Pooter

Agreed. And yet.. when there are easy things sitting right in front of our faces that can mitigate some of that risk, we generally do those things.

I'm glad you aren't in a panic about covid, but regardless of how you feel, your risk is not zero. Risk is never zero for pretty much anything and this is exactly why we compare probabilities. Then we use those probabilities to decide what to be most concerned about. I think statistics, history, and current experience all show your risk of actual observed effects from covid is much much higher than some hypothetical future side effects from a vaccine. In reference to your political point: I've said from the start in this thread I don't think politics should factor into your decision. Neither should dumb Air Force policies. Of course kamala is going to shit on the vaccine when trump is in charge and then advocate for it when she's in power. Is that an indictment of the vaccine or of her as a two faced, manipulative, power hungry person? Trump would've done the exact same thing if the roles were reversed. Political posturing and dumb regulations in response to this crisis were always going to happen and they have nothing to do with the actual scientists developing a vaccines.

Obviously I'm not here to change everyone's minds either, and I doubt random internet commenters opting out of the vaccine will ever directly impact me. I just enjoy playing devils advocate especially when these threads get a little too echo-chamber-ey. My main motivation is that I'm a very data driven person and all the data I see point to getting the vaccine. The data also points to lockdowns being stupid, lest to you think I'm some far left nut. But to me the vaccine makes sense not only for your personal health but also to put an end to the national and military-wide covid rules stupidity. It's crazy to see people complain about covid restrictions and then turn down the vaccine.. the one thing that might actually make a difference and get these rules lifted.

Sounds like a nasty hypothetical. Here's another one. You skip the vaccine, catch covid, and end up losing your class 1 due to actual observed long term side effects of covid that we already know about. All you have to do to know this vaccine side effect argument is misguided is to look at the history of vaccines. Adverse side effects across a variety of vaccines are on the order of 1/10,000 to 1/100,000. Depending on your demographic covid has a 1/100 to 1/1000 chance of killing you. So basically you're choosing to risk a much more likely and much worse outcome now, to mitigate a much less likely and much less severe thing later. Am I missing something here? Also I'm really curious how, in the minds of conservatives, the FDA went from giant bloated stupid bureaucracy to ultimate vaccine gatekeeper seemingly overnight.

I don't have any beef with you that covid policy at both the national level and Air Force level has been botched to a preposterous degree. That is plainly evident from the devastating shutdowns in places like California. But my entire argument is those things shouldn't factor into your personal vaccine decision. At the end of the day we have a dangerous virus and a vaccine to reduce your chances of getting it by 95%. All current medical evidence, the CDC, and the medical community of the entire world say the vaccines are safe. And by getting it you protect other people too as it has been proven to reduce transmission.

Right. So since I'm sure you are aware how percentages work, that reduces your chance of death from less than 1 in 100 to less than 5 in 10000. Seems like a pretty good deal to me for a mild headache and a few days of arm soreness. But hey maybe 1/100 chance of death is good enough for you. Not the response I was expecting. I guess you got me. So add a fourth one to the list, just sheer carelessness or apathy. Do you also not lock your doors at night, wear a seatbelt, or do other basic things to minimize low likelihood/high impact risk items in your life?

Of course there are other reasons. Medical conditions precluding you from getting vaccinated are basically the only reasons that hold water in my opinion. But based on this thread the only other motivations people have for rejecting it seem to be: -spite -generalized institutional mistrust -F U don't tell me what to do Here's my point. In my organization it was unbelievably easy to predict which people would refuse the vaccine. If it had been a Vegas bet I would have made a shitload of money. So why is that? Do I just have an amazing spidey sense of exactly where everyone stands on issues of personal health? Or maybe is it because vaccine refusal is inextricably linked to a particular political ideology, and it's super easy to spot the far right political loud mouth complainers in the squadron..

Because not getting the vaccine could cause you much bigger problems... I'm sorry your friend got brain fog from the vaccine. That's a new one I haven't heard about. But I would urge you to weigh the risks of the two options: Option one: give yourself ~95% protection from the virus and risk hypothetical long term side effects and the occasional case of brain fog. Option two: risk it with a virus that's killed half a million people in a year. Oh and we also don't know what covid's long term effects might be either. And If we're doing brain fog anecdotes, I'll chime in with my anecdotal evidence too: every single person that I know who has gotten the vaccine felt slightly off for one day, had arm soreness for a few days, and then went about their life.

I think we're conflating two things here. Whether or not you should get the vaccine, and the Air Force's dumpster fire policies relating to covid are two completely separate issues. Anyone who has been in the Air Force for more than a day should have been able to predict that they'd enact idiotic policies, and commanders would revert to extreme risk aversion. But none of that should play into your decision of whether or not to get the vaccine. Getting the vaccine should be based on your personal health and that is it. Big Air Force nonsense shouldn't play into that decision and neither should politics. But what I'm seeing in the 1/3rd of service members turning down the vaccine are a bunch of political blowhards refusing it out of spite. It's a selfish act of political defiance, a middle finger at big blue and the libtard lockdown people, with not a second thought given to their actual health. And that is a problem.

I'm going to direct my hate like I direct my JASSMs: with poor timing and in all directions.

Unpopular opinion incoming: I think wap is a pretty decent song. Certainly not a feminist anthem, but it has some clever lyrics and I think considering the number of male artists who spend every waking moment talking about their dicks, we can give the ladies this one. It's certainly more hilarious and fun than any of the other drivel on pop stations. Cardi b has other good songs too. "I like it" is an absolute banger of a remix. Shhhhh it's okay you can admit it.

Same here. And my dad had that talk with me. People act like the police talk is only a thing for minorities, but the same shit applies to everyone. Your police interactions will go far more smoothly if you at a minimum: mind your p's and q's and don't try to fight them. The number one way to reduce perceived police violence issues in this country is to teach people to not descend into hysterics the second you have to interact with a cop. And unfortunately exactly the opposite is being taught.

I'm leaning toward actual idiot. It's pretty wild to see such a severe emotional reaction aimed at a car company and more specifically Tesla autopilot.. a feature you never even have to turn on if you don't want to. Is it perfect? Of course not. But we aren't measuring it against perfection. We're measuring it against the competence of the average driver, which is to say, complete trash.

There aren't enough facepalms in the world for this comment. a. You proved my point exactly. You had to avoid 3-4 accidents? No shit dude.. people are terrible drivers. Why would you not want some well thought out automation to come along and help fix that problem. ABS, stability control, and traction control were all newfangled tech at one point and are now completely standard. Autopilot will be the same. b. Yes software is coded... Not sure why you felt the need to tell us that. But also machine learning and software updates exist. So Tesla's autopilot gets better every day based on the millions of miles Teslas drive and through deliberate updates from the company. They'll fix 99.9% of the hypothetical bugs you're so worried about before you ever knew they existed. On this subject, I'd recommend sticking to your circle because the clunky verbiage you're using indicates to me you know precisely nothing about "coding" and "bugs." c. Pretty creative pandemic-work-from-home edge case about electric cars sitting unused. Did you think that one up yourself? I guess that's the silver bullet argument. Really got nothing for you there. Bravo. "So this one time we had a pandemic and all these tech people worked from home I think and like probably all of them have Teslas just sitting in their garages which is super wasteful I'm pretty sure because of electricity and stuff. So probably electric cars shouldn't be a thing." Is it bad that just from your ramblings on here I can say with 90% confidence you opted out of the vaccine have a punisher decal on your vehicle?

Autopilot in the jet kicks off sometimes too. Sometimes it's completely INOP **gasp** Should we scrap the entire concept because it isn't absolutely perfect? If I was trusting Tesla autopilot to transport my family, I'd do exactly what I do in the airplane. Monitor it. Trust but verify. Because I'm not an idiot. As for other drivers on the road, I would trust Tesla autopilot software over their awareness and reaction time 100 times out of 100. Do you live in a strange alternate reality where people are really courteous, attentive, skilled drivers? If so I would very much like to visit.

I'm not sure where you're driving but all I see on the road these days are compact SUVs and crossovers. If you exclude pickups, the top 3 selling vehicles in America for 2020 were compact SUVs: the rav4, the crv, and the equinox. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.forbes.com/wheels/news/best-selling-cars-suvs-pickups-2020/%3Famp You can't spec any of those three to be even remotely close to the level of luxury and tech a Tesla has. So the Tesla costs more. This is not difficult to understand. Tesla makes luxury electric cars with preposterous performance. So yes they're going to cost more and sell fewer total units than the companies making econo boxes. I will admit they're not for everyone and the infrastructure isn't full up in some parts of the country. But it's pretty cool that the premier electric car company in the world is American.

Agreed. The craziest part to me is that PC guidance from above isn't new and it certainly isn't a difficult thing to work around. You just have to think creatively, and be straightforward with your squadron. "I'll have your back if you have mine" kind of thing. Hell, you can still have names that are acronyms for offensive things and then just create a PC cover story for them. This shouldn't be hard.

That pisses me off more than anything because you know gen rand was around back in the heyday when you could get away with anything. But now that he's old and the one who has to provide top cover he's not into it anymore.

Fisker had a lot more problems than a simple bankruptcy. See this video for more details:

There is no world in which fighter pilot callsigns will be run by the EO office. It's hilarious that this dumbass of a squadron commander thinks that would ever be a thing that anyone would agree to. I would 110% prefer to not have an official callsign than to do this dickdance and I know every single other pilot in the entire CAF feels the exact same way. The predictable result of this is that squadrons are just going to have secret roll calls and namings off base with no bobs invited. Those will be twice as rowdy and irresponsible as if they just let us have our fun in the bar. If I was the mayor during this train wreck I would, in order: -resign -cancel all future rolls calls and namings -tell everyone in the squadron to stop wearing their callsign name tags -and then I'd coordinate on the bro level to throw the biggest effing offensive secret naming rager of all time.

I agree. I can really only think of two reasons not to buy a Tesla over similarly priced competition: 1. You are going to use it as more than just a commuter car and live in a place where the charging infrastructure isn't full up yet. 2. You are an enthusiast and want a drivers car. But for pretty much any other situation the Tesla is going to be the superior choice. When you consider cost of ownership, performance, features, practicality, and continuing improvements in the form of over the air updates Tesla simply blows everyone else out of the water.

Shack. This isn't an us vs. them debate because the situations aren't even remotely the same. I lived in Del Rio for five years and saw probably three snow flurries in that time. 6 inches of snow and a week of single digit deep freeze is absolutely unthinkable for most of the state. Meanwhile, California's power grid shits the bed most summers due to completely standard hot weather. If there were routine rolling blackouts in Texas in the summer, the situations would be analogous, but that isn't a thing. I'd love to see what would happen to LA if they got six inches of snow.. likely hundreds if not thousands of deaths, complete grid failure, and almost certainly a few decades worth of shitty climate change documentaries.

Yeah but the question is how much internal resistance and manufacturing complexity the power company is willing to take on to mitigate a once in a decade storm. My bet is not much. They'll apologize and give a few superficial refunds and the same shit will happen 10 years from now. The key with renewables is the energy storage technologies need to be seriously improved. This will help not only catastrophic snowstorm recovery, but also routine power demand at peak hours if it happens to not be all that sunny or windy.

There's an enormous false equivalence here. The "race riots" were an organic reaction of the populace to a thing that actually happened.. the brutal killing of George Floyd by police.. caught completely on video. The capitol riot was incited by the sitting president of the United States spreading blatant falsehoods about a fair election because his own ego couldn't handle the fact that he lost. And even though the number of people who stormed the capitol is very small in the grand scheme of things, the scariest part of this is that ~40% of republicans believe the same narrative that motivated those rioters. If you don't understand how the latter is far more dangerous to our country than the former, we don't have a lot left to talk about.

You don't think having an armed mob storm the capitol to interfere with the certification of a democratic election counts as "falling over the edge?" Something tells me if it was antifa who did it, you would.