nsplayr

🤣 who exactly do you think led the way on nuclear weapons, globalized capitalism, the decline of monarchies and the rise of telecommunications??

That is very interesting.

Ok I mostly try to just RX rather than TX on political stuff these days, but this one is just a bizarre example of "Dems in disarray." Breyer is 83! He retired at an age two years older than the last SCOTUS Justice who chose to retire, Kennedy. And thankfully he didn't make the mistake that Ginsburg and Scalia did re: "retiring too late" i.e. dying while a President of the other party is in office!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/02/10/trump-records-classified/ “Some Trump records taken to Mar-a-Lago clearly marked as classified, including documents at ‘top secret’ level” I look forward to a robust condemnation from my single-issue voters who passionately care about the Presidential Records Act, document retention and classified storage 🤣 I keed…but only a little bit. Committing crimes is bad and folks should really try to avoid that.

Good article and the author is a good dude I’ve flown with before, can vouch for his smarts.

This is true haha 😅 Have had some ground SOF dudes tell me that in jest. Cheeky bastards. Seriously though, that one f*cking guy saying that one f*cking line put a bad rep on an awesome community literally for 15+ years…choose who y’all send to air shows and fly-ins wisely. Draco was a freaking blast and we did some really cool stuff with some really great Americans. I hope the AO replacement platform gives the dudes what they need to continue bringing violence to bad people. Massive swing and a miss passing on the scorpion jet a couple years ago IMHO, but the capes of the L3 air tractor are apparently outstanding. I’ll believe it when I see it that a tail-wheel will be selected, but I’d be happy to be wrong because the platform delivers a lot that the AT-6 doesn’t. Also happy to personally be flying a GCS from now on…you can miss me with that bullshit of being strapped into the back seat of an air tractor for a 8.69 sortie duration and counting on the 12 year old-looking first Louie up front not to pork the landing of a huge tail-dragger with no rocket chair 😆

https://www.militarytimes.com/off-duty/military-culture/2022/02/01/boy-reels-in-50-caliber-barrett-sniper-rifles-while-fishing/ Alright, fess up, which one of y’all *actually* lost your expensive guns in a tragic boating accident? 😅 Of course it’s in Florida haha…

Big Blue reports that 95% of the total force has had at least 1 dose CAO early Dec 2021...so it should not be hard to find someone in the Air Force to talk to who is vaccinated. I hope the pilot and other navy folks who were injured all come out of this ok and that we scoop all the wreckage before anyone else does.

Just a final round-up to respond and then I'll let it rest from my end at least. BLUF wall of text, feel free to keep on scrolling. 🇺🇸 Ending the Filibuster in the Senate Ending the filibuster in the Senate is not a recently-held view of mine, and it's derived from the inability of the majority to govern, which to me is anti-democratic (small d democratic). Both parties (or any party or political group!), when being freely and fairly elected by a majority of voters, should have the ability to govern and deliver on the platforms they ran on. As a basic principle, a majority of voters should translate to a majority of elected officials should translate to the power to govern; the U.S. has a variety of systems that thwart that basic premise and I think most of them should change. If I could wave a magic wand I would make the Senate proportionally representative like the House or dramatically reduce its power, I would uncap the size of the House of Representatives, do away with the electoral college, and end lifetime appointment to SCOTUS in favor of 18 year terms that rotate on a predictable and fixed timetable. I would also make voter registration automatic and generally implement measures that make it easier for eligible voters to exercise that right. I'd experiment with with multi-member districts, state-wide proportional representation rather than geographic districts, preference voting and/or ranked choice voting, etc. All to the end of making our political system more small-d democratic and responsive to the voters. Little of that is probably ever gonna happen, but that's where I stand - small d democratic reforms are both good and necessary. Why Would Any Legislator Vote Against Their Party? There absolutely is incentive for the majority party to get minority party members on board. This is observable in many other countries and in previous political eras here at home. Going with regular majority rule also allows more elected leaders to vote their conscious and the will of their constituents rather than getting shoehorned into always feeling pressured to support the national party and powerful leaders legislative leaders like the Speaker and Majority Leader. Few people want to be the deciding vote to kill something the majority of their party supports (a la McCain or Manchin), but if the dam has already broken and the bill is passing anyways, you paradoxically see less strident partisanship and more crossover voting. "Selling" your potential yes vote, even if the majority doesn't strictly need it, for specific policy concessions often works! Even large majorities want to be bigger and more robust and to look more bipartisan. You see this today mostly on federal judicial appointments precisely because the majority rules and the filibuster isn't in play - opposition members will vote to confirm even if they would not have picked that person because they are going to get confirmed anyways. Legislators like to jump on the team and come on in for the big win as the good Colonel says. Gorsuch got three Dem votes despite the Dems really believing that seat was stolen due to Garland not getting a hearing...because he was getting confirmed anyways. If that vote was subject to a filibuster (and it was at first!) Gorsuch was not getting 60 votes, and even after McConnell changed the rules for SCOTUS to seat him, three Democrats still voted to confirm him! True bipartisanship at work! Collins voted against Coney Barrett because her vote was not deciding one way or the other, freeing her up to exhibit a bit of bipartisanship that's important to her image (or vote her conscious depending on how cynical you are). Sotomayor got nine GOP votes and Kagan got five, because they were clearly getting confirmed by the large Dem majorities anyways. Other Random Issues The House of Lords in the UK is pretty complicated but only a small number of its current members (~12%) are hereditary peers. The biggest change took place in 1999 under Blair and more reforms are ongoing. Learn about it here. I can confirm I have read some of the Federalist Papers and subsequent scholarship about them and our primary founding documents. Social science major in college so that was kind of a requirement. Big fan overall with some caveats. At the time I 100% would have been a Federalist compared to what their political opponents wanted to enact. That being said, political systems are not set in stone nor should they be. Modern problems require modern solutions. I'm also probably not as "radical left liberal" as some of y'all probably imagine. I'm more of a neoliberal third-way person that can be convinced to support more leftward policies depending on the details. I believe a strong national defense is paramount (plus it puts food on my table haha!), capitalism is great and the best human system we've come up with so far for advancing technology and eliminating poverty, and I'm frustrated by some of the uber-woke folks on the left pushing losing narratives and policies. I go to church, own guns, send my kid to a private (religious) school and I kill people for a living. If anyone wants to talk big-picture political systems or reform I'd love to offline sometime - I enjoy that more than the horserace and/or the discourse on cable/twitter the older I get. Cheers 🍻

From my view this is pretty clearly untrue. With no filibuster, the majority would be able to pass more legislation, and if these bills are going to pass, there's incentive for minority-party members to "get to yes" and to also try to shape the bill to fit their state/local/partisan concerns somewhat. For example, if Build Back Better was going to pass anyways, I think Murkowski/Collins/etc. would be interested in voting yes if they had some demands met in the bill. It helps their "moderate" brand and also secures some wins for their constituents or on more minor issues they care about. Same goes on the other side, Manchin & Simena would likely be inclined to support a GOP bill that was sure to pass anyways if they could get some specific measures included. In other words, more bipartisanship than we have now. Ending earmarks was also a bad policy IMHO because they allowed individual legislators to secure projects for their specific constituents rather than just rubber-stamping whatever the national party wanted. It was a way to bring the random senator or two on board with an appropriate amount of federal cheddar for their state. As long as they didn't personally benefit, i.e. the benefit went to their constituents, I have zero problem with "procuring some votes" in this fashion to paraphrase Lincoln. Which is the process, subject to judicial review and the will of the voters, that happens in literally every single other modern democratic nation. If you have won full control of the legislature and the executive through free and fair elections, you should be able to govern! But there are not 9 "moderate" Republicans, nor Democrats in today's Senate. The parties did used to have more overlap where there were more than a handful of Republicans more liberal than the most conservative Democrat and vice versa, but that is no longer the case. Finding an agenda that would garner 60+ votes in the senate is why right now we're can't even pass basic appropriations bills with any consistency and why reconciliation is used in every single congress as the "one weird trick" bill to let the majority forward some of their priorities. Republicans are just currently more ok with the status quo than Democrats because the things they as a party basically all agree on, tax cuts and conservative judges, can be passed with 51 votes; Democrats' agendas are a bit broader and thus their frustration. "The very outdated filibuster rule must go. Budget reconciliation is killing R's in Senate. Mitch M, go to 51 Votes NOW and WIN. IT'S TIME! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 29, 2017" To be crystal clear, I fully support the filibuster ending in the Senate, even if that happens in January 2025 with Republican full control. The country will be better for it in the long run.

Really? Of the two most likely 2024 candidates by far, Biden and Harris, I think Biden has a much better chance of winning.

Lol are you sure? I like Biden enough and I think the economy in particular is doing much better than people's perceptions of it; the sentiment is unmorred from the reality. Powell at the Fed + very robust emergency/recovery spending from Congress since spring 2020 have given the US a giant leg up economically coming out of the pandemic compared to peer democracies in Europe and elsewhere. Essentially full employment at this stage is an incredible achievement and 2021 has the strongest GDP growth since 1984. The main problems remains that the pandemic is not over and that's obviously spreading a lot of bad vibes in general. Hard to be optimistic when there's a lot of plague and death everywhere! Unfortunately the enemy gets a vote. Some unforced errors from the Biden Admin ranging from SMH to "wow, what a f*ck up," but I'm not trying to debate y'all blow-by-blow here. I give them the benefit of the doubt for good intent and y'all do not, I get it. I wish Biden were not 1,000 years old and had that view all through the 2020 primary and even when I voted for him. Harris has been an absolute liability politically and is an unwise successor if Biden decides not to run in 2024. Some of my more preferred candidates would be Jared Polis (CO governor), Stacey Abrams (assuming she wins GA governor in 2022) and Mayor / Transpo Secretary Pete Buttigieg. Senators Amy Klobuchar and Michael Bennett are also good in my book. The world where Biden wins again is where Trump is the GOP nominee, simply because Trump is such a wildcard/liability in many regards. A replacement-level GOP governor/senator with relatively Trump-aligned rhetoric I think wins in 2024, that's what I'm expecting to happen at least. Incumbency is also a huge advantage that should not be underestimated...I seem to remember about 96.9% of y'all being absolutely sure Obama would lose in 2012 due to perceived poor performance.

Yea there doesn't seem to be any reason why she could not if the opportunity came up. This was asked when Trump was considering Sen. Mike Lee for SCOTUS and basically the conclusion was that during the vote, if he were the nominee, Lee could vote to confirm himself; Harris would be no different if required to cast a tie-breaking vote in the Senate. All fun speculation, but it's not gonna happen. My money is on Ketanji Brown Jackson.

As the old saying goes, “When the index is up and your portfolio is down, blame the President!” 😄 I know it sucks when your pixilated monkey JPEGs and virtual dog coins and 90s video game stonks plunge, but try to leave Uncle Joe out of it. I’ve been 💎🙌 into this obscure thing called VFIAX for about 15 years now, check it out 💰📈 HODL!

Believe what you want on the other points, but this is not true. DJIA close 3 Nov 2020 (election day): 27,480 DJIA close 20 Jan 2021 (inauguration day): 31,188 DJIA close 26 Jan 2022 (today): 34,168 S&P 500 close 3 Nov 2020: 3,369 S&P 500 close 20 Jan 2021: 3,851 S&P 500 close 26 Jan 2022: 4,349 Stocks have indeed taken a dip off all-time highs in the last 3 weeks but...🤷‍♂️

Thanks man, any word asking around? I heard back from our wing CSS folks that OCONUS leave would not be approved, but no one can point to a reg or business rule or anything in black and white that says that. Appreciate any help!

I imagine the answer is no to all of those, but the witness did not want to dance around sources and methods in an open hearing so they decided to decline to answer anything IVO the topic. Sen. Cruz should ask the same questions in a classified session if he thinks it’s that important. If you think there’s something more nefarious, ok; I do not. Many people that entered the Capitol on Jan 6th 2021 have already pleaded guilty of crimes, and I at least have a pretty clear memory of who was encouraging that angry mob to head down to the Capitol and take action in the first place.

Because sources and methods discussions don’t need to happen on unclassified environments. “Broadening the question” is often talking around what is legit classified for good reason. Sen. Cruz, with legit oversight authority, I’m sure can ask those questions in an appropriate setting and get more robust answers. The FBI is certainly not above reproach re: shady stuff, but I tend to give the federal LEOs the benefit of the doubt most of the time before getting all conspiratorial 🤷‍♂️ Is the potential charge here that what, the FBI entrapped people and actively led them to storm the building? There’s ample evidence that many of the perpetrators were there of their own accord and having a grand time with it all, at least based on their extremely unwise live social media streams from inside the building haha. The FBI thanks them for their generous cooperation. 🇺🇸

Yea he was too optimistic on being able to “beat the virus” for both obvious political reasons and because pre-Omicron it was legit more likely we could collectively push the virus back to very very low levels. That time has passed and I think he knows that. The problem is global vaccine inequity and if there’s a large reservoir of immunologically naïve humans (to this virus) anywhere on the planet that’s connected to the rest of the world, new and interesting mutations will continue to emerge given the sheer number of at-bats we’re giving the virus with every new infection.

The facts on the ground change and the enemy (ie the virus) gets a vote. Omicron is significantly mutated compared to the original virus…are y’all’s TTPs just as effective against a maneuvering, innovating enemy on day 69 of the war compared to a beat-up static target that’s been sitting in the same spot on the range since the Cold War? ”Follow the science” and just common fu*king sense means there are almost never one-shot silver bullet solutions to thorny problems. You have to maintain some acceptable level of defensive effort, keeping in mind negative trade-offs, especially against nature or nature will get ya. Have you ever tried to keep squirrels from eating all the god damned birdseed out of the bird feeders? (Ask me how I know) Death eventually has a Pk of 1, I just hope she finds me old and happy and ready to see what, if anything, the next journey entails. Probably sooner rather than later on first boosters if I had to guess. I’ve seen private employers mandate it already (large university hospital in my area). And of course you’re already free to go out and get a booster to re-up protection if you’d like to, which personally I did, having been originally vaccinated very early in 2021. I mean we get mandated flu shots every year, this will be the same, ideally rolled up into one combined vaccine for flu and COVID so there’s less beans someone needs to count. IMHO that’s the best case scenario and we’ve known that for a while; you likely can’t eradicate a virus this transmissible, but you can (hopefully) get it down to manageable endemic levels where it’s a known risk but not a world-shaking event. Anyone who thought the outcome would be otherwise or predicted something much rosier than that was either overly optimistic, misled or misleading.

Any insight into why the career field is getting nixed? Looks like Big Blue honey-potted dudes once again with lots of promises and then cut them all off at the knees 2.69 years later when the Command musical chairs being another round of their endless shuffle. Solid advice I have received over the years: only leave Ops very cautiously and skeptically, save enough early so have FU Money before you think you’ll need it, and war game our your plans A-E with your family on a semi-regular basis and have a vague idea of acceptable plans F-Z just in case.

We taking bi-curious or what? 😅 I keed…sort of. I don’t think the FARs prohibit flying with a buttplug in, but just look out for turbies haha. Good luck flying the friendly skies! I’m genuinely happy for all of y’all cashing airline checks and unironically livin’ the dream. Even as a never-gonna-be-an-airline-guy this thread is always a good read.

Would it be better for them to reveal sources and methods in an open, televised hearing? Or is it better if the FBI *didn’t* have any informants or undercover folks reporting on groups that, IDK, literally overwhelmed the police and broke into the seat of government trying to stop the peaceful transfer of power What tac said above is pretty evident, and I for one am glad…it’s literally the FBI’s job to do that kind of stuff. IMHO Proud Boys, III Percenters, Neo-Nazis, no-shitter revolutionary commies, domestic environmental terrorists, cartel hombres, anarchists, ISIS wannabes, etc., run back to your holes, fuck off, and check your 6, someone is probably wearing a wire.

I'll be on a mob for the first time second-half of FY22 (1 Apr - 30 Sep) and I'm looking for an official reference one way or the other on if I can take OCONUS leave. I'm an RPA pilot so the "mobilization" is at our home station flying our normal combat line, so no change in location/mission/etc. from the normal federal MPA orders we work all the time. I had initially thought it'd be no different than taking leave while on federal orders any other time, but other folks have raised their eyebrows and said to try to find out for sure. Looking to have a solid reg to point to before I either book expensive tickets to Europe or rolex the family vacation to another time. Thanks in advance for the help! All the small wrinkles and permutations in the Guard are vast and mysterious, and even 7 years into my Guard career I'm still but an apprentice...

Unless you're in the Guard/Reserves and your orders are not 100% continuous 😔 I still want a peek behind the curtain on these formulas man. I moved from the city urban core to the suburbs and per 2021 rates my BAH is ~$350 higher out here (non-AGR Guard your BAH is based on your residence zip, not duty zip). Houses out here are understandably cheaper across the board. Makes zero sense. Get enough monkeys handcuffed to keyboards I guess eventually they produce Shakespeare but I mean...