The life of a RDML .....

This is not to be snarky - this is simple fact.

Via Tom Ricks's blog,

Gen. Donn Starry (U.S. Army, ret.) warns in his oral history. "As a matter of fact, brigadier generals get treated with much less respect and so on than second lieutenants do in many places. I got much better treatment as a second lieutenant, in many instances, than I did as a brigadier general."(P. 1103, Press On! Selected Works of General Donn A. Starry, Vol. 2, Lewis Sorley, ed.)

It is, from a street cred POV among your peers, to retire as a Bull O6 than as a 1-star...but no one ever expects to retire as a 1-star. Everyone expects to put on the second, at least. But....

If one worries about such things, after you shake someone hand and move along - behind your back would you rather have them ask, "It's a shame he never made Flag..." or "Why didn't he get a second star?"

Of course, I never got past oak leaves - so who am I to judge? I'm not - just stating observable fact.