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Alexandria Occasional Cortex is the deus ex machina for Republicans. Seriously, with all the conspiracy theories out there, it makes more sense to me that AOC is a republican plant than to believe the archetypal millennial has descended from the heavens to save Donald Trump from himself. Overpriced undergraduate degree in a subject she knows nothing about? Check Convinced she knows more than experts in a variety of fields? Check Worked in the restaurant industry and has a terrible credit score? Check Finds racist white male privilege in every perceived injustice? Check Completely unable to judge character and thus associates with people looking to benefit financially from campaign finance fraud? Check Terrified the ecological Holocaust is moments away, but unwilling to make environmental changes in her own life? Check Considers herself qualified for a job merely by merit of her existence? Check Obsessed with seeing herself in social media? Check I could go on and on and on. You couldn't make her more stereotypical if she was slathered in avocado There's an important philosophical point somewhere in here about abandoning principals for political gain and the road to ruin, but I'd rather watch the train wreck than consider the implications for now.

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Due to a lot of misinformation from Regular Retirees and ARPC not being clear on Reserve Retirement rules and having run into more than a couple reservists telling me they stayed in the SELRES/ANG for 24 years in order to "max the pay chart" for retirement, and I think, obviously the ARC enjoying that people do not understand and therefore serve additional years unnecessarily, I am compelled to write this and wish it to become common knowledge for anyone seeking a reserve retirement. The only stipulation to carry O-5 into retirement is serving on the Reserve Active Status List for 3 years Time in Grade. Now it is unclear that if those 3 years are only years on the RASL or if those 3 years need to be *good* years on the RASL. I would not want to press to test on this nuance, so let's say that those 3 years TIG need to be good years. The biggest distinguishing feature of the Reserve Retirement is that once you transfer to the retired reserve (AKA grey area) your years of service for the purposes of determining your high 36 continue to accrue until you reach age 60 (or whatever your age is for reduced reserve retirement). The reason that your finance office or ARPC will tell you that they have no idea what your reserve retirement pay will be and then refer you to any number of online calculators (which btw are designed for regular retirement and commonly misused by prospective reserve retirees) is because the calculation requires a look-back of 36 months and no one knows what the future pay charts will say. However, to get a pretty good idea we can use an example of a grey area retiree who reaches age 60 today (1 Apr 2019) and I will outline below what that looks like right now. The formula for calculating a reserve retirement: points/360*"high36"*.025. This gives you your monthly pay. Now the confusion arises as to what high-36 is. High 36 for our guy who is now 60 years old as of 1 Apr 2019 and entered the grey area 18 years ago at 42 years of age, he now has 38 years on the pay chart, thus maxing out the pay chart for O-5. He will have 36 months at $9521 (2019 pay chart is used for all 36 months), for a high 36 average of $9521. Assuming he has 5000 points, his retirement monthly pay will be 5000/360*$9521*.025=$3306. This math can be verified by the point valuation chart published by DFAS for 2019. Here is a link to the point valuation chart (Mypers): https://mypers.af.mil/ci/fattach/get/9805796/1553879360/redirect/1/filename/2019_POINT_VALUATION_FOR_RETIREMENT_BENEFITS_RESERVIST_AND_GUARD_MEMBERS.pdf Again, this is assuming he had 3 years TIG as an O-5 at his 20 years TIS. There is no need to serve in the SELRES/ANG for more than the time it takes to get 3 years TIG. The only online calculator that I have found that will give a correct answer is on the VPC Dashboard (accessed via Mypers). Main takeaway is that your years in service are all years on the active status list (both regular and reserve) plus the years spent in the grey area. If for some reason you do not get 3 years TIG as an O-5 on the active status list, you will enter the grey area as an O-4 (assuming you didn't get the 2 yr waiver) and then your retired pay will be based on maxing out the O-4 pay charts. Here is a link from ARPC that explains all the above in fairly confusing (to me, anyway) language: https://militarypay.defense.gov/Pay/Retirement/Reserve.aspx Info about transferring from active status to retired reserve (grey area): https://mypers.af.mil/app/answers/detail/a_id/14270 Also see the attachment which dispels additional rumors I've heard such as a regular retiree with IDT points gets a retirement re-calculation at age 60. I don't know how that rumor got started, but it's false. This is the 1405 service mentioned in the power point. Retirement_explained.pdf

I guess “rolling up” the flight engineer during the later half of Atlantic crossings back in the day is not good? Literally duct taping them to their chair on the flight deck while asleep and hitting the gear warning or fire test switch lights/bells to wake’m up... Seemed humorous although it teaches one to stay on the job, but then again there weren’t any safe/quiet spaces on board either... Definitely and arguably the good O’l days.

The benefits are (were) the support structure, especially during times of plenty when surplus T-34s and T-41s could be the backbone of the club, on base facilities, including avgas availability (which is gone with the wind, obviously). But you're right, the golden goose was strangled by the typically Air Force answer to non-existent problems, such as the hamfisted application of an AFI11-2AeroClubV1,2,3 template that turns a sunny day in search of the $100 burger into, well...more queep than it's worth. That the Air Force doesn't make support (real, risk managed, managment-managed approach) to supporting Aero Clubs is a shame. It should be a core cultural priority; we're the fucking AIR Force, for chrissakes! AFB's should have an Aero Club, Navy bases should have a sailing club, Army bases should have an MWR shooting range and backcountry hiking/camping.

It appears to me that the shadow on the lower jet is the fuselage and lower vertical stab of the top jet. It’s probably the telephoto compression making them look much closer as the article states. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

IMHO, AOC does have one redeeming quality "She has nice (.) (.)" - Check. I'm still trying to determine the exact make/model AOC is "STACKED" with - "(o)(o) or { O }{ O } or (Q)(Q) or ( - )( - ) or ( o Y o ), - etc/TBD: Eventually, I foresee and epic catfight developing between AOC A.K.A. (o) (o) and Nancy A.K.A \o/\o/ (Grandma Tatas) - for control of the Democrats agenda.

The ART bonus was approved in summer of 2016. I was the first pilot in my unit to be offered and accept one. ART bonuses are taken out of hide from the unit civpay pot. What that means is the unit needs to manage the bonuses accordingly because it ultimately means less temp Techs and fewer on the spot bonuses for everyone else. My unit was doing 25% for IP's and 10% for AC's. It is calculated AFTER locality bump up and ended up being just over $29k for me payed put biweekly. I was making about $146k just in techpay as a Step 6. In 2017, I grossed about $175k with a deployment. Now, with the SSR rates, it's another ballgame. With the new rates, I would be making about $177k just in techpay with $210k+ within range adding milpay. Keep in mind, however, that it is your unit's perogative to offer you an incentive bonus above and beyond your regular techpay. The ART bonus policy is not a gimmie from NGB for all ART's. Civilian retention bonuses can be given to any GS employee and the guidance is driven by OPM. Not sure if units are still giving out bonuses to people under the new SSR rates as the new payscales are pretty close to what people would make with a 25% bonus. Yes, units can hire ART's into higher Steps if the person exceeds qualifications. It's all about how they advertise the job.

it’s called the separations program, personnel services delivery (psd) guide. page 62 is the flowchart.

She starts speaking at 33”, I don’t know what’s going on, but she is blatantly making shit up, like not even trying. We all know they stretch the truth, focus only on positives and lie, but this is different. I used to be in awe on how the Democrats stuck together no matter what, no one can stick with this, she belongs in a hospital, I’m serious.

The CC doesn’t themselves have to be progressive in order to enact progressive agenda. They just need to enable progressive ideology so as to not get in trouble (avoid risk)

Democrats roll-in on their poll-leading centrist candidate. Five years after the incident. https://dailycaller.com/2019/03/31/lucy-flores-biden-cnn-kiss/

Stop talking to this guy, he has no idea what he's talking about.

But how many modern social progressivist liberal CCs have any of us encountered? I don't think I know of any. What I do know is most careerists I've met lately are concerned with 1. Metrics and 2. Avoiding risk. Inflate the positives numbers, eliminate the negative numbers, and avoid anything that may complicate either of the above. Human behavior, especially in the military is risky, messy, and unpredictable. It requires leadership to effectively handle it. But effective leadership cannot be quantified, therefore it is not rewarded nor promoted. Maybe because I'm older and perhaps more cynical, it easy to see when someone is mimicking how a leader might speak/act vs. being one. Because it has become harder to find and/or teach our CCs how to handle human behavior in an organization that values face to face interaction less and less, it's easier to just draw ever constricting circles around the individual and tell them that their behavior or anyone else they are responsible for shall not stray beyond it. How long before people begin to reject what they're defending?

Filling the skies with additional "targets" may provide some benefit. Ever hear "Nine groups" and think "F###"...?

Dothan is the biggest town in the area, but it's a half hour away. Most folks live in Enterprise. I've lived in both Ozark and Enterprise, and would put Enterprise above any other nearby surrounding towns.

When I was a mid-level Captain I had two majors (solid dudes) on the CAG staff try to give me career mentoring, the secret to success...PCS your way to any HAF job and find an exec position as fast as you can to ensure future success. I thought at the time, WTFO this is crazy talk and maybe borderline desperate. But you know what? It's the correct strategy (if promotion is your priority) and I really appreciate the dudes for willing to share the secret recipe with me (no I didn't follow their advice). This is for a non-rated ops AFSC, but probably works for everyone.