Leaderboard

Gotta love the useless comparisons..."an eighth of the time that powered flight has existed". Things that took less time than the F-35: The Beatles entire career as a band. The Apollo program from Kennedy's speech to Neil Armstrong. The combined timelines of WWI and WWII. Both Mars rovers were proposed, approved, developed, launched, and have been on Mars for over 3 years. The entire construction, from proposal to completion, of: The Golden Gate Bridge, the World Trade Center, the Empire State Building, the Suez Canal, and the Channel Tunnel. The Manhattan Project. Alexander the Great's conquest of Persia. Caesar's conquest of Gaul. The Wright brothers' first airplane, from conception to Kittyhawk.

I couldn't agree more. I hate when people try to use kids as leverage to try to pry money out of my wallet either directly or indirectly. If I liked kids, I would have some. Unfortunately, the only thing I like less than the prospect of my own kids is YOUR kids. How's about instead of pumping more money into the daycare, they roll up a few pennies and fix the bridge to the hunting area on base that has been washed out for several years, with no funds to fix it?

Sweet Baby Jesus. My heart breaks for the USAF every time I hear or read something like this. This dude is the COMMAND CHIEF and this is what he spends his time worrying about? In a deployed location? I just don't get it. I suspect no amount of conversation with this guy could get him to see why he's out of touch. The punctuation and grammar make me think this was written by a 9 year old, not an E-9 (and certainly not a Chief!) I am sorry for you guys who have to serve under this type of management.

Proof that communism works! Suck it freedom! I keed I keed

2011-1903=108 years since Kitty Hawk

Define "leadership." If you mean POTUS, then it's re-election regardless of the individual in office (or his party keeping the office if in 2d term). The odd national interest does come into play. If you mean SECDEF, then it's all about budget and/or ego as far as "best interests." If you mean SECAF and/or CSAF, see SECDEF. If you mean MAJCOM, see CSAF. If you mean WG/CC, it's often, but not always, about the next step up the ladder. If you mean SQ/CC, see WG/CC. If you mean the bro on the Air Staff and/or AFPC, he/she is simply trying to survive a very ugly assignment with long hours filled with pain and doing whatever he/she can to make the bad man go away until he can get back out to the field where usually, not always, the tempo to SQ/CC is picked up. Save yourself some time and heartburn; get cynical now.

What Oh... Wait, WHAT?!

Ha, that's spot on. Have any of you ever tried to pick up your alterations without the receipt/ticket? I'm pretty sure it's easier to talk your way out of an on-base DUI than pick up uniforms without a receipt.

Having been in CE, I might be able to shed some light on why they're renovating rather than building a new BX. It's about the funding regulations mandated by Congress. I'm pretty sure AAFES and DECA have to follow standard government construction rules, as dicked up as they are. What you're seeing is actually all driven by Congress, not AFFES, not DECA, and not Big Blue. There're two pots of money - MILOCON (Military Construction) and O&M (Ops and Maintenance). With O&M, base and Majcom spending authority is pretty high, into the $ millions, IIRC, the timelines for funding are much shorter, and the amount of discretion in how the budget is spent is much greater at base and Majcom level. For MILCON, the funding limit at SECAF level used to be $300K back in the 90s, but is likely to be about $500K now. In either case, it's about enough to build a small garden shed and not much else. Any "new" construction costing more than that and the project has to go into the DOD's budget to Congress as an individual line item with full cost estimates, project justification, and environmental assessment. Typically it takes 3-5 years from concept to funding approval to go the MILCON route. What that means is that CE gets pretty creative in how they classify work. I can't remember all the specific rules, but they're something like, if you can keep 51% of a structure, you can do nearly anything you like under the O&M rules because, the logic goes, you're merely maintaining an existing facility. So, you keep the shell and foundation of the BX, rip out and replace everything else. You could even put on a small addition to the building if you wanted but that addition would have to be costed out separately and can't cost more than $500K or it has to go into the Congressional budget and takes years. There was the case of the Ramstein O'Club back in the late 80s where everything of the old club was demolished except one wall and from that was built an entirely new club under O&M rules, all as a way to circumvent the MILCON rules. That was taking the piss and some wrists got slapped over that one. I'm not necessarily trying to defend my CE brethren, because CE can still be pretty screwed up, but if you work in CE for very long you become extremely adept at "working the grey zone" of the regulations and CE actually delivers quite a lot given the rules they have to bend every day. I include this only so you can direct your fully justified anger at the right target - Congress. Oh, yeah, and I hated AAFES as much as some of you. Self-absorbed thieving bastards, was my view, and hanging was too good for the lot of them. When they tried to have the squadron snack fridges shut down or run by themselves because they saw them as competition was when they really just went way over the line.

CHS17Driver is right. Masshole. You seem intelligent and willing to learn which is great but quit ######ing taking what people say and putting your humbler/holier than thou spin on it. You're educated, which is great but quit trying to show people how educated you are because 1) no one cares, 2)It makes you looks stupid. I, like gravedigger also registered on a similar forum about seven years ago to get info on a job before I signed up and got my ass chewed. Thankfully I didn't run into any of those people I pissed off, but it can and does happen. Its a small Air Force and getting smaller. Start making friends now by stopping replying.

And to think that there are still some UPT FLT/CC's and SQ/CC's who bring in studs and question them on their decision to put Helo's #1 on their dream sheet...