daynightindicator

The is this trash thread happening. This website used to be valuable information with a sprinkling of gossip and early release info. Now it’s just weirdo anti-vax and anti-pop culture shit. Stop being dumb.

Not wrong. But DE is still a discriminator.

Simplest thing folks can do if they want to maximize promotion potential for O-5 is complete DE in correspondence. It might not get you promoted, but it will certainly make sure you don’t get promoted if you skip it. This is not an endorsement of the system, just an observation.

From what I’ve heard, Gp/CCs might still be a thing, however the wings will have an A-staff. It’s a hybrid of what we have now and what the “Mountain Home experiment” looked like. Each MAJCOM will make its own decision though, so YMMV.

The batteries will degrade gracefully, so even after 10/15 years, you will only typically lose 8-12% of your total range. Tesla has an 8 year battery warranty (at least that’s what mine have had), I usually sell before then. Oh and USAA coverage for my Model S is about $1400/year - might be time to look elsewhere!

I’ve owned EVs since 2014 (2 x Teslas) and had 3 homes wired for charging. I paid an electrician to drop a 220 in the garage in each home (same outlet as an electric dryer). Cost $100-150 each time. It’s a relatively simple equation to figure out your cost comparison vs. gas. A = Miles driven per month B = Avg miles per full charge C = Battery size in KW D = Electric bill cost per KWh ((A/B) x C) x D Example, 900 miles/month, my car averages 300 miles per full charge on a 100KW batt ((900/300) x 100) x .109 = $32.70/month Apologies for derail, but it might help someone if they’re debating going electric. I have no ragrets.

Was executing a weapons test a long time ago, we were enroute to Pt Mugu range. OPSEC had us refer to the weapon as the “device” and it had to be powered up a bit prior to range entry to run BITs. We were with LA Center and they passed words from the control room over center freq: “C/S, LA Center, I have been asked to tell you to power on your device.” We joked about answering on VHF, “Center, C/S, copy message. Powering on device. May God have mercy on us all.”

Here is a great primer on how BAH is calculated. https://www.defensetravel.dod.mil/Docs/perdiem/BAH-Primer.pdf Of note, it is purely based off of rental costs. The gov could care less about home prices (although they traditionally influence rental rates, so indirectly they are related).

I min ran it in about 4 months. Longest wait time is for the facilitated courses, but you can take multiple classes at once. Not sure on the limit, I was doing 2 concurrently. It’s manageable.

My take on PME in the current environment from the cheap seats... With the removal of “off-the-board” IDE/SDE designees, the playing field has leveled a bit and statistically, the average person’s (average as in “generic” not record or performance) chances of being selected improved. At the same time, the retention issues led to the relaxation of some parts of the process (no prejudice for turning it down, trading slots, etc). Tons of people picked up off the alt lists as well. It became a buyer’s market. COVID is obviously impacting the retention piece but I doubt AFPC has any idea of how that plays out long term. I think the inertia of the current situation will last at least another cycle or two. I’m not promoting or deriding PME - like anything else it’s great for some folks (break in Ops tempo, some great locations if not at Maxwell), it also brings sacrifices (multiple moves, payback tours, ADSC). In general it offers more folks an opportunity to compete for PME if they want to, and therefore more folks will be in the mix for SQ/CC opportunities as well. Promotions are facing a similar situation. I know a few folks who picked up O-6 on the most recent board without any traditional commands or res SDE. USAF is hurting for O-6s and that need will trickle down to the O-5 boards. Word on the street is that even the Colonels’ group is beginning to understand that folks’ personal preferences will need to be met (previously something they never gave an F about) in order to retain enough folks to man Pentagon desks. The aperture has widened for certain career and promotion opportunities, but like anything else, it’s totally up to the individual to weigh cost/benefit. FWIW I attended non-USAF IDE in res off the alternate board. Great year doing non-AF stuff.

Transparency varies by community and MAJCOM but realize that since WG/CC is typically a 2-year gig, you probably won’t get the tap on the shoulder until relatively close to your command timeline. Susperstars/HPOs are a different animal. I usually see on-time guys get the nod around the time they are selected for DO, and it may consist of 1) your follow on will be XX SQ/CC, 2) we are going to work hard to get you A command but we don’t know what it will be, or 3) we don’t expect to be able to get you a command. Standard AF caveats apply. I was fortunate to have a transparent leadership team and knew my future going in to my DO gig. I’ve also seen plans derailed when Gen ### decides to sponsor someone and basically directs that they get a command in a certain cycle. Someone else is usually displaced. Game plans are constantly evolving.

A few notes the SQ/CC process from the CAF side: - IDE does not automatically put you on the command list nor is it a hard prerequisite. Obviously the stats show you most CC’s were IDE folks but not all - When you apply for the board, you acknowledge being a “worldwide volunteer” - there is no way to only apply for certain commands other than the boards themselves (Hawk, CAF, etc) - CAF communities usually have “game plans” with specific folks fragged for command prior to the board. It’s one of those “if you’re in the plan, they’ll tell you” situations. Typically they will tell you NOT to apply unless you are in the plan. - CAF board applications use plain English to say “this dude is in the plan to command X SQ in the summer of XX”. It’s very straightforward. - if you’re not in the plan, you can apply, but are more likely to get picked up for a random command (deployed location or someone drops out/gets fired etc) if at all. It’s a risky move if you’re concerned about “non-desirable” commands. - The board usually selects about 2X the number of folks required. There is no guarantee at all that you will get a command. BL: Talk to an O-6 Group or Wing CC in your community and ask where you fall. They can probably help guide your decision. They also might help you get a non-flying command outside of your community if you want one.

That’s not an accurate statement Pawnman. Every community pushes their shiny pennies up the ladder quickly (hence the push for removal of BTZ to try and slow things down so our O-6s stop getting crushed by their sister service peers on joint staffs) and we all have anecdotal examples of those folks. The majority of SQ/CCs in the Bone right now are on time dudes with anywhere from 3-6 combat deployments, no aide jobs, etc. I would also guess most have over 2500 hours in the jet.

FLEA those are very good points and FWIW we are very close on many concepts you spoke about - namely getting to the root cause of why certain societal groups don’t see positive results while others do. One thing I realized reading that is that at some point, my personal definition of privilege changed from having something I “shouldn’t” have to having something someone else “doesn’t” have. That made it seem less like a personal attack on me and instead made me more interested in learning about the other persons experience. Semantics maybe, but like you said words do matter. 100% agree with addressing poverty and income inequality - by finding good policies and incentives so we can grow the pie, rather than simply redistribution of existing slices.

Agree that some people definitely use it to shame or score points...I try to avoid engaging with that stuff and I stay away from the fringe elements of both sides of the political spectrum because there’s pretty much no goodness to be had there. I think the numbers were indicating that there was something like a 6:1 chance that a black airman receives NJP as opposed to a white airman. Hopefully they investigate to see the details of why that is. For example, if you find that consistently, black airmen are punished more severely or at a higher rate for the exact same offense as white airmen, that indicates a major problem. I don’t remember hearing the stats on the promotion stuff, just that they found similar statistics indicating there may be a problem. Also, I think these issues are difficult to address because you can only get so far with policy. I’ve always believed that PRFs should go up to the board with no personal information whatsoever - just a randomly assigned number in place of all that admin stuff. However that would not address issues in stratification/OPR writing where commanders’ potential biases are captured.

One thing I think a lot of people miss with the “privilege” argument is that it’s not (or shouldn’t be) intended to shame, punish, or otherwise degrade the group with that privilege. It’s more about just understanding what other groups have to deal with and how those experiences might shape their views and actions. If you think someone is using the privilege argument to shame you or cast themselves as a helpless victim, I would A) reconsider their argument carefully to see if it’s misinterpreted, and B) if that truly is their argument, disregard them because it’s not helpful. It took me a while to understand that, but I can now see that, as a white male, there are experiences and obstacles that I have never and will never face that a black man (or woman, or other minority group) has and will. Same goes for different gender, religion, etc. I’m talking about common experiences, not individual stories of adversity...obviously there are people of all backgrounds with incredibly diverse stories that don’t fit a trite narrative. This doesn’t mean that I can’t be proud of my accomplishments, or that I somehow didn’t earn what I have, or that I shouldn’t be in the position I’m in because I am white. However, understanding that some of my airmen have obstacles or experiences that are unique to their skin color, gender, etc. is enlightening and important, and through that understanding hopefully I can be a better leader for them. Examples are plentiful and talking to your airmen or other friends in minority groups can really open your eyes. I had a SrA in my squadron tell me he and his brother were refused the sale of a handgun by a white store owner who assumed they were going to use it for a crime, despite the fact that both were of legal age and active duty military with clean records. Another Airman in our wing spoke up about how differently he is treated at the mall when is in uniform vs. out of uniform. Plenty of other examples, and that’s just with one minority group. Also, systemic (not systematic) racism is evident in the USAF promotion system and criminal justice system. I don’t have the exact stats in front of me, but that point was made by several senior leaders in recent days, and is apparently bad enough to warrant an independent investigation. I’m glad to see military leaders trying to confront it head on. It’s going to be a difficult and uncomfortable thing to talk about but in the end it will make us stronger, or at the very least, help us know more about each other.

Again, buying time could get us back to, and remain in, a containment phase. I’m not a huge fan of relying on non peer-reviewed articles written by non-experts on the webs but if that’s your jam, here is another Medium article describing how a broader strategy would play out after a hard-core mitigation phase. https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavirus-the-hammer-and-the-dance-be9337092b56 And here’s a published, peer-reviewed piece on how cities who cracked down hard and fast during the 1918 pandemic rebounded faster economically than those who resisted tough restrictions. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3561560

I think the idea is to flatten the curve to buy time, which if used properly to build up testing and acute care capacity, allows you to move back into the “containment” phase where you can quickly identify new cases/clusters, and isolate before they cause exponential growth. Gradual reintroduction of social freedoms could be applied along with improved testing and treatment, to essentially play “whack-a-mole” as cases pop up until a vaccine is developed. The article (written by a mathematician, not an epidemiologist or virologist) only makes a passing reference to those changes, noting that they should be specified in modeling (which I would think they are if you look into the 1s and 0s of the inputs to the models). The main thesis (deferring spikes if social distancing is the only factor in the model) is valid but doesn’t acknowledge broader strategies.

Installation commander may restrict travel to AD folks at their discretion. The home/work commute verbiage is actually the AFI definition of local area. My understanding (after working this at the unit level for the past week) is that leave travel of government civilians (GS employees) cannot be restricted, but *could* result in a situation where the individual is quarantined, and would not automatically be paid (individual could have to use personal leave/comp time, etc). Contractors get their guidance from their companies, but installation commander could always restrict their base access. Regular civilians (dependents, etc) are not subject to these rules but their actions could impact their sponsors (spouse travels to China, may result in quarantine for sponsor). I learned a lot this week about all this and this is my best understanding. Open for spears if anyone has other info. Crazy times indeed.

8/13 board members will be rated officers in the “large board” (Air Ops category) from the slides I saw today.

Quick update - return to fly approved! Total time DNIF was about 5 weeks and included a PCS. Two awesome docs worked together and put in the waiver paperwork. Definitely helped that it was a “one-off” event, and was written up as such. Also, no cause was discovered which allowed the docs more leeway to use their judgement.

Agree 100%. NATO is our bulwark. We need to defend the wall. Our disorganization in the international community is terrible but we need to get ready to defend our alliance.

Shout out to Amy and NBKC for another seamless VA home loan. This is my third loan with her (two home loans and a refi, all VA) over ten years and the experience only gets better. All paperwork completed over the interwebs with the exception of the final documentation that required wet signatures/notary. From offer acceptance to closing was ~20 days. Rate was exceptional.

In general, I would agree, but sometimes you don’t have the luxury of passing it off to someone else, especially if your leadership has decided the task is yours alone to complete. The most difficult cases I’ve had usually fell in one of two categories: 1) the request is made laterally to someone of equal rank/position, or 2) it’s made to an outside agency...sometimes a combination of the two. Both require people skills to get your desired outcome. Dale Carnegie’s “How to Make Friends and Influence People” is a great generic guide to both. Finding a way to “sell” your request as being mutually beneficial, or even just beneficial to the person you’re dealing with, is an art form, but yields great results. It’s amazing how far people will go to help you if they actually like you - even mediocre performers.

Losing your cool as a leader is the fastest way to lose credibility with anyone. That goes double with civilian employees, many of which have double or triple the amount of time-served that you likely do, and will remain in their jobs long after you leave. This is the first job in which I’ve led civilians, and I learned quickly that when you are unhappy with their performance, you have to be honest, firm (does not mean yelling), and document everything. You should also personalize your approach to their personality type (and yours!). I look like an idiot when I yell or lose my temper, so I usually go with disappointed-dad, or with a poker-face/unemotional demeanor during those instances. That probably doesn’t apply as cleanly to the SES/flag level world, which I imagine is like a very boring version of Game of Thrones, but the concept of treating people with respect goes far. If you ever have to use your rank in anything more than a general introduction or email signature in order to get something done or get someone to listen to you, you’ve already failed.