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Just remember that while airline pay might help you buy that second vacation home, active duty military pay provides the stability and predictability that only true, full-time service to your country can offer. And you cannot gloss over the benefits that don't show up on a pay stub: healthcare, retirement, and, of course, the unrivaled joy of serving your nation 24/7 that will put a smile on your face every morning. Remember, in our Air Force, you're not just holding a line; you're holding THE line—against existential threats to our way of life.

@ClearedHot Overall, I think two things need to be considered when listening to anybody campaigning - what’s the actual point they’re making lying underneath whatever “base igniting” actions they propose, and understanding there will be ignorant statements made from those who have never been there, had a security clearance, etc. The latter’s approach to a problem change all the time once they’re afforded the opportunity to be fully informed, read in, etc. This is all par for the course. 1. 16 yr olds and illegals are voting in some states (locally). Millions of incredibly ignorant people vote all the time. These are problems. Will Vivek actually amend it to 25, probably not at all. But will he push for a civics test, maybe, and I fully support that. That’s not suppression, that’s a contract between the country and the citizens that they actually are informed enough to vote. I do not think anyone deserves to vote when all they know is their TikTok feed. If new citizens have to take this test, then no problem with people who were lucky enough to be born in this country have to take the same. Hell, the left should be arguing it’s racist to make immigrants take it and not make natural born citizens take it. Create a nice study packet that spoon feeds the answers, blatantly even. The actual point is people will read said study packet and actually learn even if they think all they’re doing is memorizing answers. 2. FBI, DOE, NRC, etc. He sees the massive problem of our govt agencies, and so do you. His comments are to fire people up, not literal. I do think he will push for significant reform, but it’s incredibly unlikely that a hypothetical president Vivek would actually put real effort into fully dissolving these agencies (other than DOE, that one should be dissolved). 3. You and Vivek are probably about lock step on this. Humans affecting climate is real, but the term “Climate Change” as defined by the left and currently used in the 2020s vernacular is a total lie. He could have phrased his response better by clarifying that important distinction. His following statement that more people have been hurt by “climate change policies” than actual climate change is completely accurate. He then follows up with how to make America energy independent…that’s the wheat (separated from the chaff) in this line of discussion…he wants to stop strangling current day American energy capabilities while simultaneously exploring and expanding nuclear energy for a cleaner future (to eventually replace those fossil fuels). That’s about as logical and smart as you can get on the topic of energy in a very simplified manner. 4. This is a problem as you said. Have to find ways to stop incentivizing people to not work and to not be a family unit. Unless I missed it, he really just highlighted this as a big problem in our society, but didn’t provide exact solutions. That will take some OJT before anyone could provide informed COAs. 5. See first comment and #2

Yes.

@ClearedHot Good counterpoints, appreciate the response. I think @uhhello summed my thoughts up well - fairly standard for candidates (especially in a primary where the party base is all that matters) to say hyperbolic things that resonate with the base, which then dovetail into the realistic path forward come general election. Good example is “burn it down” actually translates into “significant reform.” Personally, I am very concerned with the current admin and would take any of the GOP field over the train wreck we have now. That doesn’t mean I love them all or don’t have a ranked preference, but I don’t see anybody running that I wouldn’t choose over Biden/his replacement. That’s not a R vs. D thing, it’s a that’s-how-low-they’ve-sunk-this-country thing and I have no faith that any Biden replacement would be different than him policy-wise.

Voter ID laws and paper ballots (which I support), have NOTHING to do with raising the voting age 7 years and requiring a civics test.

Michigan airshow crash report suggests pilot, backseater out of sync on whether to eject The pilot of the Russian-made Fighter that crashed earlier this month during the Thunder over Michigan Airshow in Belleville was trying to land the plane while the backseater acknowledged to investigators he likely pulled the ejection handles for both of them, a preliminary investigation found. The report suggested that moments before the jet hit the ground during the Yankee's Air Museum annual event, the pilot and backseater — who were racing against the clock in a plummeting plane — had different views about what to do. F You Nav!

If it’s Vivek or Desantis, this will be my second time voting for what seems to be a good presidential candidate. Reagan was my first chance voting, and I was proud to vote. Since then, I’ve either pinched my nose and voted, or knowingly threw my vote away voting for someone not on the ballot. I still know my support of Fred Thompson was correct and grounded in 2008!

That voter ID and legitimate traceable ballots aren't the national standard speaks to the depth of crisis we're already in. Time for a candidate who takes the issue seriously, although I grant I'm not in favor of a civics test (who will test the testers?). Imagine we're watching enemy targets & you stood up in a JOC full of prevaricating pussy Colonels and said "let's just attack these guys and eat their hearts!" I'd support your enthusiasm, agree in principal that attacking is my preferred COA, and get with you later to revisit & tweak the whole cannibalism thing (which I don't support). But let's get things moving in the right direction. That's how I feel here. Addressing boarder chaos, firing our disgraceful SECDEF then purging the military of his acolytes, and ensuring elections are run legitimately are my 3 top voting issues.

I agree with many of your points, but I totally disagree with your take on voting. Our elections are a national crisis, something radical must be done or our system risks illegitimacy. I think fraud is widespread enough to impact results, and I am not alone. Whether this is true or not we do not know with certainty, because credible investigations are stymied. However, like many things with authority, the perception of impropriety is as damaging as actual impropriety itself. I think voter ID laws and paper ballots are a minimum requirement moving forward.

Like a PIC veto-handle...from behind

You are "probably" correct, but in these hyperbolic times I pay attention when a radical screams changes to the Constitution.

Yep. Already multiple “swaps” publicly released. Several F-15 units to F-35 and EX, multiple F-16 to F-35, A-10 to F-16, additional F-35 standing up at Ft Smith, etc. Now will it all actually play out as it currently sits on paper, only time will tell. NGAD in the ANG any time in the next 15 years? Low Pk in my opinion, but we’ll see.

It needs to be Desantis and Vivek! And fuck Trump! I hope to God it doesn't end up being him vs. Biden; but if it does, I will begrudgingly vote for the slightly-lesser idiot...

Republican debate: Chris Christie was the biggest surprise of the event | Washington Examiner Don't sleep on Christie. Sure, he's no Ronnie Reagan. But, a former Gov of a blue state. Check. Think about it in terms of the general election. He might even win some blue states (New Jersey...duh!) but maybe some of your purples (your Georgia's, Nevada's, Wisconsin's) that are going to decide it. Personally, I think if you go DJT or any of his culture warrior clones then you spook the swing voters (see 2020, 2022 midterms, many other local elections, etc).

Man it’s weird how the media isn’t going out of its way to point out how diverse the Republican debate stage was… Odd *sarcasm* Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Concur. I like him, hope to see less canned statements next month. I think the main thing that pushed Vivek ahead last night was his ability to speak extemporaneously vs. cycle a bunch of rehearsed, canned answers. If Desantis can do that in the following debates, he absolutely crushes everybody. Bottom line at this point, either Desantis or Vivek are the most capable of crushing Biden in the general. As Haley said, Trump is the most disliked politician out there. He is the most likely to lose in the general election out of the top few GOP hopefuls. True conservatives see that, the progressive-like Trump cult refuse to see that. As Desantis said early on and last night, this is not about any one man, it’s about getting our country out of the dumpster fire it resides in. The “all in for trump” crowd are making it about one man, their cult leader. They are demonstrating they in fact do not care about the bigger picture and the betterment of our country. It’s the epitome of “if you don’t play what I want to play, I’m taking my ball and going home.” Really getting sick of these people who very well may end up directly responsible for foisting our country into another 4 years of this egregious bullshit. I won’t blame the Dems or their base if that happens, I’ll blame trump and all of his acolytes.

For those of us that flew the Herc or other tac airlift, I feel like we had a different perspective than many. Between early 2002-2018 I went into nearly every 2500'+ C-130 capable airstrip in and around the AOR. We got to see nearly every part of it from below 20,000' and 250kts. Tents at the end of dirt strips became B-huts, Q-huts, Prefabs, then permanent concrete structures. Dirt strips got paved, lengthed. Giant hangers, cubic miles of concrete poured in dozens upon dozens of locations. Hundreds of thousands of vehicles and equipment bought, used up and discarded. You'd see them piled in junkyards near many locations. We were constantly hauling contractors, Haliburton, KBR, Fleur, Raython, etc. Often talk to them and discuss the obscene amouts of money they were making for menial jobs. I wrote a story a while back about flying with the Undersecretary of Defense comptroller who, on the flight deck, bragged about a stack of fake currency he showed us with his face in the middle and denominated in One-Billion-Out-Year Dollars. He was handing them out to Generals to demonstrate he had unlimited funds. He was a douchebag. He later couldn't account for 2 Trillion Dollars. But, I sort of feel fortunate to have seen this monumental effort unfold over the course of my career. For much of it, I wanted to believe it was meaningful and the correct thing to do. But I'm also embarrassed that I bought into the whole "They hate your freedom and want to destroy it" line. So naive. I'm sure some of what we did prevented a lot of bad things from happening. Did other things create a lot of suffering? More? Less? I don't know. Are we a better nation because of it? We'd have blindfolded and drugged detainees strapped to the cargo floor one day, and HR containers the next. We'd reconfig for Medevac. Mulitated soldiers and local civilians including children. It all seemed pretty crazy. What I did not see much of was the up close killing, so I can't comment on that aspect. I guess my point being, looking back, it was the most insanely one-sided conflict in the history of mankind, and I got to see a lot of it, first hand, from a variety of perspectives, over 16 years. We lost 2996 on 9/11. In the war after, we lost maybe 7000 KIA and 8000 contractors. I just looked, 30,000 suicides since. We lost a couple hundred thousand allied troops. I can't find the number of losses we inflicted on the bad guys, though. I have no idea. But the world probably isn't going to miss a few hundred thousand barefoot goat-herders with AK-47s. Sort of makes you wonder what kind of effort fighting a near-peer adversary would require. That's a long way of saying it was maybe worth it for a little while, and it wasn't for a long while.

We were still directly actioning on targets from the Neptune Spear intel 4 years after the fact. That wasn’t just national building, it was dismantling active efforts by AQ and its leadership network. That’s part of the misunderstand we were there to make a democratic country. That was a secondary goal to all the stuff going on in numbered task forces. If we’d said that publicly it would have been honest, but that’s a harder sell to people. “Why are we still there?!?!?” “Well Mr and Mrs Wisconsin suburban voter… there are still a lot of S-heads that need killing.” Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

just like the EW mission, the usaf ceded the mission set at their own expense. False economies abound.

Army Patriots will kill you without a thought because the right light turns on or doesn’t turn on. They do what they’re told and critical thought is discouraged because they’re punished for mistakes. Stay TF away from them. The USAF should own their own air defenses.

War is horrific...simply horrific. I remember my first few missions and the metric of success was always the number. We count everything, crap many of us growing up who dreamed of flying wanted to be an Ace because we thought that was the top of the glorified pyramid. In time and as I flew more missions and my "number" became stupidly high...(on one misisons I killed 32 men in 8 minutes)...I had to stop counting. Yes they were evil people who deserved to die but it was still someone's brother, father, son, cousin...and I didn't want to surrender my humanity in the process. I PRAY my son never has to see the horror of war. While I cheer the Ukrainians it is not lost on me that the ones dying are not that ones that caused this horror. Yes the Russian troops are committing atrocities but this is not a simple good vs bad situation and a lot of young men and women (and innocents), are dying because of a diabolical human in Moscow. I hope Ukraine kicks the snot out of the Russians and they flee back to Russia and I hope it all ends right there. At the end of the day we all do our duty, and I did it very well, but we don't have the celebrate the carnage