ViperMan

Yes, it is virus theater - we either don't know exactly what to do, or we do know exactly what to do but it's so hard that we can't do it. Instead we all collectively play make-believe that wearing a mask while you transit a restaurant is doing something will have an effect. It won't, and newsflash - it isn't. COVID is raging right now and I literally do not see anyone not wearing a mask while I'm out. I've eaten in restaurants weekly since COVID began - no issue. That's not to say I don't take it seriously or that I don't think we should wear masks, but to say there is no "theatrical" component to this whole thing is to be denying reality.

I wonder if the Third Reich would have been successful if the internet existed back then. 🤔

False choice. The threat is anytime your perception doesn't match or correspond with reality.

If incognito doesn't work, disable javascript - there's a chrome extension. Works like a charm on NYT. $0 spent.

I was mostly referring to the displacement of basic job competency and it's replacement with "leadership" that has occurred throughout all levels of our society - including the Air Force. Good leaders can be many different things - one thing they ALL must be is extremely competent in their basic job responsibilities. I think there are valid complaints throughout the AF that such a reversal of priorities has taken place. I fully support the notion that EQ and people matter and agree that there is a mindset of "hacking the mish is all that matters" is sometimes used to disparage all the "queep" that exists in the AF. Some of that is justified, but it is usually used to justify laziness or neglecting other important shit. That doesn't mean leadership is more important than basic job ability. Cynical? Myopic? Ok. Sure. Do you have a counter argument? Or are Clark Griswold quotes valid for kills in this debrief now? My test for racism is swapping some of the variables and seeing what it looks like. Donald Trump saying he's only going to hire straight, white males is the same thing as Joe Biden saying he's going to only hire a woman of "color." One of those gets a pass (nay, applause) - one most certainly doesn't. Undergirding both of those different (but same) statements is the tacit argument that those immutable characteristics provide value in a place where the other person cannot. i.e. it values man over woman, or white over black, or woman over black, or black over white. No one I know is comfortable making that argument. If they're put to the task, some sort of hand-waving like "representation" comes out, but that just shifts the racism to who's being represented...we keep it treetop, but at the end of the day, it's racism. Frankly, none of this (IMO) should even require defense or justification - it should be common ground we all can agree on. California is an example of a democrat monolith that is completely out of control and is trying to do absolutely ridiculous things. I don't live there, either. I just worry about what might come out of there. Wasn't asking you to care about CA, I brought it up to help you see "my" bigger picture and where I'm coming from re: the democrat establishment. To bring it back to the original point, again, I'm much more worried about an empowered democrat establishment that has the entire corporate media complex carrying water for them, as opposed to one singular personality, such as Trump or Obama.

Thanks for the response. First, my broader point is that making an argument about Trump being an outlier, bad-(leader/executive/whatever), or otherwise for firing people isn't a good point. The man fires a lot of people, has fired a lot of people in the past, and will probably fire a lot of people in the future. We knew this before he was president and now we feign surprise? Or use it to make some meta-point about him being X? I just don't think arguments that ignore the context of who someone is really get anywhere - that's what I was trying to get at. Honestly, I have been basically pretty neutral about ALL the presidents I have served under and if I'm being honest, haven't seen that big of a difference between Bush, Obama, and now Trump. My day-to-day has been fairly consistent and IMO not tied to who was in the white house. What I don't like is the hyper focus on personalities that we (meaning smart officers) are exhibiting throughout this tumultuous time. If I could go back four years and examine my opinion about what the impending Trump presidency would have looked like, I would have proved myself 100% correct - which is to say he didn't change all that much. The political and media apparatus was fully united against him and invested in a useless presidency. And low and behold, that's more or less what we've had. So all that is to say I don't worry too much about any one individual, as much as we like to pin the tail on the donkey, some of these problems require more that one person to address. That said, I am extremely concerned about what I see taking place within the democrat party. To your point about leadership, fine, I guess, but I've never been one to drink the AF's koolaid that leadership is a magical panacea for each, every, and all problem. That's a meme, and one that I think infects a lot of peoples' mindset in the AF. What we're missing most, IMO, is job competence and accountability. Are those functions of leadership? I suppose depending on your frame, more or less so. But when we call literally everything a leadership problem, we lose focus on how to solve problems because everything becomes the proverbial nail. Re: MX officers being better able to lead the USAF. This argument is the literal manifestation of "my dick is bigger than yours so I should be in charge." God bless our MX leadership - lord knows I don't want to do it. That said, the size of the organization they've "led" doesn't lead to them knowing the first thing about winning an air war or leading an air campaign. Nope. That's why they're not in charge of the Air Force and also why they should never be in charge of the Air Force. It's also why the type of leadership (or skillset, perhaps) disparaged above is exactly what's required - because it's serves the greater, fundamental purpose of our organization. No matter how many 0700 meetings some O-5/6 spends going over the blotter, they won't ever have the experience garnered only from Red/Green Flag, combat, pilot training, etc. They work a critical piece of the USAF, but it still only serves a supporting role. Finally, about DT's racism. Fine - he's extremely crass and says shitty things. But consider, if you will, that Joe Biden chose a running mate based on two primary factors: a v_gina and dark skin. Which of those (or both) qualifies you to lead the free world? Maybe it wasn't either. Maybe it was her ability to garner peak support of 15%? Maybe it was her ability to drop out of the race when she was teetering at about %1? The point is that the democrats are literally choosing their leadership based on what flavor of ice cream you are - it's not about any ability - let's not kid ourselves. That is racism - any which way you slice it. And it's particularly dangerous because it's "acceptable" - it's disguised. It is all done in order to create the facade of a "diverse coalition" in order to implement whatever bullshit they know they wouldn't be able to get done with white guys at the helm. Their "diversity" is a tool. Consider, if you will, California's most recent attempt to instantiate a racist policy into law (https://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/prop-16-failed-in-california) - thankfully it failed. Consider the numerous other examples from the democrat party wherein they are attempting to do wildly Un-American things (i.e. blanket student debt forgiveness). So while DT may be an incompetent, racist, homophobe and everybody knows it - look at what the "woke" democrat party is trying to do - and they have the media on their side. That worries me a lot more than one Obama or one Trump. Hence, my disillusionment with the hyper-focus one individual.

Shoot, I meant to make my post about the guy being a big deal in another thread - my bad. Also, you forgot to mention he was a community organizer, too. Which, also, makes him a big deal. That is amazing - but we were talking about executive-level decision-making. This is basically the exact corollary to Obama (i.e one who "checks all the boxes" sts) - are you saying the Obamas in the MAF are where they should be?

To be clearer though, you are surprised that a president who was previously a reality TV show host who's tagline was "you're fired" is firing people at an ABOVE AVERAGE rate? You find that surprising? I'm surprised with your surprise. Comparing Trump (who has been an executive for decades) with Obama (who had never been an executive) is not a valid comparison. WTF had Obama led before he became the leader of the free world? Seriously?

To be fair, I don't think we know what the "long term" effects of this are since it's been around < 1 year. What we "know" is speculation.

First, that seat should have worked. The fact that it didn't while it was an "in" envelope ejection is the primary reason this young man lost his life. Second, everything everyone else says about the leadership failing this poor kid from AETC (or above) all the way down through the SOF is correct. We do have major, latent problems on the grill that need immediate intervention. Third, we all need to be able to put a shitty part of a mission behind us and be able to move forward and complete a basic flying task with an otherwise good airplane. If anyone else thinks you're flying a perfect airplane that will work 100% (even a brand new 0.0 hour one), you're high. Step one is to control what is in your power which means #1 maintain aircraft control. Sometimes this means shaking off a up (even one that is not your fault) and focusing on the task at hand and saving your feelings for the debrief. Landing at night is a basic flying task and check rides have meaning. I should be able to clear off a student and trust they can aviate, navigate, and communicate. Some major screw ups all around on this one - which is not confidence-building for our Air Force.

I found your post from August 1st? I have to admit I had never even heard the word monopsony before your post tonight. So with that said, I've spent about 10 minutes thinking about it and I'm not sure who the single buyer for cheap labor is? I feel like there are a great many buyers for cheap labor and only a few buyers for very expensive labor. My gut tells me that it is unavoidable and has been an economic law since before we had a name for it. It just seems to me that as you lower the wage you're willing to work for, the greater the number of potential employers becomes? "Hey I'll work for $10K/hr" vs "I'll work for peanuts." "While the imposition of a minimum wage on a monopsony employer could increase employment and wages at the same time, the possibility is generally regarded as empirically unimportant, given the rarity of cases of monopsony power in labor markets." (https://courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-microeconomics/chapter/monopsony-and-the-minimum-wage/#:~:text=In a competitive market%2C workers,are less than their MRPs.&text=In a monopsony market%2C however,time as it boosts wages!) I must not be understanding something. What am I missing?

My point wasn't that $0/hr was a just minimum wage for actual work. My point was that the unintended consequence of increasing the minimum wage reduces the employment level, thereby leading to layoffs, which in turn, pays $0/hr. You can't employ someone for $15/hr when the value they produce is only worth $10/hr. No website will ever convince me that math is wrong.

It'd be great if everyone could make more money, but honestly, the only thing raising minimum wage does is push current workers (i.e. me) closer to it. It's nice to make a high(er) multiple of the minimum wage - it's dangerous the lower that multiple becomes. Two other things are overlooked with this argument. The first is that the true minimum wage is $0/hr - no matter what anyone says. The second is that the value of someone's hour of labor is not a fixed amount, and in some cases it's actually negative. Minimum wage seems like a "quick fix" because it appears to immediately get you to the desired end-state, but neither of those facts is side-stepped by it, but it sure does play well with a sector of the working class. Not to mention employers simply adapt the number of employees or the number of hours they work. These things always have unavoidable "side-effects." The other major factor (or multiple factors) in reference to wages is deflation. We're all worried about inflation, but ask yourself why the Fed is struggling so hard to get it up (sts). It's because there are MAJOR deflationary forces in operation right now. One is technology - which is hugely deflationary (https://www.zdnet.com/article/unstoppable-tech-driven-deflation-will-be-the-next-economic-challenge/). The second is the aging demographic make-up of our society and the concordant reality that people achieve peak spending at an approximate age of 46, at which time it begins decreasing. The higher the average age of an American becomes, the further from that magic number (46) we'll get, and the harder deflation will bite. In reference to student loans, the moral hazard is extreme (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_hazard). Loaning money is a risky proposition, but at the same time, making good loans is a money-making opportunity. So my question is 'why doesn't the university system back the loans themselves' since they stand to profit from it? Could it be because they don't believe in their own product? The question immediately answers itself. Good loans make money and net positive return. It's because all of the risk has been externalized to the US taxpayer courtesy of the US government. With cost and risk externalized, what incentive is there to not admitting literally everyone? The only long-term solution to this problem is to fully remove the government from the student loan business and allow universities to provide loans to their most promising candidates. As a side-benefit, the positive effect on "X-studies" degrees would be almost instant. The current system is unsustainable. What's in a name? That which we call communism, by any other name would smell just as sour. That said, I do agree that student loan debt is a problem, but if we're going to agree to waive a magic wand and "forgive" debt, then we absolutely do need to address restitution for those guys that are like him: To address the Fed, I agree wholeheartedly. I would only add that we've been overspending for a much longer time than Trump has been in office. Conventional wisdom holds that the Obama years were prosperous, but would you call running up massive credit card debt prosperity when you're unable to pay your bills?

I'm gonna try to answer a few responses at once, coherently. Maybe, but I disagree because I think there is a much more likely explanation: men and women express different preferences in their lives and their choice of profession reflects those (innate) differences (https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/07/160715114739.htm). This is (by far) the reason for the differential outcomes observed in certain professions. Take being a teacher, for example. In elementary and middle school, women make up 80% of the teaching force (https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/07/sunday-review/why-dont-more-men-go-into-teaching.html). In kindergarten they make up 98% (https://slate.com/human-interest/2017/10/a-male-preschool-teacher-reflects-on-the-stigma-keeping-men-out-of-pre-k-classrooms.html). Surely you will agree that there are no barriers preventing men from getting into either of these professions, no? What causes this immense disparity, then? I contend that it is social and biological factors at work. There are numerous other disparate cases as well: nursing, engineering, oil-rig working, construction worker, dental hygienists, and yes, pilots. Taking that, there is a much higher likelihood that that a man wants to become a fighter pilot (or other pilot) than a woman. Maybe it's on the order of 10 times as much. Hence, if you took a random sample of the population (men and women), asking each whether or not they would want to be a fighter pilot, you'd probably wind up with something like 9:1 male:female. Now the interesting part is that about 25% of women (in the general population) are shorter than 5'2". In the military (this is completely anecdotal) they are taller on average. The same is true of my male colleagues. I'm of 100% average male height - yet I'm on the shorter end of the spectrum among F-16 pilots - so we skew taller as a group. Don't ask me for actual data - I don't have it. Look around though and I'm sure you will fairly conclude the same thing. It is likely that people in the military skew taller than average because you generally have to be of better health and athletic ability. So you made a point about women being excluded, but don't forget, there are large numbers of men who are precluded from flying since they are shorter than 5'2", as well. Lessening the height requirement opens the door to all of them, too. Thus, if 10% of those 25%, of say 100 women are now interested in the career, that's a grand total of 2.5 (call it 3) women. And if there are 9x as many guys in that last 1% of short males (those less than 5'2") interested there are going to be 1% X 900 = 9 extra guys eligible as well. So even if you eliminate height requirements completely you are still going to wind up with more men in that last outlier group than you do women. And if you're being fair to both groups, you'll likely wind up with about 4 more males and 1 female pilot if you choose 50%. So this doesn't "solve" the "problem." Finally, please note that absolutely none of this is to say that I think women should be excluded from flying if they want to. I honestly welcome it; I just don't think we should break our backs trying to fix nature. Thank you. This is predictably rolled out as evidence of systemic discrimination against minority groups. The problem is there are groups of whites who are prosecuted at disproportionately higher rates than blacks for different (but equivalent) crimes. See crack vs meth (https://medium.com/@JSlate__/the-myth-of-racist-crack-laws-63d7a7554cae😞 "Moreover, the press almost never mentions the federal methamphetamine-trafficking penalties, which are identical to those for crack. In 2006, the 5,391 sentenced federal meth defendants were 54% white, 39% Hispanic and 2% black. No one calls the federal meth laws anti-Hispanic or anti-white.The press has also served up a massive dose of crack revisionism aimed at proving the racist origins of the war on crack." I agree with you in the sense that it wasn't done as part of a conscientious act to disallow women into certain career fields, but I don't agree that there was any "thought process" that excluded them either. Rather it is the results of the sum total of choices groups of men and women make - which are different. Minorities were more "likely" to be accused because they come from groups that have a higher (background) levels of crime - so that is not a surprise. Since they are not convicted at a higher rate than whites, this means that justice system is fair. To your second point, that is not a problem, though it is framed as such. Innocent men are more likely to be accused than women. Problem? The problem was identified by Slackline (and maybe others, including you), and that is that there are after-effects on one's career even after charges are dropped or the accused comes out clean. That is a problem that can be solved. Here is the study in question: https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/699380.pdf. It says this: "GAO’s analysis of available data found that Black, Hispanic, and male servicemembers were more likely than White or female members to be the subjects of investigations recorded in databases used by the military criminal investigative organizations, and to be tried in general and special courts-martial in all of the military services when controlling for attributes such as rank and education. GAO also found that race and gender were not statistically significant factors in the likelihood of conviction in general and special courts-martial for most services, and minority servicemembers were either less likely to receive a more severe punishment than White servicemembers or there was no difference among racial groups; thus, disparities may be limited to particular stages of the process." What this means is that within the microcosm of the military, different racial groups reflect the same level of background noise (crime) that is present in society. This is completely unsurprising. What would be indicative of systemic bias is if one group, say blacks, was convicted at a much lower rate than whites. This would indicate some sort of command-level animus towards blacks serving in the ranks, with commanders at all levels proffering charges against black members - using the UCMJ as a bludgeon - only to have the military justice system be the final backstop that provides some sort of relief/justice - since they're not convicted at higher rates. But that's not what's happening. In actuality, Blacks, Hispanics, and males commit crimes inside the Air Force at similar rates as those outside the Air Force, and this data shows it.

Completely agree that they're complex issues that require study, and I know everyone here is actually concerned about solving these problems, it's more just a disagreement about what the core problem is, and what the solution should be. I think that when there is such vehement disagreement on what the problem is and what the solutions are, doing something contentious is very risky. Any solution we implement will absolutely require broad (bipartisan) buy in. And actual, no shit, buy in. Not "pretty darn good," high-level hand-waiving buy in.

I didn't say I think blacks are more likely to commit crime than whites - I said the data says they do. Blacks DO commit more crime than whites. My thoughts have NOTHING to do with that, and shouldn't have anything to do with it. It's not about your or my thoughts. The "why" of all this is not up to the Air Force, which is my more pertinent point. We're an organization of about 300,000 people, which is about 1/1000th of the American populace, we're not going to solve the social ills that are part of the larger context we find ourselves in.

My sentiments exactly.

Anthropological standards appears to be fair game, and would be if there was a 50/50 split in who serves in the military, but there isn't. Once we have 50 women fighter pilots for 50 male fighter pilots, then we can talk. That said, I've been in about 5 fighter squadrons over my career and there have been 3 women in them and about 200 men. It ain't some intentional conspiracy as to why ejection seats, etc, were developed for men. All through history, men have been the ones to go to war. Men have been the ones flying fighter aircraft. It was male test subjects volunteering to strap themselves to rocket sleds and test those first ejection seats. Women fulfilling combat roles is brand new. Hence, standards that were implemented reflected the underlying reality that it was men who were going to be the ones flying these airplanes - not that women were being systematically excluded from this opportunity. That said, I agree with you in principle that this is an area that can be adjusted, at present, to make things more "fair" but it doesn't meet the definition of systemic discrimination against a group (women). Discrimination is a conscious determination by an individual that they are going to produce favor for one person to the detriment of another based on the characteristic(s) at hand. On the topic of photos, I agree with you 100%. There is no reason why a photo (or any racial/sex data) should be included as part of a promotion package. In fact, names should probably also be masked so that there is nothing that can be read into when decisions are being made as to who should be promoted. As far as promotion boards are concerned, it is only performance data that is relevant. And more importantly when we implement this little "social" betterment, there is no cost imposed on anyone else - which is not the case with many other social justice initiatives, but should be a necessary condition for any of them to be implemented. As far as mentorship goes, I'm not sure how identifying a generic problem that affects all people somehow disproportionately affects a minority. It's a general problem and sure, one we should be aware of, but it's also taken for granted that it is having a measurable effect on the development and selection of "under" represented people, else, it'd be easy to provide actual examples. But such is the problem with "unconscious" biases; we have to rely on professionals who have received knowledge, and they're the perfect scapegoat for those who want to implement social programs, provide no hard evidence, and then implement whatever program they want. It's an example of the false premise fallacy - you have a valid argument, but one that is demonstrably false. It's precisely why arguments like this are so hard for people to see through. And the danger is that once you give people who have special received wisdom power, you now have a religion. On to military justice, there is one major problem with those articles - they are missing the broader, underlying context. From the stripes article: The unstated assumption in this article is that there should be no inequalities between blacks and whites. That's great, and is an ideal that reflects the desired society which we all hope is someday realized, but it is just not the present reality we live in. I'm sorry. No, the proper framing of the disparity needs to be couched in terms of the broader societal context that we find ourselves a smaller part of. In that reality, blacks commit a grossly disproportionate share of crime (https://www.ojjdp.gov/ojstatbb/crime/ucr.asp?table_in=2 and https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/topic-pages/tables/table-21 and https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-black-americans-commit-crime). The reasons for this we can get to in another thread, but within the context of the articles you provided, the proper question to ask is this: is it surprising that given blacks commit a higher proportion of crime in the broader society, that they also commit a higher proportion of crime within the Air Force? I don't think it is. So good job stars and stripes, you figured out something we already knew. It would be strange had they not found blacks are investigated 71% more than whites. I agree that it's hard to see many of these issues as individuals, but it is also very easy to take an interested party's shallow analysis and take their conclusions as gospel without asking harder questions, or doing your own homework. Let's not lose sight of the forest for the trees.

Dude, instead of using master's degrees as a proxy for some standard that was fair or unfair and how changing it either led to the betterment or detriment of the said groups, why don't we just get specific on the topic at hand? What, exactly, are the systemic barriers that are in place that prevent X-type of person from joining the AF and achieving a successful career? Personally, I don't think there are any. I think arguing by analogy in cases like these leads us literally nowhere. Get specific. On the topic of master's degrees, however, using them in order to determine whether or not someone should be chosen for advancement really only came to pass because it was a way for the promotion board to hit the easy button when they're examining a stack of (basically) equivalent OPRs. Let's be completely honest: we have developed and placed a lot of faith in metrics that we convince ourselves (i.e. promotion boards convince themselves) accurately measure whether or not someone should be promoted. In actuality, however, these ridiculous processes exist merely as ritual to legitimize a purely subjective process. This bullet means X, this bullet means Y. It would be better (more objective) - it really would be - if your OPR was merely a rank ordered 1, 2, 3, ..., n, out of N, and what got sent up to the promotion board was a list of the rankings you achieved over your career along with a recommendation of whether or not you should promote. The promotion board would literally be purely objective, and we'd be able to side-step the little temporary, subjective universe that gets created during the promotion board card game. And finally, I will proceed to flog myself for the overuse of the word 'master' in this post - it has recently been decreed that this word is decidedly 'unwoke' and its use is somehow discriminatory, triggering, inflammatory, and/or otherwise offensive to certain groups of people. My bad, tonight I'll go to sleep in my primary bedroom.

Is it just me, or does choosing people based on race, sex, national origin, or any other immutable characteristic quite literally tokenize them?

I also agree. And would like to pile on with we need more women in prison. Men are systematically discriminated against by the justice system, and the prison population doesn't represent the broader society. Therefore, we need more women in prison.

I saw something similar today and it rang true with me, as well (https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/trump-biden-democrats-reckoning-generation-matt-gorman). Edit (another good one): https://theweek.com/articles/947824/left-just-got-crushed From the article: And I tend to agree. Having Trump in office for another four years would be delicious if only for the unending YouTube stream of leftist children reeeeeeeeeing, but honestly, Trump may have served his purpose, which was killing the Clinton machine, upending the Obama years, and shining a black light on what is our politics. The next four years spent with a fully ineffectual democratic president who can't mumble his way through a teleprompter and a vice president who is in way over her head will serve the conservative cause much more in the long run.

I hope all you guys saying Trump has got it locked up are right - for two reasons. I can't imagine what handing the country over to people who don't know the difference between a boy and a girl will be like, and secondly, the YouTube videos of the liberal tears are going to be even sweeter this time around...that said, I have my doubts. We'll have to wait and see.

Absolutely agree. Watched it a while ago and two things that stuck out to me were the fact that so many (almost all) of the homeless have either some sort of "debilitating" mental condition or are hopelessly addicted. One officer's quote stood out to me in particular: "Drug dealers selling crack, meth and heroin are evil people preying on the weakest part of society and belong in prison. We arrest them and nothing happens to them. They are back out on the street immediately. We need to acknowledge the disregard for human life inherent in selling life ending drugs and lock the dealers up for serious time." There are elements in society that literally profit from people's death. I'm open (but skeptical) to the "legalization" argument. Weed has been legal in a lot of states now, and there is still a very strong illicit market for it, so I don't buy the argument that we can just tax it and it'll just all be ok.

Gotta disagree with you completely on that one. Just because we have formalized/outsourced violence to an entity called the police does not make it their job (in any part) to get hurt while "serving and protecting" the rest of us. This is a "job" that has to be done by someone and is ultimately an extension of all of our most basic rights to not be harmed by other individuals - if we didn't have police is it my job to get a "little bit harmed" while defending my home because the robber has "rights" too? I don't think so. So the police who fulfill this role in society have zero duty to take even the smallest harm from those who are breaking laws - especially doing so violently. The people who break the law and willfully conduct violence against others (including police officers) are 100% responsible because it is 100% their choice to take the actions that led to those outcomes.