The president of the United States has ordered all U.S. flags lowered to half-staff for the next 30 days to honor the life and service of the late President George H.W. Bush.

It’s oddly refreshing — if you don’t mind my using that term — to know the flags are being lowered for something other than a mass shooting. It seems all too often we are displaying the Stars and Stripes to honor the memories of those who get slaughtered at the hands of madmen.

President Bush’s life deserves the high honor it will receive not just in the next few days or weeks, but for as long as human beings inhabit this Earth.