Here we have an NPR, National Public Radio, presentation of Ed Palm a twenty year (1973-1993) U.S. Marine officer (retired), now an Olympic College dean, who decries the support given by U.S. military troops in staged events ("Mission Accomplished") to Pres. Bush, regarding it as a violation of the tradition that the military not engage in civilian politics.
Apparently we have no counter-tradition prohibiting politicians from using the military for political gain.
The Framers feared a standing army, realizing that military units on home soil could be used to police the civilian population when the intended role of the army was to protect the nation from outside invasion. Thus we have, in Article I, Sec. 8, the power given to Congress to establish a Navy, without restriction (navies were good, they didn't menace the civilian population). And an Army, but the catch is that the (bad) army must be funded each two years by Congress. The Framers weren't going to allow an army on U.S. soil that might be turned against us, say, the way Pres. Bush has turned the NSA, National Security Agency, against us, in a manner of speaking, by listening in on all of our conversations looking for the juicy bits, of which there must be quite a few, given all the marriages and divorces for one reason or another.