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The majority of the “trumps a dumpster fire” crowd boils down to they don’t like his personality, how he communicates (verbal and written), etc. It has little to nothing to do with policies and facts/results related to those policies. I’m not saying they’re wrong to dislike that side of him, but I do think it’s ridiculous that many have essentially boiled this whole thing down to I don’t like his face, so I’m voting for the other person. I feel like we’re in high school where kids vote for the popular girl who’s a total dipshit over the unpopular girl who actually has great ideas and follow through that’ll make HS better for the majority. Half of America has been swooned by the hot chick who will drive this bitch into the ground...but she’s not that other chick, so totally worth it!!!

Apart from Covid? Really? Isn’t handling a crisis an important measure of presidential leadership? Maybe THE most important measure? I can’t think of one recent president that hasn’t had to handle a major crisis. A savvy president will use the opportunity to band Americans together and cement his support (think W after Sep 11). All Trump had to do was pretend to take this seriously and encourage all Americans to come together and beat the virus. He’d be a shoe in for re-election right now if he’d done that. But Trump’s biggest weakness and his biggest failure is that he only sees himself as President of his own supporters. Politics for him is a zero sum game that involves vanquishing your opponent into oblivion rather than acknowledging that the other side is here to stay and compromise is the only path to stability and prosperity in a democratic society. His “fuck blue America” attitude will be his downfall and unfortunately he’s infected the whole republican party with it. He’s transformed the entire GOP into a cynical, xenophobic, isolationist shell of its former self and all of America will be worse off for a generation due to the damage he’s done. He spent three years lining your wallet? Well I guess that’s good for you. Me? Well call me a naive idealist but I expect much more out of the leader of the free world.

The reality is that the AI jet will win the fight... only to mort on the RTB when its sense-and-avoid system doesn't see the MQ-9.

I get what you’re trying to say, but you could say this about almost every president. I bet you didn’t vote for Obama in 2012, but did your life get worse? Doubt you can argue it significantly affected any aspect of your life, but I bet it felt like it did. It’s the same, now. In my mind, our national debt has ballooned, healthcare options for my brothers and sisters that aren’t in the military have gotten more expensive and less available, and I don’t realistically believe that the economy has really gotten better. I enjoy that my 401k has done well, but I don’t enjoy the fact that, when I tried to help my 26 year old nephew (who unfortunately isn’t that smart) find a plan to move out of his parents house, there was no reasonable option other than to take on gig economy jobs and have 2 roommates. You make minimum wage in the majority of the US, your take home pay is on the realm of 1200 dollars a month. Show me how you budget that out in any average CoL area (healthcare+rent+car+food alone exceeds that). He looked into trades, which is probably what he’s going to go with, but that brings his pay to ~$15 an hour, or 1800 dollars a month, but no one would accept him without a personal connection to his family. It’s not as easy as people make it out to be. Finally, told him to join the military, but he’s not medically qualified. The fundamental disagreement I have with you, I think, is that I believe tax rates are probably too low. Mainly at the highest echelons of society, but even at our level. The bottom 50% of society has a horribly hard time due to exponentially increasing rent and education prices, all while wages stagnate. No real income improvement for lower middle class in decades. On top of this, we aren’t anywhere close to balancing budgets, as we are approaching $27T of debt. That comes out to over $200k a taxpayer, and it’s only going up. How are we going to deal with that? *crickets* I believe that this is an example of something that has become markedly worse over the last 4 years. Please look at the marginal tax rates (don’t worry about the article if you don’t want, just the graphs) over the last 70 years, and realize that what you think about “trickle down” or tax rates did not apply during the greatest periods of real economic expansion in the US. Bottom line, taxes MUST go up: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/10/06/opinion/income-tax-rate-wealthy.html I encourage you to read about “quantitative easing” and its effect on stock prices. Bottom line, the stock market is inflated, grossly. An additional $3-5T has been added to the money supply of the market (estimated at ~$30T) over the past 4 years by the federal reserve balance sheet. We should have tightened when we had a chance (2016-2019) but the first, and I think only, time that they tried to do that, the DOW dropped slightly. Now you and the rest of America are addicted to seeing the numbers go up, and even with the highest unemployment and lowest wage growth in recent history, we have ATHs in the stock market. And that’s why we’re gonna have $10T on the fed balance sheet. It’s akin to airlines doing stock buybacks then asking for handouts, when we should stop robbing Peter to pay Paul. Global warming is real, and its effects are real. The scientific community has a very strong consensus on this. Current admin: at best, no plans; at worst, open and push for coal and actively make the situation worse. We have to invest in future technology. And that’s gonna cost money. These posts are useless, because you’ll find one thing that you disagree with and then entirely disregard the rest, but a lot of people aren’t voting against trump just cause “Orange man bad.” And, I will say, Biden is a terrible choice. But he’s still better.

Has your life worsened between 2016 and now? Apart from Covid, which is a global pandemic, how has Trump hurt your life? A lot of good changes between his election and now. Lower taxes, ISIS eliminated, strong economy. Not bad things at all. Biden? He won’t make it more than a few months past the election. Which means Kamala Harris as your POTUS. A radical California politician who stands against everything American. Higher taxes, open borders, gun grabber...you name it. Trump’s “dumpster fire” is much more palatable. Questions?

I assume you also blame Trump for the slashing of the UPT syllabus and the perceived mishaps of the last year, as well. Why hasn’t Trump increased the pilot bonus? Does he want our Air Force to fail? Or maybe these decisions fall much more squarely on the SECAF/CSAF/Congress.

Just cause you want it to be a hoax doesn't make it a hoax. The "unite the right" movement, protesting the removal of Gen Lee's statues, was the entire impetus to the Charlottesville gatherings and conflicts. They organized a march down Charlottesville's streets holding torches and chanting "blood and soil," the English translation of a Nazi slogan. In the end, one of the neo-nazi white supremacists rammed his car into a group of counterprotestors, killing one and injuring 19. Your choice - just like it's the president's choice - to support them by saying that there are fine people on both sides, do what you want. But this was not just a small group of "state's rights" or "small government" protestors. And don't pretend like there were 10 different groups on either side - this was Unite the Right and counterprotestors. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unite_the_Right_rally Also, I'd like to point out the other hypocrisy in this example. Even on this thread, you guys say to not take Trump comments literally, and that you have to actually look for what his point is. But now you are saying to only take his comments literally, and ignore the underlying meaning. You can't have it both ways.

Still pushing that hoax, eh? Let's look at the whole quote: He explicitly excluded white supremacists and neo-Nazis from the "very fine people" comment.

What is amazing is that, in an Air Force that is massively overly concerned with "how things look", on this one they're mostly concerned with trying desperately to gaslight the people who have identified that there is a problem into thinking that *they* are the problem. The AF can't even get their own dysfunctional leadership processes and priorities executed well.

It’s irrelevant as to whether the Russian/Chinese FLANKERS are on an American military unit emblem because of a mistake or because or regulation. What matters is that it makes you look stooopid. Surely it’s someone’s job in the Air Force to give a shit about that, even if it does mean having to know your arse from your elbow?

Just imagine if the drone was rocket-powered instead of air breathing! Like Mach 4 speed. And I bet we could make it pull 30g. And of course, there’s no human in there so we could give it a one-way mission. So we’d better make them cheap - like less than $1m each - and light so one fighter could control 8 or even as many as 20 of them. They can even have little radars or IR sensors in their noses, but they wouldn’t need them until close in because the controlling fighter (the mothership!) is guiding them most of the way to their target.

When I was instructing at UPT, I used to think, "man, was I that dumb when I was a LT?" This thought was then closely followed by "well, yeah, probably"

You are not wrong. He does need to someone to dart him and take his phone away. Let him compose Tweets that are reviewed by at least 2 other people before hitting send. As far as speeches go, keep him somewhat close to whatever is on the teleprompter.

Anyone remember sequestration in 2013? Flying hours cut, mishaps skyrocketed down range. I 100% blame Obama for that. Yeah..I’ll take Trump any day of the year.

The majority of Trump supporters support him just because his name reads “Trump (R),” so I don’t see how that’s any different. If we point out the numerous criminal indictments, the “individual number 1” from Comeys arrest, the senate report from the last 2 weeks that says that Russia definitively colluded with a certain campaign to interfere with the 2016 election (read it), the tapes asking Ukraine to personally help the president with reelection, the president saying that the white supremacists at Charlottesville were “very fine people,” the inane policy in the Middle East (where I’m sure you all have been)... Youre right, it’s just that he says “the blacks love me,” I can “grab em by the pu$$y,” and his other idiosyncrasies that, at best, make him the same as Joe Biden. Remember, he’s very smart (but would sue his “Ivy League” colleges to stop his transcripts from getting out) and very successful in business (but has sued at every step to stop the “very damaging” tax returns from being released).

Former next instructor here. Genuinely saddened and ashamed that big blue took something with a lot of promise and decided to use it to increase quantity rather than quality. Can't say I'm even a little bit surprised though.

WEFT There are obvious visual differences between those airplanes.

It was a computer program running a computer program vs a pilot running a computer program. The results are so predictable a 5 year old could have told you who would win. Simulators are not real airplanes. The AI would not have the data in an airplane it had in the sim; perfect performance modeling of both jets, perfect data on adv airspeed, alt, g, distance, heading, AA, etc. Probably even knew exactly what flight control inputs the pilot was making before they would have been apparent visually. A laser and a camera doesn't get you that data. The entire thing was done with the stated purpose to give confidence in a drone wingman for future fighter pilots. A cagematch in a sim does not do that, so the stated objective was not possible to meet. The entire thing smacked of purely a publicity stunt.

They’ve been saying this about the next generation since the beginning of time. “Children; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. They no longer rise when elders enter the room, they contradict their parents and tyrannize their teachers. Children are now tyrants.“ - Socrates

I think it is safe to say that judging politicians based on their morality is a mistake.

To make matters worse when prodded on the failures of the national response claims "I don't take responsibility at all" while rating himself a "10 out of 10", the most toxic of all leadership attitudes to take in a crisis. I think it's important to also mention the active undermining of historically apolitical institutions. Some examples include: publicly pressuring the Fed to lower interest rates, the Bible photo op ordeal with the General Milley, tweeting about active high profile judical affairs such as Gallagher and Crozier, picking a partisan oil lobbyist as head of EPA, politicizing NASA's commercial crew success, leaving state department positions vacant, putting alt righters such as Miller and Bannon in positions of power, etc. If you're cynical enough to believe that all our institutions are working against American interests, or that there's some secret society headed by Soros running all our institutions, then I can't blame you for voting for him. In any case, Presidents get too much blame and credit for the economy; federal government policy/manning, foreign affairs/treaties, and cultural leadership are what the President actually have control over, and for this election I think Biden is less of a dumpster fire. Not say all the the President has done is bad, of course. He earned a lot of praise from me when he chose Mattis for SecDef. However Mattis' words shortly after his resignation leave little else to be said about the state of the executive branch.

You gotta admit, that's a great pic!

Biden is a career politician, who’s showing obvious signs of mental decay. A vote for him, is a vote for Harris as POTUS. And if the far left gets into power, it will only be a matter of when, they decide that the “Imperialist” US military needs to have budgets slashed. I hate Trumps delivery, but he believes in the idea of having strong national defense; and that means funding it.

Trump is a dumpster fire. The democrat platform is a dumpster fire. I will vote for whoever can be proven to be slightly less of a dumpster fire. Go

They probably were both arguing over who gets ATIS.

apparently airliner vis recce content on the intwerwebz is a thing. Hats off to you a-word flyers. I admit it looks the same to me.

The drive times are a little longer now, but in the ballpark. I don't wish deathway 90 on anyone, I did lose squadronmates to that road during my tenure. I went the other way, and got an airplane (owned two of them during my tenure, since had to trade up when the kid came along and 160hp wasn't gonna cut it anymore). My family wouldn't have happened if it weren't for the spam cans. Places like DLF are perfect for that kind of mission. Some of the more memorable trips of that chapter of our lives were in the ol' spam cans. It truly became a pressure relief valve, and travel to my wife's family back in the KTIK area was a breeze vice driving. My avatar pic is of the second plane right there at the ramp at Pico circa 2013, which I still own. Regarding airline service, it went in cycles, due to the non-profitable nature of the city pair. Colgan had the contract with UA during the first half of my tenure there. Then the city lost service. As the pay and travel guy at my sq, I dealt with that fallout a lot. They regained service back a year or so before I finally got my parole from the place. AA feeder carrier. And now lost again as noted above. Doesn't surprise me in this environment. The one thing we legitimately miss? No traffic. But that's more of a pre-retirement lifestyle complaint. One of the appeals of airline de facto part time work, is the flexibility to live where you want. I think we're gonna try for smaller towns within driving distance to healthcare and urban conveniences when I get done with uncle sugar, since the wife is younger than me by a good clip and expects to remain in the workforce well after my second retirement. GA flying in retirement is a must (I didn't undergo all this indentured service to end up playing canasta in my off time), and since the finances don't quite justify airpark living, proximity to an airport with hangars will continue to be a driver. Good bad or indifferent, exurban living is more compatible with airplane ownership than metro core living, due to storage shortages and price pressures making it relatively unaffordable. We're not quite willing to retire to a place like DLF over it, but I'm, sure we'll find a middle ground location when we get to that bridge.

No but tell them I'll take your place and that should smooth things over. 😉

It’s just the way the USAF fighter community is going as more F-35’s come online. Similar to how the F-16 used to be the most common airframe in the USAF therefore a lot of pilots went to it to fly it. But right when it came out, most fighter bound guys were still going F-4 because there weren’t the seats available. If you’re T-6 complete now and about to start 38’s with aspirations of F-35, I’d plan to graduate at the top of the class. If you just want to fly a fighter, I’d recommend you maintain a pulse for the next 6 months and you’ll get there.

Maybe...but generally you can kick over chairs and clean up the joint without creating the "most toxic environment in 20 years".

They may have the greatest drop video ending ever...

Nerd alert: Star Trek's classic "A Taste of Armageddon" episode explores this. Two societies use computers to simulate the outcome of a war. The winner is declared without any fighting. But the losers are euthanized.

Unless she’s an operator who comes in and kicks over chairs, cleans up the joint and deals with the entrenched cadre who’ve “always done things this way...” In that case, all the clerks get their undies in a bunch and the IGs get called. (Seen it firsthand) Can not confirm on this case, just being devils advocate. Given her circumstantial (in the report) connection to a suicide though, I doubt she stays in our AF much past her current assignment. Chuck

Sterling silver wings and letting them age naturally wins over the manufactured oxidized wings, though both beat the shiny wings

Here is what you should be asking your IP’s. Where do you deploy too, how often did you deploy, what bases can you go too. I had a crusty Iron Major as an instructor once tell me to look around the school house and ask the junior captains why they were at a training base so early on in their career. Many people don’t want to leave their op squadrons after their first tour. That should tell you something about their community. As a pilot on the RC-135 variants, there is not a whole lot of vault time in terms of you having your head in the books. Many aircraft besides the pointy nosed ones do their crew briefs in a vault to bring the discussion up to a Secret/Top Secret discussion. The RC-135 takes you to Gucci places such as: Okinawa, Alaska, England, Greece, Diego Garcia. You’ll make a bunch of money because you will be sitting alert at most of these places earning North of $100 per day. Their worst deployment location is Al Udeid in Qatar. This is not a bad location at all despite what you read on here. You will work with a large crew of officers and enlisted who are the ones doing the mission. You will essentially be a bus driver, but that’s not a bad thing. The RC-135 of all variants is a highly requested and useful airframe. If you go to an RC-135 variant you can expect to spend most of your career at Offutt AFB in Omaha Nebraska. You’ll have the opportunity to fly other airframes in the iron-triad (E-3, E-8, RC-135) if you so desire. Of those airframes, the RC-135 has the nicest cockpit, deployed locations, and gets the most money from the government. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk