Mark1

Yes. And instructed/evaluated at both. And aside from the subjective feeling that things have declined, I've seen the stats with respect to training washout rates and disqualification of recent IQT grads that were, subsequent to passing their checkrides, found incapable of performing the mission. Sadly, most of them made it to combat before their performance was deemed intolerable. That should never happen on a platform that routinely deals in life or death, but AFSOC doesn't put a priority on that fact anymore. It will eventually bite them, but until something goes horribly wrong, they don't seem to care. However, the question should have been did you fly gunships before and after Cannon came into the picture (also yes). Although not to the same degree, the 4SOS has been impacted by Cannon as well. People know that once you're in the community the likelihood of ending up at Cannon at some point is high, and they're opting to take other assignments. Do not mistake this as selfish bitching about quality of life at Cannon; it is not. There is a difference between wasting a guy while he walks to get mid-day tea with his cousin (whether he deserves it or not) and neutralizing the imminent threat of a guy who just launched an RPG from 100m and is in the process of getting the next round into the tube.

Those are exactly the type missions I was referring to being likely to make up the bulk over the next 20 years, and the reason that the Talon hasn't been the first mobility asset in to every 'combat' zone over the last decade...not even a majority. It's too conspicuous, obviously affiliated with the U.S. military, and has too large a footprint. Although flying the Talon is viable as a route to the aircraft that actually have been the first in over the last decade. And I don't disagree. For a pilot the MC is, in general, a more exciting profile (there are brief periods of exception to this). Preference between missions depends on whether you get more enjoyment from periodically flying a large aircraft on the margins of safety, or from having an operator come through the door of the squadron unannounced in his dress uniform to track down the crew that he credits with saving his life. Different strokes. They're both worth being proud of. I have a hard time defending the AC without caveat as performance in the community has taken a real hit since Cannon came into the picture, but I do have to mention this based on your last post: The value added by the AC-130 to the mission does not lie solely in its ability as a fires platform...not even close. It has capabilities apart from actually employing firepower that no other asset in the world has. If you removed its guns, it would still be in high demand. That's something that I've seen forgotten increasingly over the last decade by everyone involved...including the user, and sadly even within the community that operates it. Ratio of missions flown to shoots is immaterial (for the gunners it can understandably be rough, but that's another subject). Some of the most memorable missions I've ever been a part of didn't involve any weapons employment and I know for a fact that had a Gunship not been there, no matter how many other type assets you had to replace it, friendlies would have died. Instead they didn't, and a round never left the aircraft.

No shit? You don't say. Allow me to quote the original poster: Seems it's right on topic.

Depending on your definition of 'combat zone' this is decidedly untrue. I think the bigger consideration is that even if the Talons are doing some bad ass niche shit on days 1-10 of a conflict, for days 10-5000 (in the type of conflicts we're likely to be involved in over the next 20 years) they're just a glorified slick (and there's nothing wrong with the slick mission, just take issue with Talons fighting so desperately to differentiate themselves when they aren't doing anything special). I will agree that the Talon is likely to be more exciting from a pure flying experience for a pilot. Mostly because there is more variety in the training profiles in comparison to turning circles for 4 hours (or 1.1 at Cannon). However, the gunship has a distinct edge in terms of being a rewarding mission.

I'm not going to get involved in the bullshit, but seriously, did you not think about this statement before you wrote it down? What does this prove? Don't you think that in the case that you were PYB and you didn't want it known that it would be reasonable for you to deny that fact here on this profile while simultaneously doing the same with your Facebook profile seeing as how you have access to both? Corroboration from the Facebook posts is only evidence if the profiles are already known not to be linked, and in that case, you wouldn't have to make the point. By the way, did you get that Jaundice looked at after the Fox News interview? I'm concerned for your health.

I'm not participating in the comments on the pair, but I've got no sympathy either. You open yourself up to public scrutiny when you make the conscious decision to post up an electronic advertisement of your proposal on a big screen in front of 50,000 attendees of a sporting event, and go the extra mile to alert the nationally televised cameras to watch out for you getting down on your knee...and you wear your uniform to make it a bigger story for the cameras (amplifying the douchebaggery in my opinion). I understand that this broad didn't have a hand in any of that, but you know what? If she doesn't like dealing the the fallout of her boyfriends actions, (whether right or wrong) she can say 'no'.

Plenty of cases of us dropping supplies to the Taliban in Afghanistan. I'm aware of one particular drop that was off DZ by 230NM. Pretty impressive in a country that is only around 500NM across. A lot of CCT guys have hilarious stories regarding supply drops where they're trying to be the hero for their squad by coordinating a desperately needed relief drop only to have it come down on top of a 4000ft mountain or on top of the enemy positions.

If you watch the longer video available online you'll see why the guy is 'allowed' to get out of his car. The video posted here makes it look like it just picks up the action after the officer initiated a traffic stop but that's not the case. The longer video shows the officer finishing up a previous contact in the parking lot and as he's leaving the gas station lot, the guy that was to become his victim of a botched attempt at manslaughter pulls into the gas station to buy his Funyuns. The officer saw something he didn't like and turned around to contact the victim. As the victim is getting out of his car to go about his business the officer pulls up. Part of the reason the victim made some bad moves (bad from a purely self-preservation standpoint on the assumption that he might be dealing with a maniac with a gun, not 'wrong' moves) is probably due to the fact that he was surprised to see the officer when he got out of the car and probably didn't have the time to calmly say to himself, 'okay, if he asks you to retrieve your license, don't comply because it could be misconstrued as reaching for a weapon, just verbalize that it's in the car and that you don't want to reach for it." The victim literally did nothing wrong. Makes it that much harder to watch. Jesus Christ. Are there any more hoops you want me to jump through officer? How 'bout this. We all know that this policy is going to exist right up until the point that a driver wanders into traffic on the way back to your vehicle and gets hit (if it's caught on the dashcam and the public can see it, otherwise it'll just get swept under the rug), so why don't you do your job and come to me. I've fulfilled my legal requirement to stop, and I'm too ######ing scared that if I exit the vehicle you might misinterpret that as a threat and gun me down in cold blood, so my hands are vice-gripped to my steering wheel and I'm not moving a ######ing muscle on your accord. Isn't it nice the level of trust law enforcement has managed to foster with the community they're supposed to serve.

I went to post this a couple days ago but couldn't find the original 'Liberty,Rights and the Constitution' thread where we were discussing similar egregious police actions, and gave up on it. But I think the 'WTF' thread is an appropriate place for it. At the same time I know the response I'm going to get to this and don't really want to rehash my background that was laid out in the old thread, so I don't know why I'm spending the time, but: The cop needs to do serious jail time. Whatever a citizen would get for 'attempted negligent homicide' (yeah, I know, not a real charge) It's unfortunate because this is a direct result of the training that he and hundreds of thousands of other cops have and plenty of others would find themselves in the same position for acting similarly (unjustifiably). Sadly, nobody will call into question the mentality that all cops are taught to have while they're on the street as a cause for this disastrous excuse for police work. It'll just be chalked up to a failure of this particular individual cop and the status quo will remain. M2 is right, cops face more risk on a daily basis than almost any other profession. And guess what? They knew it when they signed up and still agreed to serve and protect (the citizens, not themselves). It should be a selfless endeavor and yet as a result of what the academy teaches they treat everybody from law abiding citizens to hardcore felons as if they are just waiting for an opportunity to kill them. 'Action before reaction', 'don't expose your gun to anybody you're in contact with', 'approach in their blind spot' and on and on and on and on. Always on the defensive because something is bound to go down. And it affects their response to the 99.999% of cases where something doesn't go down. A cop ends up dead in the .001% of cases where it goes down because he didn't approach the wheelchair-bound grandfather with the assumption that he'd shoot him between the eyes? Sorry, that sucks, but it's the nature of the business. Can't accept that? Fine, don't take the job. Does that sound callous? Too bad. This guy shot an innocent human being in a benign circumstance (where the guy was actually complying too well) and got lucky to have not killed him because he assumed that this, along with every other citizen encounter he's had since he graduated from the academy, was the .001% as he was taught to do. And the frequency with which this happens (usually with a dead person on the other end instead of just wounded) as M2 indicated, is frighteningly often. Do you get more dead innocent civilians in the cases where cops assume the worst under benign circumstances, or dead cops in the cases where officers approached the .001% while not assuming it was the .001%? Bogus question. The cops voluntarily signed on for the risk. The guy pulling up to the gas station to buy some Funyuns did not. If changing the mindset of cops in the country to one of actually protecting and serving results in more officer deaths, then it's unfortunate, but still the correct decision. The training fosters a toxic mentality among the police force that permeates all of their interactions with citizens, to include the routine ones, and it's disgusting. Day 1 of the academy should run down all the ways that you may die in the line of duty, require that you re-affirm your desire to take on the selfless service, and then move on to how to be a decent cop. Instead, it's all about how to keep your thumb on your contacts so that they never get the chance to kill you. I hate to say it because sentencing this cop to serious time doesn't really serve a purpose if you're going to remove his right to practice law enforcement regardless, but nothing will change if nothing changes. Of course we all know he'll get a slap on the wrist, the academy will continue to teach a mentality that results in egregious over-application of force, and more innocent people will be killed and not be able to go home to their families in order to ensure that the public servant who accepted the risk of death can go home to his. Disgusting.

All insurance is a bad deal for the consumer. It wouldn't exist if that weren't the case. You should only insure something that would be financially catastrophic to have to absorb the loss of yourself. Very few things fall into that category. This isn't one of them. The only other cases where insurance would be a good option is if the insurance provider had done a shitty risk assessment in favor of the consumer and you somehow knew better, or if you knew that you had a higher risk of failure than their average customer because of how you planned on using the thing (terms of service probably protect the company from having to pay under that circumstance) . In this case, they have all the data, you have none, and I guarantee there's a huge margin for them on top of their break-even assessment. It's a sucker bet.

True for most, but not all.

That the word 'comprehensive' has appeared precisely once in this thread (prior to this instance) and it was in your post. So I'd say that it was dead until you tried to make a point with no premise and brought it up out of nowhere. For humanity's sake, I hope there was alcohol involved in that gem of a post.

Nobody is asking for change for somebody else's benefit, any change would be for our benefit. You can take the 'burden is on the immigrant to use the system and we're not going to change' stance, but there's just one problem...we've tried that over the last 30 years and it isn't working. They see an easier alternative, so they take it. 5000 people circumvented an 80mi long Berlin wall under threat of death, and there weren't oceans on either side of the wall. If the desire is strong enough, people will find a way around any wall that gets put up. You have to attack the bulk of the problem from a different angle. Either eliminate the appeal of making the crossing, or find a way to deal with the inevitable flow of people. And just for the record, aside from its comically short length (relative to our circumstance), Israel's wall doesn't aim to stop millions of people seeking to cross for a better life. It aims to prevent small isolated cases of crossings by people looking to do harm to the Israeli population (and isn't entirely effective at that either). It's effectiveness would be exponentially less if there were hundreds of crossing attempts a day. It should never be brought up in conversation about securing our borders.

Honest to god, I said to myself that it would take less than 3 posts following mine to see the 'San Diego case study' posted...I suppose I overestimated. I won't even entertain the suggestion that Israel's circumstances are applicable. Pointing to the fence bordering San Diego as indicative of anything regarding border control in whole indicates either a complete lack of understanding regarding human behavior, or a willful ignorance of reality. Illegals crossing the border look for the path of least resistance, just like everything else in nature. Their desire to make the crossing might be so strong that they'd be willing to swim through 10 miles of human shit to the other side, but if it's not necessary, they're happy to walk across into comfortable San Diego. Put a fence up blocking San Diego? Illegals crossing into San Diego drops by 95%. Because you've thwarted them? Give me a break. Although not by much, El Paso is still easier than 10 miles of excrement, so they'll cross there. Block El Paso? Fine, they'll walk through 50 miles of mountainous desert with half a gallon of water. Fence of the desolate desert areas? Fine, they'll dig a tunnel, or cut a hole in the fence, or obtain a counterfeit passport and cross 'legally', or a thousand other options. OR, maybe they'll exploit the Gulf of Mexico, or that marginally large body of water called the Pacific Ocean. Raise the bar high enough and the coyotes will start employing submersibles like the Central/South American cartels use. Those options aren't used today because they aren't the path of least resistance. Put up a fence at enormous cost and the stream will just shift off land. Put the Coast Guard on it? They'll think of something else. Want to raise the bar high enough that none of those options are viable? How many trillions of dollars are you in for at this point? Maybe reasonable border control measures coupled with policy that makes legal immigration the path of least resistance is a better option than a 2000 mile long electrified razor wire fence (and yes I'm aware that you, Clark, aren't advocating that, but some are).

Nothing a trillion dollar fence can't fix. Oh, wait....

Never noticed that the U-2 has a yaw string before. I imagine it's there primarily for use during approach/landing as a heads up yaw indicator to help prevent awkward loading of the tandem gear. Is that right, or it's your primary slip indicator throughout the flight?

And of course what you read earlier in the year was that a small contingent of remnant 'Sons of Iraq' militia forces that were still on the payroll of the Iraqi government, and therefore still aligned with them, fought to repel ISIS from their home region of Ramadi/Fallujah. And because tribal ties in that area of Anbar are much stronger than elsewhere in the province, they would have fought to keep outsiders out regardless of who they were, so why not do it with the support of an Iraqi military. And of course that fact speaks to the entirety of the ~100,000 original members of the 'Sons of Iraq' despite the fact that less than 3000 were actually involved in the effort to repel ISIS in that specific case. But not to worry, having tabs on 3% of the former membership is enough to make sweeping generalizations despite the fact that there is ample evidence to show that their ranks have defected in great numbers to ISIS (much of it since the incident you site) because as the movement gained traction in western Iraq, they came to appear as a viable alternative to simply bearing a segregated Iraqi Shiite government. The 4 lines of WSJ article that you provided before I ran into an advertisement was supremely convincing. You win the argument over whether ISIS is being fueled by disillusioned Sunnis upset over their lack of representation within the Iraqi government, or by disillusioned Sunnis upset over their lack of representation within the Iraqi government who used to be SOIZ. Well done, sir.

Despite the fact that my numbers are solid (maybe you're considering a different timeframe), what does it matter? Is there not an agreement that they've increased in size by something approximating an order of magnitude in a short time? The nature of their increase in size is not in dispute as it is well documented where the majority of the difference came from, so the point remains valid. Logical fallacy much? The information is readily available. There is no open source that I can provide that won't be picked apart here based on one fallacy or another (see above), so just seek out the facts for yourself if you're interested instead of listening to anybody who is going to write off the movement as a pure, simple, uncomplicated, case of twenty thousand psychopaths with identical psychotic views of the world happening into each other on the street-corner and deciding to form a gang. There happens to be an article on CNN.com right now that deals with some of these issues. The fact that they're covering it, as quite possibly the worst media source of information on the matter, should make it clear how well accepted it is among circles that consider this kind of thing. From the first page of a quick google search on the matter; the Presidents statement earlier this week: “What we don’t have yet is a prime minister and a cabinet that can . . . start reaching out to all the various groups and factions inside Iraq and give confidence to populations in the Sunni areas” that the militants are “not the only game in town,” he said. “In order to ensure that Sunni populations reject outright these kinds of incursions,” Obama added, “they’ve got to feel like they’re invested in a broader national government. And right now, they don’t feel that.” Not much to say about radical Islam there because to suggest that that's the sole motivator is a lazy cop-out. Why would an inclusive Iraqi government placate a radical Muslim bent on martyring himself for the global caliphate? It wouldn't. Instead it appeals to human beings with human motivations behind their actions, and to write them off wholly as monsters that can't be reached and can only be stopped by a bullet will only lead to missed opportunities to fix the issue. You can find similar statements about the need for inclusive government to stem the tide of fresh Sunni recruits to ISIS from the UK and French authorities earlier this week (among others, but they're actively participating in humanitarian efforts). Open source information that supports their statements are readily available along with the fact that it's implicit in their statements that closed source intelligence assessments come to the same conclusion. And then for those of you that have access to the closed source data, there's that.

Most of my point is that that is not the case. It may have been their distant origins, but they are not the same organization today as they were 8 years ago. Yes, leadership and perhaps 1500 core fighters within the organization are truly radicals. But they didn't find their way from 1500 members to 15-20k by radicalizing the difference in a few short years. The whole point is that you may not be able to reason with the hardliners within the organization, but the bulk of their fighters that have allowed them to re-energize and become a more effective fighting force than they have ever been in the past are not radical hardliners. They're made up of run-of-the-mill military age Sunni males (i.e. Sons of Iraq) that are disillusioned with their prospects in an Iraqi state that is now dominated by Shiites that aren't interested in forming a country based on equality between the minorities/majority. They might be susceptible to re-incorporation to an Iraqi state if that state actually tried to represent their interests. Unfortunately it's probably too far gone, but ISIS is not made up of 20k unreasonable, violent, radical, militant animals. That's only a fraction (they happen to be the fraction that you see in disturbing execution videos, skewing perception). The longer that the bulk maintain their membership in ISIS because they see no other valid option, the more will adopt the radical approach.

Yes we were fighting them in Iraq, but we also gave them support when we were there as well (Sons of Iraq). In fact, we had them on the payroll to the tune of several hundred million dollars...and in large part, it improved conditions in Iraq while we were still there (even if the 'peace' was simply bought). It's a mistake to write off ISIS as a solely crazy fundamentalist Islamic militant organization that won't respond to reason (or money, or inclusion in society, etc.). They're is certainly a component of that within their ranks, but it's more complicated. Unfortunately things have gotten bad enough that for the time being the imminent threat has to be dealt with, but there's a reason they aren't pushing into Turkey/Lebanon/Jordan. If their forces were only basing their advance on some backwards militant Islamic principle and they truly wanted to martyr themselves in battle they'd be fighting everywhere they could reach, but they aren't. They've carved out a very specific region for themselves, and it's based on logic (even if flawed), not on some fundamentalist ideal. In 2003 when we rolled into Baghdad there were plenty of people in the streets singing the praises of the Coalition. Every single one of them was a Shiite Muslim that felt he'd been liberated from the oppression of the Sunni dominated Hussein regime of the previous 20+ years. Behind the scenes, the 35% Sunni population was quietly shitting their pants with the expectation of going from the dominant force in the country to complete subjugation by the majority Shia, and likely reprisals for the last two decades. When Paul Bremer blacklisted Ba'ath Party members and dissolved the entire Sunni dominant Iraqi military (against advice of others), their fears were realized. Hundreds of thousands of young men took their weapons and went home unemployed...and then the insurgency flared up. Elections were boycotted by the Sunnis and the government turned out to be largely biased towards the Shiites. Exceptions only existed because the U.S. took steps to ensure at least some Kurdish and Sunni participation. Then Bush installed Al-Maliki, a man widely considered incompetent. Several high level officials resigned over frustration in dealing with him. When we left, there was no longer anybody to ensure a balanced makeup of the Iraqi government. Al-Maliki immediately began a campaign of purging the government of Sunni participation. He had his own Sunni vice president arrested days after U.S. forces departed, and started cracking down on Sunnis throughout the country. That included slowly eliminating the Sons of Iraq from participation in the Iraqi Security Forces, again sending a hundred thousand armed, disgruntled men, home unemployed. There are some very aggressive and violent people (many foreign fighters) occupying leadership positions within ISIS, but they can't be effective without cannon fodder. They've got plenty of foot soldiers at their fingertips because of the disillusioned Sunni population in Iraq that would rather align with other Sunnis, regardless of their brutality, than to be a subjugated class within Iraq. Even those Sunnis that aren't willing to actively participate in the movement are likely to allow ISIS to 'occupy' their villages without resistance. That makes it possible for ISIS to push their offensive lines further into contested areas without having to dedicate fighters to maintain a presence in every village they pass through in order to protect their supply lines. The complete removal of the Sunnis from Iraqi civil governance is what Obama was referring to when he said that there is no military solution to the problem...and he's right. They're in a situation no different than the Shia were under Hussein, except that they are a minority where the Shia at least had numbers under Hussein. When the Shia attempted to revolt against Hussein's government, the U.S. lionized them as freedom fighters. Now the Sunni do the same under similar conditions (yes, I know, the severity of the subjugation doesn't compare to Shia under Hussein) and they're just written off as crazy animals. Their behavior has earned them that, and I'm certainly not excusing it, but don't think for a second that had the Shia been able to get the upper hand in 1991/92 that they wouldn't have done the same. And again, it's a mistake to write them off as unreasonable. If conditions change (and I'm not saying that they will or can at this point) many ISIS foot soldiers may abandon the cause and the animals at the top can't survive without them.

I'm with you on the 'border' checkpoint issue, but I'm concerned for your health. You need to get yourself checked out for Jaundice. That or not permit the Fox makeup guy near you next time you're interviewed. I'm not sure which, but one of the two.

What's the CoSAF?

My pet peeve applies because any 'stock training program' that costs $3k is a sham that almost certainly advocates frequent and sophisticated trading techniques. Probably authored by a former wall street 'insider' who saw an opportunity to bilk people out of hard earned cash in a new and novel way (through purchase of the system) that seemed even better than the conventional theft through exorbitant money management fees. If the program does not advocate 'sophisticated' trading techniques (highly unlikely) then it's an even greater scam as the skills necessary to build a portfolio that 99.9% of investors should have could be taught by way of a 50cent pamphlet, 1hr lecture, or $14.99 book. The book that I referenced doesn't advocate an approach, it just destroys every approach out there leaving only one option, the correct one, as default. And it's not a novel idea put forth by the author, just an unpopular one that won't ever garner headlines because people want to cling to the idea that they can outsmart the market and make millions. This particular book was just written by an author that was able to make digesting the information easy and enjoyable, which is why it's more popular than plenty of other sources on the same subject (typically math heavy technical journals and the like). The statistical information is out there that proves the impossibility of beating the market in the long run (assuming you're not trading on illegal information), people just don't want to listen. It's also inherent that any trade that offers the possibility of big gains, is also highly risky. In the long run, rate of return on trades of that type will generally approximate the whole market's return, just with larger volatility in the process. In real life, you're exposing yourself to a likelihood that one big volatile downswing will bust you. That risk comes in exchange for the chance to cash out after a timely volatile upswing. That's fine if that's your thing, but again, shouldn't be recommended to others who aren't familiar with what they're getting into. I think most people would be surprised to see how many 'brilliant' hedge fund managers invest their own money in a collection of ETFs that approximate the total market....all while putting their clients' money into sophisticated monetary instruments that make money for everybody involved except the investors.

Although I don't doubt that whatever he was doing with his money was worse than *trading* stock, he was probably better off not reading any of your literature. The only book he should have read (or any of a number of others that advocate the same approach): https://www.amazon.com/The-Four-Pillars-Investing-Portfolio-ebook/dp/B0041842TW I find that the world of novice *traders* is full of people who exhibit behavior identical to problem gamblers. They downplay and suppress their losses in conversation and talk up their wins in order to save face with their friends/family/etc...frequently to the extent that they actually come to believe themselves that they're beating the market. Anybody can get lucky with a big score (and probably spend the rest of their lives giving it back due to the delusion that their 'score' was the result of skill), but nobody survives in the long run. Ask anybody to name a famous investor and you'll get back Warren Buffet and then blank stares from 99% of the population. Out of 7 billion people on the face of the planet, most people can name only one that is successful at 'beating the market' in anything approaching the long term. But they only know his name because he happens to be the outlier at the upper reaches of the bell curve that probability/statistics would predict if picking winners/losers and timing the market was pure chance. He won big, others lost big, and the majority hung around the mean return of the market. But of course in Buffet's case, he buys controlling interests in companies and then injects his business sense into them which, given that he's a world class businessman, increases the value of the companies earning him a 'guaranteed' return. Anybody else that got rich *trading* in the market either got lucky, hit big, and had the sense to get out (or is just still in the process of losing it back), or was trading other peoples money and siphoning off exorbitant fees in the process. If you have monies that you can afford to lose and like to gamble with in an attempt to score big, that's great, but to suggest that others should do the same is irresponsible. Sorry, but it's a pet peeve of mine because there's an entire sham industry that pays it's officers million dollar salaries to provide a useless service to their customers while simultaneously stealing their cash.

That is correct. The only military discounts I ever benefited from were those that were automatically applied without solicitation on my part because I was in uniform. However, I don't take issue with military discounts... There's a big difference between a private business owner giving you a discount of their own volition to say 'thanks', and using your ID in the hopes that a government official will give you the 'bro' treatment and spare you the cavity search that your civilian counterparts get. Do you think it's appropriate for an off duty police officer to 'accidentally' flash his badge and appeal for leniency after being pulled over for breaking a law that you or I would be ticketed/arrested for?