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Republicans did. Twice. George Bush was easily a good man. They called him a Nazi. So then, a few years later, they picked Romney. Maybe the most ethical person to ever run. Biden accused him of wanting to re-enslave black people (metaphorically), and then he was called a sexist for having resumes from females. I believe that most politicians are corrupt, but the final straw was the Kavanaugh hearing. The (D) party tried to paint a good man as a serial rapist on absolutely zero evidence. I do not blame Democratic voters for buying into the bullshit; I expect no complex thought from the average voter. But the Senators and Representatives who knowingly participated in that smear campaign are evil people, who did evil things. So yeah, the Republican party is a bit tired of being lectured about "human decency." There aren't many parallels. The highest levels of (D) party leadership enthusiastically lied about the characters of good people. Not just one or two random representatives. The whole damn party.

Lol-we waste so much money on bullshit. Prime example, there are still many offices that are suppose to be “teleworking” that usually provide “support” to the force during the non China virus times. Yet somehow the people hacking the mission continue flying and deploying without them. Cut the 69 billion pointless jobs on bases we have and we would have enough money for a new fleet of Phase 2, 3 trainers and god knows what else. Don’t get me started on how much time/money we waste on whatever the social justice hot topic of the month is. let’s be honest, the Air Force long ago decided your flying ability wasn’t really that important. Who was on the party planning committee and spending time in school is what matters to the bobs. This attitude has finally trickled down to UPT. Edit for grammar. I shouldn’t post before I’ve had my coffee.

We wouldn't fight a strike Eagle in a clean C model - that's just not even sporting. I disagree that it would be like me calling a fight in the back of a fighting falcon (I've done that too). The control zone is the control zone, a wez is a wez; potential energy, bandit maneuver options based on said energy/jet capabilities and fight history are pillars of aerial combat that don't really change from jet to jet. (ie A C model has the same wez available to it when fighting an E model or a 16 & vice versa). If you think that BFM and the lessons taught in mastering that art form aren't useful in the rest of tactical aviation "nowadays" I'd say you are part of the problem. The ANG doesn't just do coastal defense. Honestly I'm shocked that anyone in the USAF thinks that's all the ANG does. Have you been living under a rock for the last 20 years?

But, a legit critique of this, “big airlines do all sim training, so that’s what we’ll have T-1s do,” is that to get to an airline you need a couple thousand hours of actual flying... I think they forgot that part or conveniently ignored it.

Been lurking a bit on this thread, but what I’ve seen over the years: - They’ll move more training and ability to log events to sims, but will refuse to find more sims or update them as the jet evolves. - Sims break (some more than jets) and can create a backlog when they go down. - Instructors: you either get civilians (WW-nam dudes who can’t evolve with TTP efficiencies or stop telling war stories long enough to actually teach how to fly the jet) or the IP bill comes out of hide, so your already-overtaxed line flier gets kicked in the nuts with sim duties. Either way, it’s painful. In the end, this seems to be the only true desired efficiency: they can replace green suits with blue and push more guys to the line...who will then have to pick up the training slack when the eventual product hits the unit.

I’m just glad their fact sheet doesn’t say you can track to Bears or Backfires from the T-1 track.

Our primary mission sets are pretty well known things we practice for and singularly focus on learning TTPs. That’s a terrible analogy.

I get it, some units have the iron. Some not as much. But blanket statements like that make me chuckle.

The thing that worries me is not the increase in sim time, but that were losing out experienced instructors out on the line. At least on the heavy side, you've got about 1.5-2 years to learn before you're up for AC. But if you don't have good instructors and ACs, knowledge and skills get lost, and we relearn those lessons the hard way

Vance is already doing this with their new 2.5 classes. Studs get early access to academics and knock out several tests before their class actually starts.

"Never shoot a large caliber man with a small caliber bullet!" But guns are personal, and you want something she can shoot accurately (shot placement is key!), carry comfortably (hopefully not in her purse), and isn't afraid of! I recommend finding a range that rents handguns and having her try a few. Some places have programs specifically tailored to new and/or women shooters. Or go to a gun show and have her handle a few handguns to see which fit her grip and of course which ones she likes. Or find a few buds with handguns willing to bring them to the range so she can try them. I taught my nephew's girlfriend how to shoot. I started off with a GSG 1911 in .22, then moved up to a 1911 in .45ACP. Lastly, but far most importantly, make sure she is properly trained on how to handle a handgun safely!

I don’t expect Trump and the governors to work perfectly together. But I do expect that Trump’s own executive branch operate coherently. Wishful thinking, I know.

I get what you’re saying, but the “fairness” argument doesn’t work for me. It wasn’t fair at all when I went through and some really good pilots in 38 classes got sent off to non-fighters and UAV’s because there weren’t any fighters in the drop. Juxtapose that with now where kids graduating 18/19 are getting fighters. That’s not “fair” either. The USAF needs to fill cockpits and motivated individuals should be able to give themselves an edge within the structure of the program. This would also empowering flight commanders to have some control of vectoring if a guy is a totally selfish prick and doesn’t do anything to help out and be a bro. On the issue of accessing the sim building, have it available 24/7 but manned normal hours. I’m sure it’ll get broken or something, but these people are military officers. We trust them with opening and closing SCIFs and accessing SAP material as Lt’s, I think using the T-6 sim is okay. And if they’re fucking around to the point of breaking the sim, boot them out of UPT. This whole topic to me is odd because so many people are convinced we are going to produce terrible aviators that will kill themselves or not be able to accomplish the mission without doing UPT the same way we did in Vietnam. In my current community (U-28), I’d gladly take a smart kid that was T-6 only trained. Main reason for that is we put them in the copilot seat and most of their mission duties aren’t flying the airplane at all. The second reason for that is we have companion PC-12 trainers where you can go practically anywhere you want VFR or IFR and develop great air sense. That companion trainer is amazing to develop young aviators and I think that would help a lot. Admittedly, the PC-12 variants we fly have identical avionics and for all intents and purposes the performance is similar so that wouldn’t work in a lot of communities. Having some T-6 or T-7 (T-38 could work but I know they’re very in the tooth) sitting on the ramp for young bucks to cruise around in and build time would be great. I’m not personally a fan of the C-172 and similar as companion trainers because they’re just so different in performance than the assigned MWS. It’s better than nothing though.

I am of the other camp on pistol calibers....bigger holes are bigger. a lot of the “kick” has to do with the weight of the pistol. A super lightweight “lady” gun (lady smith revolver in 357 for example) has a sharp angry kick. An all metal 1911 does not .... and as an added bonus can be used as a blunt implement if you’re out of ammo

A1

OK. I’ll play. If he was my WG/CC, his performance is way better than you let on. His GP/CCs (Governors) have received everything they needed* (important to distinguish between wants and needs) to conduct the mission. When they needed ventilators, hospital ships, etc, they received it. I’m not taking this down the rabbit hole of unemployment benefits given the shit show of shenanigans associated with the game. The benefit my WG/CC has is he can fire underperforming GP/CCs and SQ/CCs (governors and mayors). He has the ability to massage the leadership to manage the crisis, not stand there and take the mutiny. It is nothing short of absolute horseshit to vilify the “inaction of the administration” when local and state governments are putting condoms on the monkey to let it go fuck the football. Where is the outrage for cities and states not enforcing PPE and distancing requirements? It has somehow become popular for the federal government to be responsible for the failures of local-level officials. In all of the issues we see regularly, it’s mind boggling how little local communities are seen doing to improve their situations other than pointing the finger at the federal government. This is exactly why socialism fails, and for some reason a large portion of our nation can’t see this ugly truth staring them in the face because the glow of “free shit” is blinding them. FUCK!

Anxiously awaiting the blotter note for the first time one of these is used “inappropriately”...

How long are guys sitting casual before starting UPT now? I think we should start those casuals on ground school immediately and get them some basic instructions before they start UPT and give them access to the sim building. Give them basics to develop their hands and some instruction for primacy and that way, they can start the syllabus ahead of most guys and trim time off of how long UPT takes. If the goal is truly to produce talented aviators, let the motivated ones work on it instead of some bullshit casual job. Get rid of syllabus deviation and shit like that and allow students to take care of events themselves ahead of time. Just rewrite those events to make them hours requirements and assign some IP’s to ensure they’re not going full stupid with what they’re doing. Then give them something like a checkride prior to UPT start to ensure they’re at a standard and start them on the syllabus. I honestly think with some basic instruction with this type of training you could cut out large portions of contact and local instrument sorties.

BURN THE WITCH!!! How dare you say more sims isn’t the answer! BURN!!!

Excuse me if this has already been posted, but when I read this the thought occurred to me that if prior flying experience is helpful to new UPT students, perhaps the same concept might apply to post-UPT students as well. “What the study found was in line with what we value already from the PCSM, in that the AFOQT scores, number of previous flight hours and any potential previous aeronautical ratings most positively relate to a successful student,” Dillenburger said. https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2020/02/21/air-force-confirms-effectiveness-of-a-pilot-selection-tool-even-though-it-may-hinder-diversity/

I know several WSOs who are great dudes and solid “force multipliers” in the strike eagle. They kick ass, and I mean that. But I also have a lot of previous strike friends now flying F-16/15C/35 and all of them have a similar statement: flying with 10% of the WSOs was great and increased effectiveness in the strike, but the other 90% were boat anchors for one reason or another (and one reason may be the pilot’s inability to work well with a specific WSO, so the PCF can also be on the pilot).They would never want to go back to 2 seat and are incredibly glad to be flying single seat. Haven’t talked to a single one of these guys who wishes they had a WSO in their new jet. So, it’s not that GIB=bad bro, it’s just that technology has well surpassed the need for one in fighter aircraft (outside of the strike, which is obviously specifically meched for 2). Guys can be offended all they want at this post, but it won’t make it any less true.

Absolutely everything about Covid has been an unknown, as evidenced by the wildly differing recommendations, forecasts, and results. Oh, don’t forget the disinformation China was running that helped obfuscate the threat. So yeah, plans to fight a known enemy you practice to and specialize against with intel channels on is a terrible fucking analogy. Show me anyone who would have made better decisions about Covid in that office, and I’ll show you someone who got lucky. You don’t seriously think Joe Biden would have somehow magically stopped it at patient zero, right? NY did more damage by sending those senior citizens back into nursing homes instead of appropriate care facilities than any national policy, terrible self-centered communication style or not.

I hear you and I think that would make a great top off for a t-1 complete student. The problem with that airline style of training for direct from T-6 studs is that they realistically have left the UPT nest to fly off-station twice. Even with great sim fidelity you can't replicate the complexity and randomness of flying in the real world. And that is exactly what the out and snack portion of t-1s accomplishes. High fidelity airline sims are for teaching already experienced aviators type-specific tasks. They are not for teaching Stanley how not to be an asshat in class bravo airspace. Also high fidelity airline full motion sims are probably as or more expensive per hour than a t-1

You know what kills small businesses? States like California continuing to shut everything down. Edit: oh, and rioters and looters, if you want to go there on your concern for small businesses.

Shamelessly stolen from a MAF corner of the internet.

Machines do difficult things easily and make easy things difficult.

You think those pilots high 5’d afterwards?

Or maybe task saturated lamenting the days when an FE got the ATIS and they didn’t have to.

They probably were both arguing over who gets ATIS.

Quoted again for emphasis.

It is real. The end game for heavies is airline style training, as far as the Kwast-bred PTN illuminati is concerned. There's even sub-pipelines in the works to get hypothetical regional (and equivalent experience et al) civilian re-treads and just send them to FTU after an assessment of "credit" for civilian training. The paradigm is being baked to dispense with heavy sortie counts in the aircraft, which is SOP in airline training. That means T-1 sims only in the most likely formulation, though they'd love to jam the FTUs with T-6 direct. That's their Motrin you see; every problem in the USAF can be solved by Oculus and "t-6 dIrEcT". They got a fever, and the only Rx...is more T-6. *cowbell clanging* As to the question about quality, the quiet part has already been spoken out loud. It's even in the title FFS. This is about throughput and quantity, not quality. As to retention? oh children, enough already....They don't care about retention. And our new CSAF already took a jab at critics in that propaganda piece. So don't forget, any objective criticism of these opportunity costs just lands you in Luddite "you're part of the problem, old guy" re-education camp. Now it's on public record, so there should be no question what the marching orders are from the top. This will be the new reality. And be careful, the commissars are everywhere, "mentoring" has already occurred in some instances, if I may be euphemistic. From the article [my emphasis]: So they don't need your skepticism, now get back on the parade line and look enthusiastic for dear Leader, you're not singing convincingly enough. 😄 Stay safe out there everyone. LINK: Air Force Magazine, Aug 23 2020

I hate knowing this but I think this is a battle we (pilots) are going to lose.