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Yesterday's reflective belt is today's preferred pronouns in the email signature block.

can we all just grow the fuck up and be done with this woke virtue signaling nonsense? this is the fucking military take your bull shit to some other government organization. i dont care if you're a gay pilot, woman pilot, trans pilot, they/them, just be good at your job. is that too much to ask? do whatever you want in your private life i don't care but stop pushing what sexuality you prefer/fuck in public JFC. rant over.

Chief is an interesting rank. All other enlisted ranks up to Chief are pretty well defined. It’s almost like you hit a completely new rank structure when you look at how many different types of Chiefs there are. It’s like that scene in Forrest Gump. Shrimp gumbo, fried shrimp, shrimp scampi…. You see Chiefs out there in squadrons, groups, wings, first sergeants, staffs, etc. There aren’t many Chiefs in the AF but yet they seem to everywhere. Some genuinely care and use the rank to better their organizations and their people’s lives. Others are power hungry assholes just like some officers.

The USAF is getting a free lesson right now on why the artificial tanker gap caused by early KC-10 retirement is at best a criminally negligent act and at worse a root cause for a loss in a shooting war. Even against a second-rate opponent. The real question is whether they’ll admit mistakes or implement a solution.

If the metal moves in July, there will be no contract. I'm tired of listening to pilots bitch about the contract, then spend 15 minutes on the phone fixing a catering problem, or refusing to write up small discrepancies that will delay their flight, or chasing contractually non-compliant assignments for a few bucks, etc,etc,etc. "Well I don't want to delay the passengers..." "But they might have to cancel the flight!" "I'm not going to screw over the FAs" "I just want to get to the hotel" "I have family in Tulsa, so I'm just going to get us there." It's the same here as it was in the military. A lot of type-A people who love the smell of their own farts. But if it isn't a specifically-enumerated decision authority for the PIC/A-code from the FAA/11-202, the tough guys get real soft when it gets to be time to cancel the flight. Fatigue, weather, maintenance, doesn't matter, the metal moves. And since the motivations in the airlines are completely different, it's made me rethink my military experience entirely. I always thought it was fear of being passed over, or missing the next award, or not getting the desired assignment that kept military pilots grinding on, despite the regs and despite safety. But none of those considerations exist at the airline. So the only logical conclusion is that pilots are by and large a bunch of golden retrievers that get immense validation from "getting it done," even when no one gives a shit on the other side of the table. That's probably a good thing in the context of a risk mitigation career. But it makes you incredibly vulnerable at the negotiating table.

To Chris. Him him...

FedEx negotiations - no different than the standard industry-wide teeth gnashing. A very vocal minority complaining on Airline Pilot Central, about 12 angry men just screaming at each other, mostly about personal issues, and mostly without ever providing a real solution. Standard internet board chaff. We're just over a year into negotiations. Both company and union say mean things about each other. It's business, it's not personal. Most guys are just flying their line, and there are a few that will again make over $1M for the 3rd year in a row. I still can't control what other people do in life. Oh well. No credible rumors about pay rates and work rules yet. If we're lucky, we'll see a TA before peak. If the historical 2+ year timeline holds, we'll see a TA in the spring. Unclear which timeline we're on. Union/company politics are just as draining as normal governmental politics if you let the evil in. I've found that keeping the bull$hit at arm's length is effective mitigation...just fly the line like cog that I am, then go home to hang out with my favorite people on the planet. From my seat, FedEx is still the best job in aviation There's beauty in being a cog. A well paid cog, but a cog nonetheless.

It’s almost like we made it up post Gulf War with no real purpose.

I highly recommend Bullshit Jobs: A Theory by David Graeber. Really ties into the AF quite well

This is a sweeping generalization: 50s Baby Boomers > 60s protestors > 70s decadents > 80s yuppies > today’s old liberals. They never lived up to their WW2 vet parents’ accomplishments, so they’ve always felt the need to “do something” even if there’s nothing to do. Combine that with the white guilt from becoming millionaires for doing nothing other than buying a house in the 80s and living off the economic foundations built by the Greatest Generation, and you get a lot of the current Democrat politicians that are striving to accomplish something before they die. For boomers like Warren, Sanders, Biden, etc, the overturning of Roe v Wade - the single most important social political issue - is absolutely devastating to their self-perceived legacy. From their viewpoint, after a lifetime of comfortable counter-culturalism, seeing the world turning back to that of their war-winning, company-founding, golf-playing dads is absolutely devastating.

HAHAHA!

Copy that brother—thank you! Best of luck to you!

I legit think we shouldn’t bring people home until the war is over, including mobilized reservists and guardsmen. Good luck politicians with these bullshit conflicts with that archetype.

I am in favor of providing support to women who carry their babies to full term. Actually, a lot of people are and operate crisis pregnancy centers around the country, completely without taxpayer support!! However, lately they’ve been the recipients of a great deal of arson, vandalism, and other cowardly forms of attack from the champions of “choice.” And since I’m using quotes, I’d also like to give a big shout out to the Supreme Court for their recent ruling that has, at least for the past few days, granted the American Left the freedom to use the word “woman” again! Because “menstruating person” was extremely “offensive” to “persons” who do other stuff besides walking around bleeding everywhere all the time.

This individual is about to make an even bigger impact because there’s no real large combat deployments affecting vast swaths of the military. When there’s not those pesky wars, that’s when the Shoe Clerk rebuilds his empire. Guarantee there was some Roman hassling some legionnaires about their sandals being tied correctly after they conquered Gaul. Nothing new.

Ever read "The Heart of Darkness"? The parallels are unreal. Joseph Conrad's novel about colonial Africa, late 1800s I think. I had to read it for classes a couple times, once in high school and twice in college. "For a time I would feel I belonged still to a world of straightforward facts; but the feeling would not last long. Something would turn up to scare it away. Once, I remember, we came upon a man-of-war anchored off the coast. There wasn’t even a shed there, and she was shelling the bush. It appears the French had one of their wars going on thereabouts. Her ensign dropped limp like a rag; the muzzles of the long six-inch guns stuck out all over the low hull; the greasy, slimy swell swung her up lazily and let her down, swaying her thin masts. In the empty immensity of earth, sky, and water, there she was, incomprehensible, firing into a continent. Pop, would go one of the six-inch guns; a small flame would dart and vanish, a little white smoke would disappear, a tiny projectile would give a feeble screech—and nothing happened. Nothing could happen. There was a touch of insanity in the proceeding, a sense of lugubrious drollery in the sight; and it was not dissipated by somebody on board assuring me earnestly there was a camp of natives—he called them enemies!—hidden out of sight somewhere." Anyway that book inspired a couple follow-ons, the classic Apocalypse Now, the newer sci-fi movie Ad Astra, and a video game 10 years back or so called 'Spec-Ops: The Line'.

This is simply not true in a historical context. As pointed out, the median income is no longer capable of buying the same things. And the distribution of wealth over the generations at specific ages has shifted dramatically lower. The college scam has started millions off with crippling debt. Millennials did not create this world, their parents did.

I’m married with 3 kids.