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One time I went full honest with the new flight doc because at that point life was more important than flying. She said, “holy shit…don’t ever tell anyone other than me.” I said, “copy. But just saying, that’s a perfectly normal Wed night on a TDY!”

They were a solid group of dudes when I worked with them. Too bad to see the doors close.

Is a 5 liter stein just one drink?..., asking for a friend.

Stop being childish. You should know by now that's not my style. If I issue a threat it's direct and usually rash...and usually retracted. Threats on the internet are stupid. Most people I've encountered start tearing up the first time they feel how bad a punch hurts their own knuckles. I know I did. I'd be willing to bet that the majority of the guys here are doughy dudes who've never actually been in a real fight. Hopefully your cute online insults serve you well in the real world. I asked a legit question based on legit science. If the body is in shit shape, the brain isn't going to work as it should. I still haven't gotten an answer from prozac. If you are unacquainted with the association of physical and mental health, you should be. If not, don't feel bad. It's a common problem in American society. Oddly enough, a lot of the rest of the world clearly understands it and almost takes it for granted. For example, the Japanese have culturally inculcated physical activity as a daily requirement for their salaryman class. They've even got walking tracks on the roofs of their skyscraper office buildings. Yet Americans think someone is being a meathead bully if they ask someone else if they exercise or physically train. It's rather weak minded...which is rather appropriate, all things considered. If you haven't noticed, I don't imply questions. I ask them directly. Sometimes I get drunk and ALL the filters get bypassed, but my core belief remain the same. I have yet to have one person answer me directly as to why they believe that the current agenda is good for our country. I've heard lots of what. Very little Why. For clarity: My one and only core belief is that I am broken and need a savior, which was provided by God in Jesus. He lived, died, and rose again specifically for the purpose of reconciling me to God. Nothing that I did, nothing that I am. Who he is, and what he's done saves me. My relationship with Him is the ONLY thing in this life that's worth anything. I was built to relate to him. I am highly imperfect. But it's worth the work to try and be better. Politics, religion, money, relationships, family, morality...all of those things are subservient and I poorly understand them. So when I ask pointed questions, it's because I want pointed answers. Living a coherent and intellectually honest life in view of origin, destination, morality, and meaning is the best I can try for. Which is why I ask direct questions. So. Soft on China. Transitioning of children without parental approval. Active celebration of non-straight sexuality. Advocacy of teaching sexual agendas to kids in school. Mandates of politicized public health agendas. Legalization of drugs. Incentivizing fathers to leave the home in low income families. Celebration of biological men oppressing of biological women. Not being able to clearly define what a woman is. Suppression of freelance workers in the economy (go look up the Pro Act and the 70 MILLION freelance workers it would crush). Egregious excessive spending the likes of which you would NEVER approve in your own person budget. Suppression and elimination of the cleanest energy sources human kind has ever created. Enforcement of a 'green' agenda that is not only disastrous for ecosystem, our economy, and our country's defense, but is literally physically impossible. Should I keep going? Claiming that our country's and community's stances on these issues to be sound is intellectually dishonest. All those agenda items are not only endorsed, but ACTIVELY ENFORCED by our current American leadership. Yet you insist that voting for the current version of the democrat party that endorses ALL of the above is sound because they are the party that represents your values. Values which you and your liberal peers refuse to explain. I'm not asking you to change. I'm asking you to explain why you believe what you believe. All I asked prozac, and now I'll ask you again: Why do you believe what you believe. I used to vote democrat. I'm an independent now. I am a parent who has a world that I'm going to leave to my kids. I know what it's like to have a world dumped on and passed on to me by my parent generation. I'm not going to do that to my kids. That means WE ALL need to work to preserve our community and get back to it's foundational principles. If we've gone down the wrong path, progress has to look like backing up and returning to the right path. It seems clear to me that our country is going down the wrong path. We need to back some things up. I guess that makes me conservative. You know what's never happened? A liberal supporter asking me what I believe, not to mention why I believe it. TLDR: Please question your premises about being a "Democrat" or "Republican" because the Democrat or Republican party represents your values. You might find that it actually doesn't. I'm not asking you to vote for my guy. I'm asking you to stop supporting causes that are bad for our community and our country. If you can't see the bad impacts, please get out of the echo chamber and actually inspect our country. Those bad causes have started to impact our personal lives, and more personally our kids. That I'll defend. That’s a lot of words. I am choosing tot to engage because I don’t usually have the time or energy & I feel like when you and I have engaged in the past it turns into a circular argument. I’ve been on this forum a long time & I think that most who know me here have a pretty good idea where I stand on most issues. Feel free to check out my post history if you’re really curious. I’ll throw you a few cliff’s notes here though: I believe that the US is, and should remain the most prosperous and powerful country in the world and that we are full of opportunities for everyone here. We’re far from perfect and should endeavor to remain the world leader in all of those metrics. To me, that means we should have things like the best education system in the world, the best healthcare system, the best infrastructure, etc. Not just in rich areas of New York, or California, but in rural Mississippi and Arkansas, and Kentucky. It’s unacceptable to me that gun violence has become the biggest killer of children, or that creationism is being taught to American children, or that certain segments of our population have been, and continue to be shut out of the best parts of our economy. In my eyes, the reforms needed are on a national level and are of a nature that only an empowered federal government can tackle. These are just a few of the reasons that I tend to support a larger role for central government as well as tax policies that allow for raising the revenue to prosecute those aims. I am aware there are many pitfalls in this strategy. But there are just as many pitfalls in conservative strategy (more, in fact, IMO). I fully allow that there are many good arguments for a more conservative mindset. I used to subscribe to many of them. I eventually came to the overall conclusion that despite claiming otherwise, conservatives weren’t realists. The argument that we are better off leaving people to their own devices assumes they are generally good and rational. While that may be true on a mostly individual basis, most people simply don’t act in good or rational ways often enough to solve our issues. For instance, expecting local churches to solve poverty, hunger, and homelessness is an exercise in futility. Some problems are simply to big to be left at the local level, yet many conservatives continue to insist that is the way forward. I disagree. Here’s the bottom line. I 100% believe that at the end of the day, despite our differences on how to get there, you and I want to see the same thing: A better United States. You know what worries me more than any of the issues I detailed above? The fact that once upon a time, most of us understood that. That our differences in opinion did not mean we were enemies. Now, it’s different. If you don’t agree with me, you must be trying to destroy my country. While that sentiment certainly exists on both sides, the cacophony from the right seems much louder & is yet another reason I have gravitated to Democrats in recent years. This concern is what sparked my original comment about Hailey and my appreciation for her generally well reasoned positions. To me, it’s far more important for us (Americans in general, not necessarily you and I) to stop thinking of one another as enemies than it is to pledge allegiance to any particular political ideology.

An update: My plan worked to perfection. Separated with 120+ days of leave, took ~90 terminal, paid the rest. Got hired by a legacy airline and started with ~60 days left on terminal. The airline asked zero questions about any Air Force promotion stuff. Got the plane and domicile I wanted straight out of training. I'm already a line holder. Holy crap the airline life quality of life is a million times better than the Air Force. Zero queep. Zero outside work work. Zero mission planning. Zero paperwork. Brief and debrief? Maybe a total of five minutes combined per day of flying. I am so glad I got passed over and wrote a letter for the second board. I was told I am a legend in my old squadron and tales are being told of how I played by their rules and won. Do it. The letter is due in November. It is completely different if you are selected for major and then decline. You must not get selected, and a letter is a good way to do that. Here's something like the memo I wrote: MEMORANDUM FOR RECORD FROM: Capt Cool Dude SUBJECT: Non-Consideration For Promotion to Major 1. I do not wish to be considered for promotion to the rank of Major for board ABCDEFG123. 2. I fully understand the consequences described in AFI36-3207 and AFI36-2501 that will result from not being selected for promotion to Major a second time. 3. For questions regarding this memorandum, please feel free to contact my Executive Officers at DSN 123-4566 or lameGuys@us.af.mil. Signature block Ping me if you have questions. Tell your friends and anyone else that wants out early. I have zero regrets. We could have a recession tomorrow and I could get furloughed. Zero regrets would still exist.

We don’t live in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia, etc, Raise your standards.

So is no one in the US poor because we are comparing ourselves to the world's population now?

You bring up a fair point but that’s not really what I was getting at. The mentality that the other side of the aisle is my/the nation’s enemy is a much more common conservative talking point than it is liberal one, evidenced by the fact that you constantly hear about things like civil war from conservative media. I don’t think I’ve ever heard the left leaning sources bring that kind of thing up except to point out the sentiment on the right. That thought process is scarily destructive to our country IMO. Your point that conservative voices and ideas are suppressed by the “mainstream” media has some merit. I think there was a pretty strong argument for that for many years. It eventually led to conservative talk radio programs with folks like Rush Limbaugh, and ultimately, to networks like Fox News. These outlets like to harp on the idea that they’re the underdogs who tell you the things the mainstream won’t, but the reality is that they’ve become mainstream in their own right. Fox News commands the biggest audience on television and has recently spent a not insignificant time in court admitting they lie to their viewers to keep them tuning in. Not saying that’s necessarily different from any other network, but the idea that anyone has the power to suppress stories in this day and age is misleading at best. Conservative media suppresses the stories its users don’t want to hear & vice versa with liberal outlets. The problem isn’t the media, it’s us. These networks are giving the American people exactly what they want, whether that’s the constant drumbeat of Trump indictments, or painting every place with a Democrat in charge to look like an apocalyptic wasteland. We, the American public eat that shit up. Not sure what the answer is but I’m pretty sure it starts with us becoming more savvy consumers of media and recognizing the difference between information and entertainment.

I think you’d find a large percentage of conservative minded ppl that would vehemently disagree which side the larger cacophony is originating from. Copy, they’d believe that because they’re biased too. However, the amount of silencing of conservative viewpoints via social media platforms, news media, and print journalism is a very polarizing issue. Political pundits and journalists labeling anyone non-progressive as a bigot seems to usually be exclaimed quite loudly. Do you think this viewpoint from the right has any basis in fact? Are conservatives over-exaggerating what they feel as a concerted effort by progressives to demonize them, or are they just trying to rile up their base?

Nashville is not a urban cesspool with a large crime problem because the sanity of the surrounding Republican/conservative population won't let it. Where leftists and liberal idiots have been allowed free rein in deep blue states, chaos and misery has embedded into the cities. 500,000 people have bailed out of California, IIRC. Google population decline in blue states for better numbers. Claiming to be blind to facts or making false comparisons certainly won't improve the life of anyone too poor to run away from those bad policies. But hey, keep voting for those policies, I'm sure something different will eventually result.

Citizenship for service. Absolutely great fucking idea. The USA is founded on the best ideas and socio-political philosophies humans produced, but the crippling flaw is free citizenship. A selfish spoiled trust fund baby, a criminal on welfare, and a wounded vet who works full time all have equal voice in selecting future leaders & laws of our land. Not optimal. you sound like a white supremacist transphobe. Take 4 COVID shots and one online queer-theory class before signing up for monthly BLM donations to absolve yourself of sin.

Bummer. A lot of good dudes flew for the 66th.

If you’re mature enough to pour yourself a bowl of Golden Grahams, then you’re more than capable of making life altering choices. Come on man.

Getting dinner in San Francisco is not exactly the same thing as living in San Francisco. Whether it's homelessness, the Exodus of retail (Nordstroms was the most recent), or the phenomenal incidents of vehicle break-ins, "awesome" does not describe San Francisco. Your cartoonish denial of reality is usually a bit less obvious, but not here. However, it does quite nicely demonstrate the arrogance of your political philosophy. I had fun there once, so why are so many people complaining?

Values? Hookers and blow brother. That’s why I’m hoping Hunter will be appointed as his dad’s successor by the Pentaverate when old Joe inevitably dies in a couple years. 🤣 🍻

I highly recommend “What is a Woman?” which can be found on Twitter searching for The Daily Wire. Pretty scary stuff and even scarier that the children are being indoctrinated with this stuff. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

In the eternally prophetic words of Saint George of Carlin:

You’ll be crew plane only but no one in your follow on community will hold it against you.

So fucking true.

That doesn’t directly reflect on your ability to be a good pilot, just the unique pressures and requirements of flying fighters isn’t your thing, and that’s OK. I’ve recommended to leadership twice in my career an individual needs to stop flying fighters, and they were removed without FEB (post-MQT mind you). They’re doing fine, including one flying for a major. I’ve flown with a lot of pilots (either outside the AF or as an observer in their mil aircraft) who are great pilots, and also with fighter pilots who would die in a GA airplane if I wasn’t with them. The aircraft type you fly doesn’t immediately define the quality of pilot you are (good or bad).

Yeah, you're not wrong. I fall into the "I don't know shit about investing" category. But... mainly on other airline websites... I read posts where pilots get on their high horse and admonish other pilots for their "need" to have an 85 hour month. Or they bad mouth this and that, and tell us how smart they are for doing X or Y. And if it works for them, I'm happy for them. But lecturing others is poor form. Some pilots are living on the edge of their finances because they are taking care of a parent suffering from dementia... or devoting their efforts to a special needs child... or dealing with a painful and costly divorce. Some have sick spouses that require treatments that exhaust life savings. Life is tough for many people. And before someone starts pontificating on how other pilots should be saving for college and how they should be more careful with their money... then they should stop... give thanks to God that they are not in a bad situation... and simply pray that others can find a way to become financially secure. Frankly, no financial advice given on this forum is going to make a difference. As such... I will shut my fucking piehole before I offer my less-than-sage wisdom on the subject.