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You are racist...Bidenomics is good.

Additionally, I would be shocked if they had a nuke and Israel didn't know about it. That's not an easy thing to keep under wraps, and the Israelis haven't had much of a problem in the past finding out about, and impeding Iran's nuclear ambitions. For all the shit he gets, Netanyahu is not some belligerent warmonger. If he thought Iran had a nuke and there was any chance of that type of escalation, they wouldn't be hitting them so hard. Especially when your most important ally (USA) is having an identity crisis and you honestly can't tell whether or not they have your back.

pre covid i wasn't too awake to the intense propaganda the media blasts the public with, but post covid holy hell is it obvious once you see it. operation mockingbird was a real thing and probably very much in use today under a new name. just the fact the dems now say kamala was no longer in charge of the border, when she obviously was, is so 1984 Orwellian.

What’s worse is much of the American public seems to be buying it.

The T-7 is easier to fly than the T-38, but it is still is a fast mover. FWIW, I think IPT to T-7 a dumb idea. AETCs risks were all about losses to production but never anything about students morting themselves. There are also a lot of MAF dudes (no offense to them) making these decisions that have never flown fast jets in their life. And hindsight, for those of us who know you, your writing style doxx’d you years ago. hah

I'm pretty sure if Israel thought they had or were at end stages of having it, that capability would be set back. They have everything to lose by allowing them the big boomer.

Florida inventory is up a little and prices are slowly coming down. Airbnb values drop? Who cares, I am WAY ahead AND my Airbnbs have been rocking for six straight years. Now I get 60 day winter rentals that cover my expenses for the entire year. I ran the numbers last month and after expenses I am generating on average 32% profit based on the current value of the homes. I own six homes outright and have one home with a mortgage, the last thing I am doing is sweating...especially after doing a IRRRL and locking in at 1.75%.

Seventy years ago today, the B-52A—the first production model of the B-52—flew its first flight (pictured) from Boeing’s Seattle plant. A.M. “Tex” Johnston, Boeing’s Chief of flight test, and Donald Knutson, co-pilot, flew the aircraft, taking off at 3:42 p.m. local time, and landing at 5:00 p.m. The production model of the B-52 differed from the two test models that came before it by having the pilot and the co-pilot sitting side-by-side instead of tandem. Since the mid-1950s on through to the present day, the B-52 fleet has been the backbone of the USAF’s strategic bomber capability.

100% same. Pre-Covid I only partly paid attention to or cared about politics. Now I feel like my eyes are open, and the coordinated big media propaganda is an active, obvious, and evil presence in our country.

Buckle up. We got a bag day ahead of us.

I think we too often underestimate how much to consider what people say about themselves and what they believe. For example, when Hamas says they want to 'kill every Jew in the world' we would do well to take that seriously. However, there are also people that need to basically be watched on mute because they are either playing to a target audience, just like constantly being the center of attention, or riling up the other side to get a desired reaction. Trump is in this second group. Ignore what he says and pay attention to what he does.

amazing how kamala went from the most unpopular vice president in history, to suddenly a media darling front runner for president. who hasn't won any vote for nomination, just picked by the big bosses in their soft coup. "defending democracy!"

A formation of MC’s… ironic coming from him since he, you know, wanted to kill formation.

He personally called the 27 SOW/CC to request (demand really) a two-ship flyover of MCs for his USAFA CoC, because with everything else we have going on, yeah sure, we've got the time and assets for that. Edit to add: my first question when this came down was "Does anyone care/does it matter that he got soft-fired?" Anyone, I'm the only one, ok I'll shutup now.

This…and you’re not being a prick. Additionally, how embarrassing to go from being a MAJCOM CC to being in charge of the zoo. The fact that he (I’m assuming) didn’t request retirement says a lot.

I mean, I won't lie, I wouldn't mind this if it helped catch the asshole I saw the other day that drove off after causing a crash because they were weaving in and out of traffic and ran someone off the road. BUT....I understand slippery slopes and all. Ya, unless you live out in sticks, you're probably on some camera anytime you're outside of the house (and even sometimes inside), even in your back yard. Look at how many incidents have been witnessed thanks to ring cameras (SWA low in Chicago, NFL players parents house explosion, etc...). They already canvas the neighborhood for these videos, but I'm not sure I like the idea of them just tapping into them all without approval. I have no doubt it will play out as a "do it for the children" or "if it saves one life," type of argument.

Amen. And not to be a prick, but why is he entitled to get moved to another job as a 3 star? It didn’t go well in charge of a MAJCOM, that’s it. Retirement time. Thanks for your service.

I'm voting Trump because I mostly approved of his policies while POTUS. I won't vote for Harris because I totally disapprove of the Biden-Harris policies. See, it's easy to make a decision without making excuses.

Here's the problem green suiters never seem to understand about this tired "contractor deus ex machina" COA. Every.single.time the question gets posed in the real world (and it has, ad nauseam) it boils down to the same self-evident retort: "Where and for how much?". And the answer continues to be the same: "No thanks." The contractor undergraduate training pipedream cannot be scaled to the requirement, unless and until you get rid of the unholy Trinity: Laughlin, Columbus and Vance. I'd give details of what it takes to staff the place, but I don't want to doxx myself, plus I'm not even sure some of the stuff I've dealt with is fully JTR-kosher anyways, so 1 2 3 4 fifth. "Senator, that hooker was dead when I got to the gangbang....." 😄 BL, it is my lived experience that what you people want, cannot be had for what your bosses are willing to pay. A few townie-married check o the month types willing to teach "back waivered" UPT in a Grob are not going to save this enterprise. If you don't move the enterprise to metro USA, that COA is DOA. Reality. There's zero political will to move XL and CB. Reality. The number you get is equal to however many green bags you can non-volunteer to do the job for 3 years at a time + the aggregate cost of 7-day opts. Reality.

No matter F-35 delivered munition or 2 month prior delivery by Amazon, doesn't matter. What does matter is Iran was known as the safest of havens for terrorists and one of the Hamas leaders took the room temperature challenge and lost in Tehran. Israel has fully implemented the FO part of FAFO much to the dismay of the surviving dirtbags. Hopefully, more Hamas barbarians will get the invitation to meet Allah.

Today is 1 August... On this date in 1955, Tony LeVier went for a taxi test on Groom Lake in a new Lockheed aircraft that had yet to be flown. However, the aircraft had different plans, and before he knew it, Tony was airborne in what was the unplanned 1st flight of the U-2. So today, the pressure-breathing, pressure-suited prima donnas celebrate 69 years above 69,000 feet. And tomorrow, over 25% of all living U-2 pilots on the planet will gather for an exceptional Homecoming to celebrate the solo flights of what could be the last class of U-2 trainees. Hail Dragons

Create an organization that has no true measurable metric for success. Then imagine the types of officers who are going to excel and advance within that type of organization. Finally, consider the types of decisions that sort of leader will make. It's the inevitable trajectory until there is once again a measurable metric for success.

A legend went west yesterday, Godspeed Mike. Hail Dragons. Article Link Dragon Lady Down Mike Hua’s airplane was leaving a silvery streak of vaporized jet fuel in its wake, as its tanks slowly drained through a fractured fuel line. The thin trail was barely visible in the starlight of a summer night; only a chase plane could have seen it. Hua had no idea his gas was bleeding away. But on August 3, 1959, the only chase plane in the world that could have paced him would have been another Lockheed U-2, since that’s what Hua was flying at 70,000 feet over Utah. Mike Hua was actually Major Hsichun Hua, an experienced F-86 Sabre pilot of the Republic of China Air Force, based on the island of Taiwan. He had been sent to Laughlin Air Force Base, in Texas, as one of a select group of Nationalist Chinese pilots appointed to train on the then super-secret spy plane so they could overfly mainland China. All of them had been arbitrarily given Western handles—Pete, Jack, Charlie, Sonny, Spike, Terry, Mickey, Mike—by their U.S. Air Force instructors. Hua, today a retired ROCAF general living in Mary­land with an aeronautical engineering doctorate from Purdue, has retained Mike as part of his name ever since. That night in 1959, however, he was 34 years old and on just his seventh U-2 training flight. His assignment was to fly from Laughlin to overhead Big Spring, Texas; then northwest to his turnaround point at Ogden, Utah; southwest to Delta, Utah; and finally southeast for the long, lonely slog home. Hua wasn’t flying from VOR to VOR as any private pilot of the time could have done with his simple Narco VHF radio, and of course there was no such thing as GPS. He was navigating with the U-2A’s built-in sextant, taking star sights like a 19th-century mariner, albeit through a hooded cockpit scope. He was doing this while wearing a pressure suit and helmet, in a cockpit the size of a 1952 VW Bug driver’s seat, at night, in an airplane that required remarkably precise speed control. Five knots too fast meant Mach overspeed and possible failure of the fragile airframe, and 5 knots too slow meant a stall upset and equally destructive airframe failure. All of Hua’s U-2 flights had been solos, since no two-seaters existed as yet. To have survived this far was a sign of substantial Chinese aviation talent, for the “Dragon Lady” was the hardest-to-land airplane in the Air Force’s inventory, and perhaps the hardest-to-land aircraft in living memo­ry. (Those who have piloted restored and replicated Gee Bee racers might disagree.) But Hua had landed solo six times, and his seventh U-2 touchdown was about to go down in aviation history. The spy planes were usually landed with the help of an experienced U-2 pilot stationed at the approach end of the runway, like an aircraft carrier’s LSO, to tell the pilot how many feet above the ground he was. Assuming the pilot had at least nailed the over-the-fence airspeed, every extra foot of altitude meant 1,000 more feet of runway would be needed. Eventually—and to this day—U-2s began to be landed with the help of “mobiles.” These are U-2 pilots driving muscle cars that can easily accelerate to 100 mph from a taxiway to catch up with a landing U-2 so the driver can call out precise altitudes, even in inches, to the pilot. Mike Hua had no mobile. In fact he didn’t have a friend in the world when his Pratt & Whitney J57 went silent 13 miles above Utah. U-2As had no fuel-quantity gauges—assumedly a weight-saving measure. A low-fuel warning light was supposed to come on when just 40 gallons remained, but Hua doesn’t remember seeing it. Since a glowing red instrument panel warning light would be impossible to ignore at night, apparently it had failed. It was 2258 local time when the big Pratt checked out and left Hua with nothing but the sound of the slipstream. Actually, Hua did have one friend: his long-winged Lockheed jet sailplane. From 70,000 feet, a U-2 could glide 250 nautical miles to sea level—make that 200 nm in Hua’s case, since he would ultimately land at 5,900 above sea level. For every 23 feet it traveled, an engine-out U-2 sank just one foot, a glide ratio identical to that of the ubiquitous Schweitzer 2-33 two-seat sailplane. Not far behind Hua was Hill Air Force Base, at Ogden. Crystal-clear hindsight 55 years later suggests that Hua could easily have turned around and glided to its 13,000-foot runway, where the U-2 would quickly be dragged into a hangar, its secrets intact. But below him was an unbroken undercast with tops at 40,000 feet, and Hua had watched the cloud buildup gradually obscure all ground lights during his leg from Texas to the Ogden turnaround point. Shooting an unfamiliar, dead-stick, single-­pilot instrument approach into Hill would not have been fun. There was a better reason why Hua confidently held his southeast heading toward home. “We were told during ground school that the engine was not stable at high altitudes and would occasionally flame out,” he noted in a recent e-mail. “It could easily be relit below 35,000 feet, though. Before the first training flight, we were told to shut down the engine at altitude and to glide down to 35,000 feet to practice an air start, which we did. That night, I was frankly overconfident that the engine was having one of these ‘normal’ flameouts, so I maintained my course. When my air-start attempts failed, I was too low to reach any major field.” Below 35,000 feet, there was enough oxygen to support a relight, but Hua had no way of knowing his tanks were dry, and nothing in the world would restart his engine. As he entered the undercast, Hua called Hill AFB to try to get a steer away from the mountains that he knew were hidden below him. No answer. He transmitted a mayday on the guard frequency that was supposedly monitored by the military. Still no answer. Was there nobody flying late at night over Utah? Possible. Did nobody understand Hua’s Chinese-accented English? Maybe. Life was getting complicated. He’d lost the autopilot when the engine failed and the generator went offline, and a U-2A was a full-time job to fly manually at altitude. Hua’s pressure suit had also automatically inflated, which left him in solid clouds and turbulence trying to read a chart, working radios and hand-flying the airplane while blown up like the Michelin Man. The pilot’s classic mantra “aviate, navigate, communicate” may sound simple, but not when each step requires his full attention. Once Hua reached combustion-sustaining air at 35,000 feet, he tried three engine relights. He even got out the emergency procedures checklist to make sure he was doing it right, but of course he was trying to relight air, not jet fuel. Now he was down to 17,000 feet. His continued involuntary descent in the clouds must have seemed a butt-clenching eternity, but at 7,000 feet above sea level the U-2 broke into the clear and Hua could see how lucky he’d been. He was flying southeast in a dark valley, with mountains to each side, their tops still in the clouds. Hua was actually just 1,000 feet or so above the ground, perhaps less. At his 11 o’clock, he saw the lights of civilization, which turned out to be the small city of Cortez, Colo. And Cortez had a municipal airport. Luck continued to ride with Hua. He spotted the airport’s rotating beacon several miles southwest of town, and then the runway lights. The Cortez city council had recently decided that leaving the runway lights on at night was an unnecessary expense for a cash-strapped town. But as midnight neared, an inbound Frontier Airlines flight was running late. So on this night of all nights, the lights had been left on. Hua glided across Cortez Runway 21 from west to east, then made a broad 270-degree turn to the left and gently rolled out on a long final to the 7,200-foot runway. (Don’t be fooled by that seemingly ample length. Cortez Municipal is at 5,900 feet above sea level, and at that density altitude on a warm August night, the runway was probably equivalent to a sea-level strip roughly half that length. It was also only 10 feet wider on each side than the U-2A’s 80-foot wingspan.) In a remarkable demonstration of precision approach-speed control under extreme pressure, Hua put his big U-2A down, if not on the numbers, certainly close enough for government work, as the classic and appropriate expression has it. The extreme challenge in landing an early U-2 was created by a combination of high-aspect-ratio wings fat with low-speed lift, particularly in ground effect, and a lack of effective lift-dumping devices. Sailplanes with U-2-like wings have powerful spoilers that are as effective as a throttle: Pop the spoilers and the glider decelerates like a Cessna with its throttle pulled to idle. Retract the spoilers and the glider reacts as though you had added power. The only way to bring a U-2 to earth, however, was to bleed away every ounce of lift short of a stall while at the same time avoiding a stall, since dropping a U-2 onto a runway from 2 or 3 feet could terminally damage its fragile airframe. Try to land a U-2 in a level attitude on the main gear—to “wheel it on” with its wings still anxious to fly—and the spy plane would bounce back into the air and float the length of the longest runway the Air Force owned. Touch tailwheel first just as the airplane loosed its grasp on the air and a U-2 would call it a day. Major Hua got it exactly right that night. To his surprise, the U-2’s landing gear collapsed during rollout because the airplane had lost its hydraulic pump after the engine failure, so the gear extended but lacked the hydraulic pressure to engage the downlocks. “I felt like I had made a nice landing, but then the belly scratched the runway,” Hua wrote. This put the wingtips close enough to the runway that a ground loop was inevitable. The left wing touched, and the big Lockheed spun out like an old Porsche 911, ending up facing backward in the sagebrush alongside the runway. “I so lucky. I so lucky,” a bystander recalls Hua muttering after the landing. But luck be damned, the Cortez incident was a textbook example of how to handle a nighttime, IFR, single-engine, in-flight engine failure calmly and skillfully. Give that man a medal, the Air Force said, and awarded Hua the Distinguished Flying Cross. From the Denver Post: After receiving a Distinguished Flying Cross from the U.S. Air Force for his feat, Hua went on to become a four-star general in the Republic of China Air Force. He earned a master’s degree and doctorate in aeronautical engineering at Purdue University and was in charge of Taiwan’s aerospace program. Now living in Maryland, he has written or been a source for several articles about the landing. Hua also wrote a book, “Lost Black Cats: The Story of Two Captured U-2 Pilots”, about two of his comrades who were captured in mainland China after their spy planes went down.