo.

Moore writes in his autobiography that he was “shocked” at the lack of discipline in the company and began issuing Article 15 charges — common but controversial nonjudicial punishments during the conflict. The soldiers under his command recalled Moore focusing on regulation haircuts and constant salutes, and called him “Captain America,” not meaning it as a compliment.

“His policies damn near got him killed in Vietnam,” Barrey Hall, who served under Moore, told The Associated Press in 2003. “He was a strutter.”

His former law school professor confirms other veterans have told him the same thing.

Guy Martin taught Moore in a seminar titled Discrimination in Employment. He, too, served in Vietnam. Veterans told him that Moore demanded that he be saluted on the ground in Vietnam, Martin said, which everyone knew was a foolish thing to do. “When you go to Vietnam as an officer, you don’t ask anybody to salute you, because the Viet Cong would shoot officers,” he explained. “You’ve heard this a million times in training.” If Moore indeed violated this rule, Martin went on, “There’s nothing more telling about a person’s capability and character and base intelligence. It’s crazy.”

Now, obviously the latter is rumor, but it’s corroborated by the former, and the source served under Moore in Vietnam, so I find that claim pretty credible.

So what kind of person violates said rule in order to assert his authority over others?

A person who has low self esteem, I would gather. The Snotty Captain whom I described earlier was just that kind of invertebrate. He considered all enlisted folks inferior to him, and loved wielding his authority over them. He thought we were all barely literate neanderthals, and treated us as such…

…until my Sergeant Major informed him exactly which university had issued my degree. All of a sudden, Snotty Captain became really docile and obsequious, and started trying to discuss world events, military theory, and economics with me. It got weird, so I spent the rest of the deployment avoiding him.

The kind of officers who demand salutes, even in the most inappropriate situations, are the kind of officers we least respected. They want recognition no matter what. They want their due, because they need affirmation about their superiority from people whom they consider inferior – even though said affirmation is superfluous. They desperately need that kind of validation. To them, the salute is a substitute for real accomplishment – recognition without the necessity of achievement (other than having checked the right boxes, or fellated the right personnel, to attain the rank of O-3). The salute is necessary, because that’s all they have.

The personality type fits. The same Roy Moore allegedly pursued numerous young girls as a 30-something attorney, probably hoping their youth and inexperience would translate to admiration for an older, accomplished man who showed interest in them. He sought veneration from juveniles, likely because he felt he couldn’t get it from others – pretty typical for a sub par law student, whom one of his professors called “Fruit Salad,” because he was so mixed up.

I may be completely off on this assessment, but the kind of military officer Roy Moore reportedly was seems to correspond to the kind of adult he became.

Just something to consider.