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Tonka

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Everything posted by Tonka

  1. Thanks, I'm starting to figure it out. Since I am receiving payment via a W-9 do I have to pre-pay tax each quarter? Even if I plan on spending most of what I receive on Business expenses (thus deducting them) throughout the year that won't reduce my tax liability for Social Security, correct? and thus require a pre-pay? Any big gotchas between: actual money accounting or accrued money accounting... as long as I reduce my account below $400 each year on 31 Dec I should be good with actual? I looked into LegalZoom, I am a little wary of that type of impersonal relationship... especially if I don't exactly fit the cookie cutter mold.
  2. I've been earning some part time money (received via a W-9) and I really do not want to pay a lot of tax on it. While I know my current arrangement won't last for too long, I figured more opportunities will eventually surface and, even if not, I might as well incorporate the family name so I can deduct business expenses for the foreseeable future. 1) I would love to hire a CPA to set it all up. Any good advice for pitfalls, expectations? What can I expect cost wise? 2) Since I seem to move every 1.2 years, does it matter what state I use to register the name? Can I just choose one to avoid state income tax? Do I have to have an address there. 3) Sole Proprietor, LLC, or what? Anything better for veterans? I'm not looking to get very complicated, just something to knock the tax sting down a little bit... and help/advice/direction would be perfect. Couldn't find anything on this topic in the archives... Appreciate it.
  3. Well there was this one guy... He tried that, but was getting a recurring instrument/qual at the same time (2 evaluators, 1 AF, 1 FAA) i don't think the AF evaluator was to keen on having another evaluator on board... Gave the dude a Q3 for whatever reason and the FAA evaluator had no choice but to follow suit, even though he really wasn't familiar with the aircraft.
  4. Weird trajectory. Kept the speed pretty constant throughout. To the crew, family and friends!
  5. What's the class size these days? Breakdown of #s?
  6. I get it, it makes $$ sense with our current technology, but their has got to be a better technological advance around the corner. It's like driving a truck while pulling an airplane down the runway because it's cheaper to drive the truck for 6000 feet. If there is driving need to make this financially viable there is a driving need to find a better technology. I'd still go fly it and be happy doing it...
  7. Tonka

    Edwards AFB

    Bump... everything about the same out west? Whats the best place for K-8 schools?
  8. What's the expected dress code for taking the ATP check ride? I assume green pajamas are tacky?
  9. Boeing, then SpaceX will take astronauts to space in 2017... well let's at least hope "by the end of this decade." Granted this announcement was actually made awhile ago, the competition was challenged by Sierra Nevada but confirmed today. Also, Boeing will send up one of their own test pilots, perhaps entering a new civilian astronaut corps... we can only hope. http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/26/7916125/nasa-spacex-boeing-commercial-crew-program
  10. Half in jest at the countless pallets of water bottles i remember moving. No not everything can go on a boat, but many things don't have to be there yesterday. I won't derail the thread anymore.
  11. I can solve the 11M manning problem. Put everything on boats, and stop unnecessary air refuelings for the sake of 3 hour ground times; will probably save at least $500 mil to boot... We're going to have stop doing things out of convience, we have fighters to buy.
  12. I get it, in fact that is perfect setup for most of the military... It's effective and efficient. However aviation has changed, dramatically, over the past few decades. When we "gen" back up and lose a few airmen and planes in the process, we are no longer talking $100,000 and 5 months training; it is beyond exponentially higher than it was. Nor are we talking the same percentage, we lose one p51 and pilot that is nothing compared to losing one f22 and pilot... Not that I'm belittling the value of a life, I certainly am not, but the effect on our militaries ability to wage war is dramatically decreased with respect to the loss of the latter. They are truly irreplaceable. If we were really serious about reducing mishaps, pilot training would be completely different. From UPT, to initial, to continuation, we would have triple the number of sims, they would all be connected, scenarios would be random, difficult, challenging, you would fly it until you could recognize and react flawlessly. You would train, continually. Exercises would be tough, failures would be common. Flying hours would be abundant. We keep saying that we can never eliminate the human element, but we really haven't scratched the surface with respect to training aviators as best we can. What if we lost a missile crew, missile, and war head 5-6 times of year, do you think we would nonchalantly sit back and say, "that's the cost of having missiles." I will just never understand why losses are so acceptable in aviation... I'll go out on a limb and say, with a few exceptions (fatigue, depression, altered mental state, impromptu air show, etc...), anytime we use a human factor code or label it "pilot error" we are masking the problem and therefore the solution. It is so much easier and cheaper to blame an individual rather than fix the system that produced him.
  13. I really don't think so, it might come at a tremendous cost but we could reduce our mishap rate to a fraction of what they are now and eliminate "crashes" (from a HF cause). The reason we typically don't have that vision is because me make dudes IPs at like 5 hours of flying time, and the more we watch each other screw up the more we believe...well, pilots just do dumb stuff from time to time. We have to got to change that mindset, that's not normal. Not sure of the answer, but how many of the mishaps involving spacecraft cite the crew on board as causal? I bet the percentage is dramatically lower then the military mishaps rate in the same category. If true then maybe we can better eliminate those category of mishaps by finding out what NASA does.... Would you admit that most people see Astronauts as infallible when compared to military pilots? Do you really think they are super human, comparably? No... the difference is they focus solely on their mission and they train their freaking arse off to cover every possible scenario down pat, so when the fit hits the shan they react the right way... They are no smarter than us In that sense, the subconscious reacts the way it is trained to. If we don't train it to that level you get freaking great Christmas parties planned but bent metal too. Go watch "how it's made" where the dude is sewing a shoe together, I bet he makes a million flawless shoes every year with a high school education. Because he's done it so much he can recognize a problem in the thread or leather that will affect a shoe 5shoes from now. What we do is really no different in principle, we just don't get dudes 10,000 hours to recognize problems before the exist. Yes I just compared flying with shoe making. If we gave dudes 10,000 hours before making them A-codes we would be some awesome shoe makers.
  14. Well that "problem" equates to people's lives, careers, and families. I'm sure that is not what you meant, but let's not miss the bigger picture... The military person (99% of them) is (are) not to blame, yet is feeling a dramatic share of the pain because we can't or won't cut the programs we need to. How about we pretend like we care about physical fitness, and physically-fitness-assess people right on out the door. Why don't we just not offer continuation like we've always done, but show that we care by releasing a memo suggesting it's possible. It isn't fair to keep changing the requirements to keep your job because we can't manage personnel numbers farther out then the next VML.
  15. Premise 3 is false, We know the problems: read just about any thread in these here forums to find them, categorizing into human factors code is as useless as categorizing your dogs shit color when he drops a turd on the carpet... It's a secondary/tertiary effect that makes for pretty charts but does nothing to address what the problem is or how to solve it. You want to fix aviation, at least military aviation, you make it your only priority and make sure, absolutely, nothing else matters. We'll stop crashing airplanes when get back into the business of flying them.
  16. Ugh... That's pretty shitty, all around. Gives new meaning to dropping bombs, explosive diarrhea, shit hole...
  17. I've always wondered, by the way, which one's pink...
  18. Retired aviators that return as GS provide an incredible cost savings to the government, amazing continuity during military turnover, and incredible learning experiences for those military flyers (not only medical, but they meet the same flying standards as well)... I would suggest we could actually expand their role in many state side flying billets and be much better off because of it. I have no doubt that Matt was an accomplished aviator and his role as GS did not impact this tragedy. Him him.
  19. So they unlocked it in anticipation of commanding it to feather, but it feathered without the pilot commanding it?
  20. "One of our competitors, Orbital Sciences, has a contract to resupply the International Space Station, and their rocket honestly sounds like the punch line to a joke. It uses Russian rocket engines that were made in the 60s. I dont mean their design is from the 60sI mean they start with engines that were literally made in the 60s and, like, packed away in Siberia somewhere." -Musk in 2012 wired interview
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