Lord Ratner

February 10

6 hours ago, HeloDude said:

Once again, this is a good thing. Now maybe more people who support this guy and their nonsense will wake up. Maybe.

I'd bet dollars to donuts that this guy thinks cutting services will somehow cause his constituents to apply national level pressure to Texas to stop the flow.

Of course it won't work that way, but I think a lot of people are gradually coming around to the realization that we have been electing sociopathic clowns to all positions of power for quite a while now. Legitimately, these are people who are exceptionally good actors, matched only by their exceptionally weak intellects.

February 10

20 hours ago, General Chang said:

3 words: SERVICE BEFORE SELF.

I knew it was coming, but it's still a thrill 🤣😂

February 9

3 hours ago, ClearedHot said:

The scenario quietly playing in the background, and the one that scares me the most...

Dems get to the Convention and Michelle comes sweeping in to save the day. Maybe then she could finally be proud of her country.

I just don't see a path to victory for her. Obviously all the Democrats vote for her, though I don't think she will stir up much enthusiasm amongst the moderate or Union Democrats. Obviously the Republicans won't vote for her, but she'll probably do a decent job boosting Republican turnout a bit.

But the but the independent voters? Does she really pull them? Trump doesn't, though he'll do better with the spiraling immigration situation. But Hillary Clinton at least worked as a politician before running for president, Michelle Obama will purely be a president's wife running to be president. I don't know.

But I think the bigger issue is that if she runs, there's no chance of getting RFK Jr out of the race, and I think he will harvest millions of votes from Democrats who don't just want to vote for the wife of a politician.

You may have noticed that there is almost a complete media blackout of RFK Jr. They do not want anyone to realize he's still running.

February 9

17 minutes ago, gearhog said:

I can't believe this interview is allowed on Western media outlets. Just a few quick thoughts.

1. Tucker was cringe. His trademark giggle seems fake and it was almost as if he was fawning over Putin. He just let Putin ramble for 15 minutes at a time.

2. Putin took the first 30 minutes to give a 1000 year dissertation in ancient Russian history. Tucker tried interject and get the interview back on track multiple times. No one wants to hear all that. We all want to hear the recent relevant highlights while Putin apparently thinks and talks in encyclopedias. It's called "History" because it's over. It has nothing to do with the current situation.

3. Putin kept baselessly claiming NATO was expanding, that we provoked a coup in 2014, and the Donbass separatists were being bombed. And Neo-Nazis? Is he being serious? Sounded like a lunatic.

4. For being the head of the Russia state, every time he was asked about his assessment of the actions or rationale of the US, his answer would be something to the effect of "I don't know what the hell they're doing. It makes no sense." How can someone in his position be this perplexed by our strategies and methods?

5. Putin said he had neither the capability or intentions to invade Europe. Which is what anyone would say before they did just that.

6. He did mention that we should be more concerned by the massive invasion of our southern border and our unsustainable debt, which he might have a fair point.

7. He said he was willing to negotiate a settlement, but then said he refused to call Biden, contradicting himself.

8. Tucker tried to get him to release a US journalist and he refused, and claimed he was a spy.

Overall, it was thinly disguised Pro-Russian and Pro-Putin propaganda. Do not watch.

I have always thought that Tucker Carlson has an excellent record on domestic issues and a nearly perfect streak of getting international issues dead wrong.

February 9

50 minutes ago, BashiChuni said:

i think the democratic establishment is setting biden up to step aside

1) no way the special counsel was allowed to write those damning words about bidens age without strategic messaging from democratic strategists. it would have been LESS damaging if they had simply charged him. instead they unequivocally said he is not mentally competent to stand trial. huge blow during an election year.

2) biden took off the cuff WH press corps questions for the first time since? i can't remember the last time he took un-scripted questions. biden has been held on a very tight leash by his political handlers....it doesn't make sense that on the worst day of his reelection campaign so far they let him speak AND answer press questions. doesn't make sense AT ALL.

3) NBC and CNN WH correspondents were asking openly hostile questions about his age. those networks have not done that during his presidency. they usually ask pre-scripted softball questions. not this time. and as the twitter files have demonstrated there are numerous connections from political strategists to the press. these questions are not asked without explicit permission from the party power brokers & news chiefs. those press corps reporters would be replaced on the spot if they weren't towing the company guidance IRT tough questions.

4) Biden is clearly not mentally capable to be president. it's becoming too obvious to hide. he called the president of egypt the president of mexico in his presser. the democratic power players are starting to get nervous that the dam of bidens incoherent faculties is starting to fracture, and not even the most powerful media spin playbook is capable of sweeping it under the rug anymore.

i don't think he makes it to election day.

Yeah but did they wait too long? They know Kamala Harris is a guaranteed loss. Do they have time at this point to run a primary? I don't really know how it works this late in the game. If Biden is out then it seems like zero chance they are able to rein in Robert Kennedy, and I think if he's running as an independent the Democrats are in a Ross Perot scenario, also guaranteed to lose.

February 8

8 hours ago, SocialD said:

Only the best Charlottesville has to offer! Lol, when I was on the WB, I used to hate on my plane flying to the 'burgs & villes," but now they're going to have to shut this thing down to get me to leave lol. I'll take my MSN layover over AMS any day because I wont be dead tired walking around...I just gotta bring my sunglasses.

Speaking of fight club. Anyone see that Delta clown at the Transportation Committee Hearing? The memes generated from this goober are hilarious! BTW, if you didn't know, Mr Nehls has a 63 year old Delta pilot brother. He's one of the reasons it's made it this far. I didn't watch the hearing to know if this flexing pilot is him or not.

O'Doyle Rulz!

I'm sure his head will explode when he finds out that a lot of us don't think anyone over the age of 65 should be allowed to serve in Congress or the executive branch either.

February 8

3 hours ago, SurelySerious said:

Yeah…but it shouldn’t be on without visible moisture or a contaminated surface, so this damage occurs outside of proper system operation. Not a real shocker.

2 hours ago, HossHarris said:

Yup. Nobody ever forgets to turn it off ….

Lol, exactly. Forgetting to turn off the anti-ice for 5 minutes and you get a total engine failure? That's the definition of a "real shocker."

February 8

14 hours ago, Spoo said:

You may have found it humorous, the rest of us were terrified. I still have no idea why Big Blue thought it was a good idea to bring back a UPT 65-14 grad.

Until I flew with Huggy I had no idea that we even had pilot training in 1865. His class patch was printed on papyrus...

February 7

1 hour ago, SocialD said:

Not sure what year that was, but I was a Capt, 4-ship flight lead in 2012 when orders dried up for a bit. I went to a regional to pickup some hours because, even with my 700 hours prior to UPT, I was still shy of legacy requirements (not that they were really hiring). Starting pay was $19/hr with a 72 hour guarantee. With the staffing levels we had at the time, there was no way to make extra cash. Second year pay was something like $30/hr...$25k/yr. I think Captains we're lucky to get in teh $60s...really living large lol. But none of those dudes seem care about those years, because you're making good money right now and it didn't happen when you were at Delta. Never gonna be another down turn or black swan event!

This was 2010 and 2012. Same.

I fly with a lot of captains who spent 10-20 years making those crap wages. Seems like they all thought they'd be at the regionals for a year or two, so they didn't care what the pay was, but then everything went to hell and suddenly it mattered.

Personally I think the regionals are going to get swallowed into the legacy airlines if we don't get a slowdown soon. The huge benefit to the corporations of lower pay is dead, and if you get your regional pilots on to the mainline seniority list sooner, it makes it much less likely they will jump ship. The aircraft are also getting bigger and bigger, and in many cases are operating with fewer installed seats due to contractual limitations with the mainline pilot contracts. Suck the regionals into mainline and those limitations go away.

But whatever makes the least sense is what will happen.

February 7

Bottom line, the airlines made being a pilot absolute dog shit for anybody who had to go through the regionals before making it to a legacy carrier. They took advantage of deregulation, mergers, and bankruptcies to rape and pillage the pilot pipeline for years. They did such a good job taking advantage of the regional pilots that everybody told their friends and family to pursue other careers.

I remember when I was a FAIP having the regional pilots show up and talk about how they had to join the guard because they couldn't live off of $15,000 a year anymore. Absolutely insane that someone flying dozens/hundreds of people around the country everyday would be making that type of wage.

So now we get the crocodile tears from the airlines about how there aren't enough pilots in the pipeline, and how unfortunate it is they have to pay the regionals so much money now to keep them from jumping ship. Fuck these guys. They took on billions of dollars of debt so they could buy back shares and bump their share-based compensation a few pennies each quarter, and they have the audacity to cry to us about manning and compensation.

The 1500 hour requirement was put into place because of aviation mishaps and a reassessment of what is required to operate in the modern airspace. Absolutely nothing in that regard has changed, so neither should the experience requirements.

If we keep rewarding these shitty executives by letting them run to the government to solve their self-induced problems, we're just going to get the same behavior over and over again.

February 6

3 minutes ago, Danger41 said:

During a recent trip to the shitter, I looked into this and was surprised to see ALPA thinks this is bad. Why would they do that? Isn't their motivation to get their members more money/better QOL/better work rules?

Yes. And there are far more members under 63-64 who are against this than those in favor. Many remember the stagnation caused by the previous increase. And it removes leverage.

February 6

I will support age 60-whatever when there is meaningful testing that filters out pilots.

Too fat? Bye. Can't handle *complex* surprise EPs in the sim? Bye. Can't pass a real medical exam from a random AME? Bye. Comparative cognitive testing from your previous attempts shows a decline? Bye. And not just for 65+, all pilots.

But right now this is about guys who aren't ready for retirement, many of whom are convinced their particular struggles make them uniquely deserving, wanting more.

My ability to retire early is affected by how soon others retire. So if the 65+ crowd can make a financial-based argument, so can I. But mostly I'm just tired of the Baby Boomers upending every system for their financial advantage then acting shocked that other generations don't appreciate being left the tattered ruins of a once functional societal pact.

February 5

3 hours ago, FourFans said:

What ever happened to the US's stance of "If you start a fight with me, I'll finish it" ???

Seriously.

Now it's "please don't start a fight...please please please please...ok fine I have enough dead Americans now and my populace is rather pissed...I'll strike something NEAR you, please don't hurt me"

This weak dick foreign policy needs to go.

It's not going anywhere. The population is more interested in what they can get from the government, and they will elect politicians based on it. Neither Trump or Biden claim any intention of fixing the deficit caused by these giveaways.

Any threat to global stability is a threat to the governments' ability to continue the domestic handouts, so they will keep their head in the sand. Ironically, the obsession with short-term stability is going to guarantee the deterioration of conditions long-term.

February 4

6 hours ago, arg said:

I don't think SNL is as funny as it was in years past but I chuckled at this.

He's one of my favorite comedians

February 4

7 hours ago, ClearedHot said:

Thread revival...

Given the recent lack of blots panel blow out issue a lot of folks are leery to fly the max. I saw this a couple of hours ago on a Delta form, anyone on the line have validation or an update?

"Update from second leg on Max9 aircraft: Well folks stuck here on the ground at DEN in a max9 we pushed back then the aircraft lost power and emergency power came on. Captain came on a few minutes later and said that 17 other aircraft are experiencing the same issue. A value in the APU is freezing over and not allowing the engines to start. The current temp on the ground is 36 degrees. I think it’s another issue with Boeing possibly? Waiting on a tug to get back to the gate. The flight attendant told the group of us in the back that he’s never heard of this happening nor has experienced it."

Depending on exactly what the problem was, I've had this happen before. Tried to spin up the engines and it only got to ~13% before stalling out. We couldn't figure it out, and then the plane next to us reports the same problem. And then the plane next to them, and so on.

Turns out the planes were angled such that the freezing rain froze the valve that controls air intake to the Apu. But only the planes that were lined up in the same direction.

The solution was to shut down the APU and let the heat from the APU radiate outward and unfreeze the valve, but that required external power and by that point DFW was a circus. Eventually they called freezing rain in the METAR and just closed the airport for the night.

February 2

26 minutes ago, brabus said:

Still risky because now we’re assuming savings accounts paying > 2.99% will exist for the next 5 years (assuming that’s the USAA loan term). Savings accounts could be paying max of .5% in 2 years for all we know (or maybe not, but point is nobody knows). But it’s kind of a moot argument anyways, because even a 2LT can afford a $450 payment, unless they have specific, negative financial circumstances out of their control. So assuming he can pay the $450 out of the paycheck, he’ll make way more money over time doing something other than a savings account.

I know you're just trying to make a point, but you're wrong here. In that scenario you could just pay off the loan early. Zero risk.

Like I said, it's been so long since the Fed wasn't fucking around with artificially low interest rates that we have forgotten how a market acts in time of limited liquidity.

February 2

26 minutes ago, brabus said:

Have you tried talon grips? I put the rubber version on mine and really like them. Cheap and easy to install. No issue against bare skin when IWB carrying.

No, I haven't. I'll keep them in mind if I decide to try carrying a Glock, but I've been really happy with the Sig P365X so far.

Though I might just try them on my G17 for the range. Thanks for the tip

February 2

5 hours ago, brabus said:

Glocks are great guns - simple, accurate and dependable as fuck. Their only crime is bland looks, but I don’t give a shit about that, especially on “purpose-driven” guns. Range toys are for fucking around with fancy shit.

And if you can’t stand stock, a trigger, sights, barrels, springs, etc. are not expensive, easy to find, and easy to replace. I had a buddy give me shit once because I “had to” replace the trigger on my glocks, so that’s why they suck. Even with that and a aftermarket barrel on that particular Glock, I was still less money in than his malfunction trainer…I mean Kimber.

I never understood the obsession with 1911s. They are gorgeous, and I have one, but every time someone tells me they carry one I have to question their thought process. Ancient tech, low capacity, and a super light trigger pull. Just doesn't make sense to me for most realistic use scenarios.

They are thin, so I guess that counts for something, but it's not like it's a small gun.

Glocks are fucking hideous, and I don't love the grips, but it's a phenomenal weapon for actual use.

Edit: Obviously I'm assuming your friend is using a Kimber 1911.. That's all I ever see from them.

February 2

2 hours ago, brabus said:

Copy leveraged vs. not. If he can’t afford/doesn’t want to pay the monthly back to USAA from his AF paycheck, then he shouldn’t be taking this loan at all, for anything. So with the assumption that he’s not retarded enough to take out a loan he can’t pay back from his primary income source, he’s been given lots of good ideas.

That's not true at all. If he can't afford to make the payments back of he loses it, for whatever reason, then his original idea is financially sound. Take the loan, put it into a high-yield savings account, and then pay the loan off using the savings account.

February 2

10 hours ago, mcbush said:

Lump sum investing beats dollar cost averaging about two thirds of the time. There are a ton of studies on this... see, for example, this one from Vanguard.

That's great, but useless to an individual. Would you risk your financial stability on a one-time bet with a 33% chance you lose?

For personal funds, sure, for leveraged investing that's a different story.

10 hours ago, mcbush said:

Let me ask you this: would you be willing to loan me money at 2.99% if I told you I were going to invest it in the broad market? If not, what interest rate would you charge me to make that risk/benefit math worth it to you? I understand that it depends on the length of the loan, but what's your ballpark?

I would do it exactly how the investment firms do it. https://www.fidelity.com/trading/margin-loans/margin-rates

So around 9-12% with the option to liquidate your collateral if your losses put my funds at risk.

If the loan is restricted to only market index funds, then maybe that drops to Fed Funds Rate + 3 (so about 8.5%), but again, only if I have the option to liquidate your collateral if the investments decline towards a loss.

February 2

1 hour ago, nunya said:

Gents, before this gets derailed too far, @Lord Ratner's point is not invalid. He's assuming you will pay the loan payments with the loan capital. Everyone else is assuming you pay the loan back with fresh paycheck money.

I'm in the latter camp because I think even as an Lt, you should be able to scrape together $450 from your paycheck and let the loan money sit for the long term untouched. You shouldn't NEED that loan capital to pay the loan payments. It should be locked away somewhere (i.e. 2x maxed Roths + the rest in a brokerage account, although I'm more of a VTSAX man, myself).

If you will NEED the loan capital to make the loan payments, then yes, put it in HY savings and make a few dollars on the difference.

Finally. You guys really haven't been paying attention to financial history for the last 20 years of you can't differentiate between investments with loaned money and investments with personal cash. Hell, we literally had the worst/second worst banking failure in American history happen less than a year ago, and all because the risk managers at the 4 banks invested borrowed money into what they were positive were highly safe assets. Until they weren't after a 40 year bond bull rally.

Leverage is always a completely different game. If you don't understand that, you have no business telling anybody what they should do with their money.

And anybody under the age of about 40-45 has never invested in a normalized interest rate environment. Absolutely everything has changed now that we are no longer in the era of ZIRP/NIRP. Just look at what is happening to commercial real estate, another "sure thing."

The cadet should absolutely dump his personal money into whatever investment vehicles he wants to, but investing with leverage is a dangerous game. It should not be done by anyone who assesses the viability of financial instruments simply by looking at the chart brabus posted.

February 1

1 hour ago, brabus said:

@Lord Ratner What? He’s young and should get started on long term investment. Now is absolutely the time to put money in things like a SP500 index. A simple index will massively outperform his 2.99% debt. It’s also lower risk than buying individual stocks. Your advice to not do that is either retarded or you’re assuming he wants to cash out the hypothetical investment in a few years. If it’s the latter, I see that point, but also cashing out in a few years is exactly the opposite of smart long term investing.

I DGAF about 2008, and the simple reason is I didn’t lose my mind and pull out all my investments. I now have tons of gains from the very money I “lost” in that time period. If I was 60 at the time, it would have been different, but I was in my 20s with tons of time to wait it out. Buy early, buy often, have patience and emotional control = all someone needs to do in their 20s to build a solid base for retirement.

It's not his money, it's the bank's money. If we need to go back to the basics of investing then step one is knowing who's money you're playing with.

There is a cataclysmic difference between dollar cost averaging, which is a good strategy for index investing, and dumping most of your (the bank's) money into something that historically has very large moves in the negative direction on its way up.

On 1/29/2024 at 12:38 AM, brabus said:

Dump it into a SP500 index fund

Anyone who dumped money into the market back in 2000 or 2007 took years just to get back to even. Those who dollar cost averaged did much, much better.

The same uniformed amateur financial advisors who recommended everybody buy a house at their PCS location "because housing never goes down" put a lot of people into some serious debt when '08 '09 came around. That's all well and good when it's your money to lose, but when it's the bank's money it's a very different game.

1 hour ago, brabus said:

A simple index will massively outperform his 2.99% debt. It’s also lower risk than buying individual stocks.

It may seem obvious to you that this statement has a gigantic caveat, but it might not to the cadet asking for financial advice. Better advice: " A simple index fund historically outperforms 2.99%. however that is a running average and varies dramatically based on the starting and ending points of the investment. Dollar cost averaging will help you avoid these wild fluctuations and take advantage of the long-term trend upward, so don't dump your money into an investment all at once, ever."

If that's what you meant, great. But it certainly wasn't obvious from your post.

February 1

On 1/29/2024 at 12:38 AM, brabus said:

Dump it into a SP500 index fund and never log in to check on it, ever, no matter what. You’ll be glad you did.

On 1/29/2024 at 4:28 AM, StrikeOut312 said:

Throw it in something that’ll have a better rate of return than the high yield. Max your Roth IRA this year too.

Any SP500 index should be solid.

Don't do this.

The guys who did this in early 2000, and the ones who bought houses at their PCS locations in 2006/2007 got their dicks kicked. "It can only go up."

Now, if you already have much more than 25k (let's say $100k or more) in investments and can afford a 50% haircut on the 25k, then go for it. Otherwise:

Stick with your plan (or better, put it directly into T-bills with higher yields)

Or

If you want to put it into the SP500 (or other "unsafe" assets), put 1k per month in over the course of the next two years, keeping the rest in the HYSA as you dollar cost average your way into the market.

The stock market over time trends upwards. But in the short term it's a casino. I have most of my money in it, so I'm not just a paranoid gold hoarder, but you definitely shouldn't be dropping huge percentages of your wealth in when you have a deadline for repayment. The dudes who put their money into the NASDAQ at the peak in 2000 took fifteen years to break even. Same duration for the Vegas housing market to surpass the 2006 peak.

January 27

5 hours ago, HeloDude said:

So in the end, someone believes the system is working as intended or it’s not…it’s clear that the left doesn’t believe it is, so at what point does the right follow suit in their own way when they believe it’s harming the country?

Someone is going to win the culture war. And at the end of that process, they will have to have a system to support. What exactly is the conservative-right defending if they decide that the rule of law isn't a rule at all?

Disregarding the supreme court *is* happening the country. It's one thing to adopt legal strategies to defeat the left at their own game. It's another to claim that the problem with the left is their disregard for the law of the land, so we need to disregard the law of the land to beat them.

This is the most conservative supreme court in generations. If you lose a case with them deciding, then perhaps your strategy isn't going to be great for the long-term survival of the American system.

January 26

It does no good for conservatives to delegitemize the Supreme Court. You think ACB is rooting for the Democrats? The Supreme Court is how conservatives are going to fix many of the problems we have. Throwing a tantrum when they force you to find a better strategy that aligns with the constitution is a short sighted and stupid plan. I hope Abbott doesn't dick this one up.

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Posts posted by Lord Ratner