I never liked that saying. Anyone regardless of occupation can die for their country. The goal is to make the other guy die for his. You're also under strict supervision when performing your job. To break it down for those who don't know, you have roughly one Sergeant for every four soldiers. A Staff Sergeant for every two sergeants and eight soldiers. A Sergeant First Class for every four Staff Sergeants. It maybe more or less but this is the generally how it works. Off hours however you have a bunch of unsupervised frat boys who can do pretty much anything that's not illegal as long as they make it to formation in the morning. Drinking can be a real problem in that kind of situation. Having been in charge of my share of soldiers I can promise you they will do something stupid at the drop of a hat.

That's the joke. There were people dying from all kinds of causes being marked down as death by corona.

Third, would be transparency both in the office and out. This is simply that anything that effects the people should be understandable by the people it affects and you don't get to hide things if someone wants to know since you took the job. (I'm not talking about security issues here). You want to pass a bill or get a law put into place? Not a problem but it should be completely understandable for the average high school graduate to read and know what it means. Fourth, term limits. No matter what position there should be a finite time limit on how long it can be held by a single person. And no getting around it by moving. You get two terms as a Senator/Congressman/President/Governor etc... in your lifetime. None of this 20-40 year crap where you've never even held a job that wasn't paid for by the government. Lets get rid of the good old boys club.

I'm not going to take a side on here, for American politics, but the most effective way to prevent these types of things is four fold. First, solve everything at the lowest level possible. The highest level should never be involved in deciding what and how things are done on the individual level because by definition all individuals are different. This includes things like, a person, a town, a city, a state. What works for one may but most likely not work for all hence the need for lower leadership. Second, anyone elected should be held to the highest accountability for the things accomplished or not accomplished based on the reason why they were elected in the first place. Did you accomplish what you said you would? Yes or no. Yes, great your doing good. No, then you need to go. Let someone who can do it do it.

Many times the politician actually makes the situation worse by voting for this or that but because they have already prepared a scape goat who they can point too and accuse of doing the very thing they're doing they get away with it. It's the time honored tradition of creating a bogey man that's the cause of all your problems not those whose job it actually is to fix them.

Many politicians use this as a means to get elected and stay in power. Example, there's an issue that effects a group of people. Politicians: Vote for me and I'll fix this for you. Politician gets elected. Politician makes big noise about issue says I'm working on it let me get back to you. Nothing happens, people forget because issue has been ongoing and it's just a thing we always deal with. Next election. Politicians: Vote for me and I'll fix this for you,. But you didn't last time!!!. Politician: That's because of this person or that group or this reason, not me they/it stopped me, but this time we'll definitely get it fixed. And so on and so on.

True, but the main problem, at least with the French Revolution, was that the cause they were willing to die for is what killed them. Essentially it was, down with those in power because they're bad. Oh wait, the leaders of our revolution are just as bad if not worse, Oh wait, and I'm dead.
There is nothing wrong with change. In fact it can be a great thing. However, change for changes sake is not good. And unfortunately for most of the ^ those people they don't really understand what the leaders actually intend once they get the ball rolling. Most people are reactionaries, not revolutionaries. Something happens they don't like and they react to get it changed. But the reaction is not a plan to fix the issue it's just to stop the symptom. Unfortunately in those in power or those who want power generally understand this and use it for their own benefit.

Generally or at least of one singular set of cultural values.

It's also almost entirely homogeneous. Not that that should matter but it seems to.