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Showing content with the highest reputation on 12/16/2016 in all areas
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In terms of who should be investigated...the victims of the hacking were the DNC, campaigns on both sides, and individuals like John Podesta and Colin Powell. Not exactly under the purview of the USG to guarantee the cyber security of every single person, but I'm sure there is some legwork being done to help put up better defenses in the future. Personally, I agree with Rubio in that no matter who the victim is, we should not take political advantage of hacks conducted by a hostile foreign government. It's very hard to defend everyone and everything all the time, but we can choose not to take advantage of other people's misfortune. If/when the Russians start hacking the USG or GOP campaigns/institutions under President Trump we should combat it and retaliate and I will not be a fan of any future Democratic political campaigns that take advantage of hacked information. I am pissed at the current administration for not reacting more strongly back in October based on what they apparently knew at the time. It's a tough problem, you don't want to politicize intelligence but in the final stretch of a Presidential campaign everything is political...how would you have responded differently given what's known to the public now? As for a response, it's apparently been ongoing behind the scenes with more actions forthcoming. Although with a new administration taking over in a month that doesn't believe the hacks even happened, I'm not sure there will be a lasting effect unfortunately...the Russian perpetrators will likely face very minor consequences for a major act of aggression. It was Russia. 100%. That is a fact. The Russians don't even deny it. The entire US intelligence community is united in disagreeing with you. The Democratic President, the Republican Speaker of the House, the Republican Majority Leader of the Senate, and many other congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle agree it was the Russians. The GOP-controlled Senate is planning hearings on the subject. All of these national leaders are basing this belief that it was Russia on having access to the entire breadth of classified sources and methods at the disposal of the USG. What are you basing your opinion on?2 points
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"To be clear, this is not to suggest that in similar circumstances, a person who engaged in this activity would face no consequences. To the contrary, those individuals are often subject to security or administrative sanctions. But that is not what we are deciding now." - Comey on Hillary's e-mail abuse That gave me all I needed to know about our intelligence community... Basically, if you're not a powerful politician, get ready to face the full extent of the law. Otherwise, just repeat "I didn't know" or "I don't recall"... Mention how smart phones and technology are scary and makes your head hurt, and be on your way with not so much as a "now, don't you do that again, you scoundrel you"2 points
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No doubts here about capability for the Russians, or anyone for that matter, to hack the DNC. But I honestly think that a 12-yr old from Bangladesh could hack the DNC, route the attack through a VPN server in Russia, and CNN would still be trying to prove that the hacker account Guccifer 2.0 isn't Romanian. The intelligence community hired a contractor to find out the identity of Guccifer 2.0 (the account that claimed responsibility for the DNC hacks), and found out that the account did an interview on the "dark web" that said he/she/they hailed from Romania. Regardless, the contracting agency that specializes in cyber attack analysis said the the tactics were familiar with those of Russian hacking tactics; also, the language that was used to obtain the Russian VPN was, wait for it, Russian. BUT what they failed to mention is that some independent analysts (aka cyber experts on the internet) called bullsh!t on the report, and said that the e-mails in Russian looked to be crude pieces of sentences that would appear if you typed the Romanian equivalent into google translate. Our cyber-related investigation operations can be laughable. We hire a company called "l337 h4ck3rb0yz" or an 'independent consultant' named "xXpu55ysl4y3r69Xx" to investigate the cyber attacks, and sometimes the findings are incomplete. Finally...1 point
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Not saying it's what happened...but even if Russia didn't do it, it's more beneficial (to Russia) for us to believe they did. It would be smart for Russia to lead us to believe it was them. I think a lack of denial is nowhere near proof that they did or didn't. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network Forums1 point
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It doesn't change with a change in rank, just a PCS. I kept thr O-4 rate for two years because the O-5 rate for my base had dropped so low.1 point
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If BAH declines at your location after you're already there, you get to keep the older higher rate.1 point
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Try asking the Wing Historian. He might know and he'll probably be overjoyed to know that someone knows he exists.1 point
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Erotic Carp calendar... your welcome. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2327321/the-erotic-carp-calendar-you-never-knew-you-needed-is-here-in-time-for-christmas/1 point
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I'm a trougher in the Reserves, and NO, people aren't pulling down 50K 'easy'. The previous poster caveat was that his unit has an alert commitment. He also is still in training, so he's going by what his bubbas at the unit are selling him. A year makes a lot of difference between what they tell you is the case when you interview and what the overarching reality is when you work that first day after MQT nearly 2 years later. At any rate, alert commitments, full time support of AD MAJCOM contingencies et al, allow a healthy money pot to be accessible to the supporting RC units and their members. This is not the case for all tanker/fighter units though. Your financial success as a bum will be directly dependent upon the airframe you fly, the mission assigned within that airframe, the amount of other bums in your unit attempting to do what you're doing at the same time, the state of affairs among the airline crowd (the furloughed O-4/5s) and your willingness to be away from home to get paid. The best way to find that information out is to talk to the bums in your unit and getting the skinny. The money may be skosh and that sure as hell should be a consideration prior to getting into said unit. Bumming is not for the faint of heart. In general you'll make around 60-70% of what your regAF counterpart gets paid and you'll put more days a month than they do. Multiple weekends a month is not out of the ordinary. There's no sick leave or worker's comp. You get sick a week and can't fly/show up? You don't get paid period. It's freelance work at its rudest. 60% of senior Capt doesn't sound bad, 60% of 2LT and now you're grazing non-technical hourly wages at the local factory, and you're a freggin' mil pilot. I've known Viper pilots do the mexican house antic, 3 to a house 'cause one works for Eagle and makes jack, the other can't get Lowes to take him seriously when he puts -16 driver on his resume, and neither can get a cotton-pickin' manday at the unit. Now, all that said, none of us had to ask for a day off to go off to wherever for a week. Every day you're unemployed is a day you have off, so might as well look at it glass half-full. As a bum, you're getting paid in the ability to say NO to the AD BS. You know, relocations, deployments and disco-belt shenanigans. Now, with the advent of TFI even that apparent benefit seems to no longer hold true, but I'll leave that out of the scope of this thread. Historically, fighter guys have a tough time getting enough days out of the unit to bum successfully. Getting on full time orders for a year to go to asscrackistan doesn't count as bumming either. Bumming is how much money you can pull without having a civilian job and no continuous orders over 30 consecutive days (hence no paid tricare, no leave accrual, no BAH type I). MQT is also not bumming. Everybody gets UPT, FTU, MQT (to varying degrees). Bumming starts when your unit starts feeding you out of their RPA pot and not on the AD MAJCOM MPA money (i.e. the devil's money). I made 45K taxable income last year, which is probably closer to 50K when accounting for the fact that my mil pay include tax-free fractionals of BAH and BAS. That was working 2-3 weekends a month, 3-4 mandays a week (which is way above average to the Guard weekly allowance), averaging about 2-4 more days a month at work than my regAF buddies. For my rank that's about 65% of what they make. I wouldn't call this 'easy' money. Conversely, one of my squadron mates, higher rank by about 1.5 years, spends half his year playing warrior with PACAF and is on full time orders for the duration of that stint. Great, that kid probably pulled about 65-70K. But he was gone as much as his regAF counters were and they still outearned him by about 10%, and they got more leave and medical allowance than he did. So as you can see it's a scale and not a set number. I made 65% and got to carnally know my wife on my own time and when it damn well pleased me. He made 90% and was gone more than AD and missed Thanksgiving, Xmas, the anniversary and Easter, and I sure hope nobody got to carnally know his pretty thing of a wife in his absence; and this is as a "Reservist" mind you. That opportunity cost sucks in my book, but to each their own. So I do think it's possible to clear 45-50K as an LT bumming, but it's burning weekends, and may be outright impossible in units without a decent money pot or with too many bums fighting for the same money. At that point it becomes a choice of either accepting being gone to get paid, or not. Which is kinda AD in nature, and that's really not why I got into the Reserves for. YMMV. If I were you I would do myself a favor and do a long-term look and gut check as to why you would want to pursue bumming. My experience is that long term, bumming outright sucks as a financial plan and is a bad idea. The vast majority of us are doing this to get in line for a full-time position at the unit because we value homesteading and it's probably the only other way we're going to attain a six figure income after vesting our lives into a particular profession in some of the garden variety Guard/Reserve locales where these units are located at. Locations where outside of niche fields or medical, people ain't making jack for money. Alternatively, some people bum to offset an eroding airline industry, either following a furlough or anticipating one. Whatever the situation, all these men and women have probably agreed said status would be temporary. I know too many folks getting into the unit behind me come with expectations of 250K houses and $1000 between two car payments, snicker and pant heavily at the indignity of attempting to fulfill these "expectations" on the grace of whatever bumming they could get out of the unit. That's nothing but piss poor planning. So most do an honest assessment of how long they would be willing to bum for, and if financial landscapes do not change within the time their household could have a tolerance for bumming, they opt out or pursue civilian employment elsewhere and usually leave the unit for another unit closer to the civi employer where they could still min run and get their 48 UTA, 48 TPs and 14/15 AT. I suggest you do that math TODAY versus the day you start bumming at the squadron and your wife gets indignated 'cause your 'job' ain't bringing in half what y'all need to be set like she thought life after college "is supposed to be". That full time job may come in two years, or it could take upwards of five and now you're behind the eight ball financially compared to your age peer group, and your wife is pissed. Good luck to you.1 point
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So what you're really saying is, let's ignore the criminality Hillary Rodham Clinton, John Podesta, and the DNC because their crimes were revealed by a third party. That is what you are saying.-2 points