Pooter

Of course you have the right to make whatever decision for you and your family that you want. And if you have considered the data and come to that decision I am happy for you, whatever you decided. I will say I would be interested to see what your thinking is since we are coming to different conclusions. My point was that when I hear people talking about fauci, or teachers unions, or the lab leak theory suppression in reference to a vaccine discussion, it becomes abundantly clear that those people are not basing their decision on data. They are basing it on political narrative. And considering the highest vaccine acceptance states are all blue and the lowest are all red, it looks extremely closely tied to political ideology, not data. You can't tell me everyone made individual risk assessments based on data and the numbers just happened to shake out this way. Take a look: https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/public-health/states-ranked-by-percentage-of-population-vaccinated-march-15.html

I agree with you that this has been mishandled and politicized from the start. But also... the Democrats' shitty interpretation of the data shouldn't cause individuals to abandon data-based decision making in response. There are good data on the efficacy and safety of these vaccines from all over the world and none of it has anything to do with the lab leak, what the teachers unions are up to, or what fauci says on a daily basis. An educated person should be able to distinguish between those two things and still make a solid data-based health decision. Don't trust the CDC? Perfect, because there's 100+ other countries whose health departments have reams of encouraging data on vaccines too. But instead, we have close to 50% of the country refusing the vaccine. I don't think it's because they carefully considered all the data and made a finely calibrated personal health decision. It's because they're wrapped up in the covid narrative battle and they believe the Democrats/CDC/fauci are lying to them and trying to use covid to control them. Which, again is completely true. It just shouldn't be a factor in an individual personal health decision.

It's fascinating to me that after a year and a half of this people are still bringing up anecdotal evidence in the face of the literal sea of data from around the globe on this virus and the vaccines. Maybe anecdotes carry more emotional weight which cause them to resonate with people more than hard data. I'm gradually coming to the depressing realization that a lot of people simply don't care about the data, don't understand it, or are so jaded by politics they think it's all manipulated.

I gotta say I have a lot of complaints about the modern Air Force but this isn't one of them. It's pretty cool that commanders can be held accountable by the people with nothing more than a few memes and a cell phone recording. This is what accountability looks like. And I especially like that the wing cc is having to address it rather than being able to sweep it under the rug like what could have easily happened in the past.

"safety is a driving factor" "and the procedures we have in place to triple check ourselves back up this assertion." ...like ORM and 11-202 crew rest requirements? ..That your OG just took a steaming shit on?

Agreed, there's a weird sentiment in some communities that go/no go's are like a break glass kind of thing or only restricted to combat ops, and it makes zero sense. Getting adequate crew rest is a concern no matter what type of mission it is.

🤦🏻‍♂️ No one is talking about the hurricane hunters. And I'm not sure what airmanship or proficiency you gain by flying into a thunderstorm. Sounds like a good way to damage your aircraft and thereby reduce the combat capability of your unit. The point of the sign is you shouldn't take unacceptable risks in training. Get-the-job-done-at-all-costs-itis kills more people at home station than combat does. People regularly lose sight of the fact that they are conducting training and push things well past the margin of safety. As for this instance, the OG has the right to be pissed. His people couldn't execute when the time came. But his anger is directed in entirely the wrong direction, with a big bag of AFI ignorance to boot. Something in the chain broke down between the exercise planning and the squadron level where the aircrew were given a garbage plan. A good commander would have gotten up there and asked his people how this broke down to the point aircrew were forced to make that decision. And how they should approach exercises as a wing in the future so this doesn't happen again. But he didn't do that, and seems like a pretty big twat. I'll be eagerly awaiting the crucifixion.

Just finished up watching trump's cpac speech/stream of consciousness stand up routine. After not hearing from him for 6 months I almost forgot how incoherent he is. I doubt even the most seasoned qanon nut could follow the speed and frequency of his tangents. As someone who wants to see the Republican Party put up a serious challenge to the democrats in 2022 and beyond, it is a constant source of frustration that he has been allowed to stay in the picture. Trump is the perfect foil for Democrats because all they have to do to win is point at him and say nothing else. If Republicans were smart they'd pick the most boring, straightedge candidate possible and position themselves opposite the Democrats' insane policies and social justice initiatives. Remember, most of the things Democrats are pushing--CRT, reparations, LGBTQIA$?!: initiatives, packing the court, massive federal spending etc.. aren't actually popular. We have a really good opportunity to pick a Nikki Haley or a Ron Desantis and just shut up and point at the dems' lunacy. But the Republicans aren't smart, and they are even less cohesive in their election strategies. So 2024 will probably just be another referendum on trump when it could be a referendum on the left's batshit ideas.

No it isn't. It's intellectually honest to follow the science and science points to the Big Bang. Scientists are also perfectly happy admitting to you that they don't know what caused the Big Bang, or what if anything existed before it. Intellectual honesty is admitting you don't know rather than making shit up when you reach the limits of your understanding.

@lloyd christmas -not on the left -not trying to deny/deflect -also agree critical race theory is trash Just chill for a sec and you might realize im agreeing with you. And my proposing personal finance education was a dig at democrats because it would do way more to achieve their "equity" goals than CRT would. You create upward mobility in society by teaching self-sufficiency rather than perpetual victimhood. @dream big As for creationism over CRT, I'm not sure what good teaching one brand of nonsense over another would accomplish. Especially because there are some pretty nasty implications that follow if you accept the premise that an omnipotent god created everything.

The thing that pisses me off the most here is that while we all shit-sling about CRT, there actually is a topic that, if you taught it to every child in America, would go a long way in leveling the playing field Democrats are so convinced is systemically unfair. That topic is called Basics of Personal Finance. Proposed lesson plans include: What is interest? How can it work for me and against me? How does a loan work? How do credit cards work? How do I make a budget? How much should I save and for what? What is a retirement plan? How do I invest my money? What is appreciation and depreciation? The fact that financial literacy is not regarded as the absolute most important thing to teach in public school has always blown my mind. I had a substitute teacher play Dave Ramsey videos for a week once in 11th grade, and if I hadn't already been taught most of those concepts by my parents it would have been the most consequential week of education in my life.

Everything everyone said above. Also, know that some of the best flying to be had in the Air Force these days is flying the line in a UPT squadron. You will never fly more with less prep work than you do there, and you will hone your airmanship and competence in the airframe to an extreme degree. And yes it's very nice to basically check all of the boxes for your airline application in your very first assignment. One downside: if you are a guy who has their heart set on weapons school, know that you have a huge game of catch-up ahead of you. When you eventually get to your MWS you will be well behind your peers in tactical knowledge and the time window to apply will be rapidly closing as you will be a mid level captain at that point. Definitely seen it done, just know that the window of opportunity is small, and closes quickly.

Okay that's something.. But is that ever going to happen in the real world? What other medications do you know of where the manufacturer/government preemptively accept full financial liability for any/all future side effects? In this hypothetical scenario, how would you even go about proving the vaccine is causal in a medical problem you have 10 or 20 years down the road? And which side effects should be covered? Also are we going to apply this rule to other medications? I'm sure in a country of 300 million I can find five people who died after taking Advil. I'm asking these things because if the line in the sand we're drawing is unrealistic, maybe we need to come up with a better one. For me the calculus is very simple. We don't know the long term effects of the vaccine or covid so there's no point trying to compare two unknown variables. What we do know is the short/medium term effects of both, and even for young healthy people a bad vaccine reaction is orders of magnitude less likely than dying from covid 19.

As interesting as this conversation is.. I am neither a fighter pilot nor a nav and I'm curious at what point the quality and quantity of data supporting the efficacy/safety of the covid vaccines could convince you guys to get it. Is there a benchmark you are looking for it to surpass? A certain number of years without widespread major side effects? A specific number of long term studies that prove its safety? A certain entity whose data you would trust? Would the emergence of a more dangerous covid variant change your calculus? I'm just wondering, because without a logical, measurable benchmark to evaluate this on it's essentially the same trash argument as the granola munching anti-vax mom crowd... I'm seeing a lot of similarities "I don't trust anyone, the science was rushed/flawed, the data is doctored" etc.. So what data, when, how much, and from whom do you want for it to be good enough?

Edit: these vaccines are so good they made the liberals clinging to mask wearing look like complete idiots. What's not to love?

For what it's worth, I trust the vaccine because of the pharmaceutical companies, not in spite of them. Conservatives (including myself) love to tout how the free market in America fosters more medical innovation than anywhere else on the planet. And I really believe that is the case. Most drugs are developed here. If you need world class surgery of pretty much any kind, you come here. The system isn't perfect but on the innovation front, we solve the shit out of medical problems. And the covid pandemic is the perfect example of that. 9 months ago the US was the covid dumpster fire of the entire world, and now because of these vaccines we are more open, back to normal, and with lower case loads than almost anywhere else. That's an amazing achievement and it has absolutely nothing to do with the government. It has to do with the awesomely smart people who figured this shit out and who would have never signed off on it if the benefits didn't outweigh the risks. It also has to do with the fact that the free market incentivized these companies to make a vaccine that would actually work. They knew they'd have to compete with other vaccine brands and they also knew the mother of all global class action lawsuits would be waiting for them if they porked it.

People with the means to will just say F the city and move out to red states and more rural areas in general. Which is what we're already seeing happen. That's the one good thing to come out of this pandemic--it showed everyone how shitty the liberal policies that dominate our cities are. The only draws cities ever had in the first place were employment opportunities and amenities like nice bars/restaurants/shopping etc... but the Democrats just proved they'll shut that down if they feel like it. And then all you have left is an expensive, crowded, crime-riddled shithole.

They can talk about whatever useless nonsense they want in sociology classes.. perfectly fine by me. That degree already isnt worth the paper it's written on so CRT conversations certainly aren't going to change that. But with CRT itself I don't think we need to wait at all. Despite entering the mainstream very recently it's been around for decades and is basically Marxist class struggles repackaged in terms of race. The gist is that any outcome differential between racial groups along any metric imaginable can be chalked up to a racist system. The part they don't want you to know is that since differentials between groups have and always will exist, "the work" needed to alleviate "systemic racism" will never be complete. And If you disagree with the assertion that all of the systems are racist, that's because you're a beneficiary of those systems which only increases your need for remediation. If the goal is to permanently cast oneself as the victim, it's basically a perfect ideology.

I think senior generals are heavily influenced by the whims of the administration. It is also possible that he's busy, doesn't have the bandwidth to fully look into this stuff, and does not realize now nefarious the content he's quasi-endorsing truly is.

To your first point - Absolutely. As for Gen Milley's context, it could be a "know ones adversary" situation or it could be more of an endorsement of those ideas on his part. I air toward the second option when you look at what else makes up most of these reading lists: bonafide military history/strategy books and organizational/leadership self help books. I don't see him putting kendi on there just to play some devils advocate.. especially on a hugely hot button issue. There's also a third option: he was pressured to include it on the list, and "know thy enemy" is just the excuse he's using to try to pass it off. Probably why he's a four star and I'm not.

Agreed on Ingram and gaetz. But hugely object to putting CRT trash like that on the reading list just to be "well read." I noticed that Marx, Lenin, etc.. aren't on there. Which is a good thing because those are bad ideas and antithetical to fundamental American principles. We should know what CRT is, but only for purposes of debunking it. Featuring critical race theory on the chiefs reading list is a de-facto endorsement, and I would bet the good general was "strongly encouraged" to include those titles by administration officials who have a vested interest in this ideology that goes much deeper than being "well-read" and "understanding the American people"

Pushing for "equity" is a master stroke by the left because it can never be achieved. You will always have more work to do in the pursuit of perfect equity so it always gives them a racist/classist boogeyman to point at when things between groups are inevitably inequitable. I think the best strategy for republicans is to try and educate the public that equity between all groups is never possible and has never happened in the entirety of human history at any time or any place. The fact that the equity goal is vague and the goalposts are always moving is the feature, not the bug.

It's almost like the president of the United States, who has the highest access to intelligence reports of any human being on earth, could have....... set the story straight. but instead we got: "it's not a big deal it'll go away soon OH WAIT actually it's a huge deal and probably a Chinese bioweapon OH WAIT take this hydroxychloroquine drug and shine a flashlight up your ass OH WAIT masking is a fundamental violation of your rights." Again, for the one millionth time, of course the media is biased. Of course they hated trump. And of course they wanted to do everything in their power to trash him. But at a certain point even they are limited by the bounds of reality. If trump came out and made responsible, cogent, fact-based points based on quality intelligence he had pertaining to the origins of the virus, that would be very difficult to discount. Instead he spewed xenophobic, scientifically illiterate mixed messaging like the absolute clown that he is. He is not a serious person, so stop complaining that he wasn't taken seriously.

Yes, I understand your point and I completely agree big tech, media et al. are way out of line. This is truly some dystopian 1984 shit. But it's a wild oversimplification to pretend that one side is solely responsible. I think you need to ask yourself why you're holding social media companies to higher standards of truth and transparency than the literal elected leader of the free world. Factual, responsible discourse should start with the president and serve as an example to everyone else. If you elect a troll, don't get upset when they get banned.

No. It does matter. The president of the United States cannot continuously spew garbage and then magically expect everyone to take him super duper serious when one tiny portion of what he's saying turns out to be true. Trump is like a right wing idiot's Nostradamus. They think he's a genius and make constant excuses for him because he's right occasionally, while conveniently ignoring the mountain of chaff and nonsense. I agree that trump derangement syndrome is a thing and the media was looking for reasons to discount or oppose anything trump said. But two things can be true at once. The media needs to uphold better journalistic standards and trump needed to uphold basic standards of truth and honesty as the president of the United States.