Rokke

This mishap and any potential cause aside...the resumes of those guys just isn't really impressive. Imagine putting some of your younger wingmen and flightleads into older jets bought from a foreign country and telling them to put on a formation aerobatics display. Reminds me of the time I watched over 100 Mooney's (the aircraft, not the bald beggers) take off from an airport in Wisconsin for a mass flyby at Oshkosh. There's an art and a science to launching a mass gaggle of aircraft from a single airfield. People who don't do it for a profession probably shouldn't try it. Same goes for formation aerobatics.

That made me laugh. But I think you're right. I have been there and the whole allah akbhar thing would draw pretty quick attention from people more used to wrestling brown bears for fun.

That's a pretty good deal. I'd give them 10 camels to take him.

Bfargin, from what I observed at the Academy recently, I'd say you're on to something.

On what data do you base your assessment that the legislation is working? And it sounds like your district was held accountable for its negligence before there was legislation. So why do we need legislation to accomplish what was already being accomplished?

No. I am saying there should NOT be legislation. It is worse than useless. It is nothing more than interference by politicians looking for campaign points. It costs the schools money they don't have, wastes the time of staff members on administrative processes that end up in some legislative circular file, and hasn't changed anything with regard to the amount of bullying that has, and always will exist at all levels of human society. It is nothing more than legislation for the sake of legislation (read political interference) created by the same idiots in our state governments who can't balance a budget or even repair a pothole. And believe it or not, New Jersey is lauded for having among the nation's best anti-bullying laws. That ought to tell you about the quality of the crap created by other states.

I know who is punished. Nobody. That is why the laws are nothing more than legislative feel good efforts. They lack the clarity to stand up in court, and despite all the anti-bully laws on the books, I challenge you to find any school employee who has been found guilty of violating them. The New Jersey anti-bully law was nearly nullified in March because several school districts challenged it as an unfunded mandate and won. The governor had to throw a million bucks into the budget to fund it, but that probably won't be enough. Meanwhile, school administrators in New Jersey say the law is causing such an administrative nightmare it is counterproductive to its intent and keeping them from doing the kind of hands on supervision actually required to maintain discipline. I'm sure you probably picked New Jersey at random, but dig a little deeper into the impact of its anti-bully law. It proves my point in spades. Government legislation is not the answer. In fact, it has created even more problems.

An "ACTUAL anti-bullying law" is a great source. But you linked to a 2010 summary of amendments to New Jersey's actual anti-bullying law first passed in 2002. My kids attended school in New Jersey when the 2002 law was passed. It was big news window dressing then that contained little meat and no funding, but did manage to confuse the heck out of school officials, and since then it gets conveniently updated everytime there is another highly publicized bullying incident in New Jersey schools. Here's a SYNOPSIS of the actual law: Synopsis: 2002 New Jersey Laws, AB 1874, Requires each school district to adopt a policy prohibiting harassment, intimidation or bullying on school property, at a school-sponsored function or on a school bus. The policy must include a definition of bullying behavior, consequences for engaging in such behavior, a procedure for investigation of reports of such behavior, a statement prohibiting retaliation or reprisal against persons reporting bullying behavior and consequences for making a false accusation. Requires school employees, students or volunteers to report any incidents of bullying, intimidation and harassment to appropriate school officials. Grants immunity from any cause of action for damages arising from a failure to remedy the reported incident to persons reporting these incidents. The law is very broad, uselessly vague, and "aimed" at anything and everyone having to do with education. NOT at teachers and administrators who "failed to investigate or stop bullying".

Classic. Someone who doesn't even bother to read what I wrote and the context in which I wrote it tells me to read a book. It is ironic that the least perceptive people are usually the first to demand other people get educated. With that in mind... no, anti-bullying legislation is NOT "aimed at teachers and administrators who fail to investigate or stop bullying". In fact, most of the legislation isn't really "aimed" at all. Like hate-crime laws, most anti-bullying legislation is a feel good effort that causes more confusion than anything else. Do you just make stuff up, or rely on poorly written internet blogs to get your information? . With regard to my own kids...bullying prevention starts at home with parents communicating with their children. I know personal responsibility is a foreign concept to the liberal side of our culture, but it works amazingly well. If you aren't familar...maybe you could read a book.

Oh good. Anti-bullying legislation. Just what this country needs. More legislation. Someone tell me which schools in this country currently prohibit teachers from stopping students from harassing anyone, including gay students. What kind of asinine logic concludes we need new legislation to "allow" teachers to stop students harassing other students when they already have that authority and responsibility? Of course, outside of school, if anyone wants to call someone else names and tell them they are going to hell, we already have a law governing that too. It shows up really early in our Constitution. And last time I checked, teaching the Constitution was still allowed in school. It apparently just isn't done very well. But I'm not going to suggest anyone introduce legislation to do that either.

So does that leave her face up or down?

His boobs aren't big enough.

Wow. You must have been there when I was. I did learn one useful thing. A guy in my flight said his professional/life goal was raising two good kids. That put a lot of things into perspective and guided my career from that point forward. Not coincidentally, SOS was the last PME I completed. Still made O-5. And I've got a couple of awesome kids (at least in my opinion).

You could draw a little square on the windscreen with some red lipstick.

When Ron Keys was my WG/CC he called all the pilots on base to the club (back when clubs were fun) and spelled things out almost exactly like that. He told us "when you're flying I want you to picture my face in your HUD. If you can't explain to me what you're doing, you probably shouldn't be doing it." Good advice and it has served me well in every airplane since.

Don't worry. That's what this guy is for.

I'm not trying to start a protracted theological debate, but the value of what you just posted above is the equivalent of saying the images below are essentially the same because they both depict people. Just saying.....

Happy Halloween.

Never met the guy, but if he's still got a hair on his old fighter pilot ass, he'd throw up on me if I looked him in the eye and called him "sweet and charming". Not sure what your background is, but you lose any credibility you have with this statement..."trashing the reputation of one of this nation's last living heroes." You obviously have NO idea what you are talking about because our nation is blessed with thousands of living heroes, most of them under the age of 30 (many under 20). They are fighting in places you've probably never heard of, and are performing acts of heroism that make breaking the sound barrier seem kind of boring. But thanks for the lecture.

Well I hope he had a reflective belt on. That road walking can kill you.

I read yesterday that Netflix has lost nearly 1,000,000 subscribers since announcing their "improved" service. If the Air Force is really interested in shedding people, maybe it should study the Netflix business strategy a little more closely. Then again...maybe Netflix learned its strategy from the Air Force.

Rule Number 1 about leaving a job...don't burn any bridges. Nevermind.

According to our CiC... "I have directed this deployment, which is in the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States, pursuant to my constitutional authority to conduct US foreign relations and as commander-in-chief and chief executive." So I guess the strategic political "big picture" is that the LRA in Uganda is a threat to our national security. I found this quote about them on Wikipedia (so it must be true...) ""the LRA remains one of the least understood rebel movements in the world, and its ideology, as far as it has one, is difficult to understand." That actually makes them very similar to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Probably time to deploy SEAL team 6 to Wall Street.

Oops. I meant 8:31:07. But at least you got to see the Keira Knightly/Natalie Portman love scene inserted at random times between the 5 hour and 7 hour point. Hotttttt.