What’s old…

Posted on by December 14, 2018

Is new again…

First it was Kef, and now… drum roll…

P-8s are going back into, wait for it, Adak! Sigh…

WASHINGTON: The Navy may begin deploying submarine-hunting P-8 Poseidon aircraft to a small airstrip hundreds of miles off the Alaskan coast, signaling a new emphasis on keeping watch over Russian and Chinese moves in the Arctic.

Full article, HERE.

Word of advice folks, make DAMN sure you carry your foul weather gear with you, and remember to bump up your on top requirements, since your alternate is 2 hours away!

And while you’re there, touch up the paint on the det emblems, please? And don’t forget to add your own!

Sigh…

Posted on by December 12, 2018

I used to think I was just a regular guy, but . . .

I was born white, which now, whether I like it or not, makes me a racist.

I am a fiscal and moral conservative, which by today’s standards, makes me a fascist.

I am heterosexual, which according to gay folks, now makes me a homophobic.

I am a Christian, which now labels me as an infidel.

I believe in the 2nd Amendment, which now makes me a member of the vast gun lobby.

I am older than 60, which makes me a bit less than I used to be.

I think and I reason, therefore I doubt much that the main stream media tells me, which must make me a reactionary.

I am proud of my heritage and our inclusive American culture, which makes me a xenophobe.

I value my safety and that of my family and I appreciate the police and the legal system, which makes me a right-wing extremist.

I believe in hard work, fair play, and fair compensation according to each individual’s merits, which today makes me an anti-socialist.

I believe in the defense and protection of the homeland for and by all citizens, which now makes me a militant.

Recently, a sick old woman called me and my friends a “basket of deplorables”.

I need to thank all my friends for sticking with me through these abrupt, new found challenges in my life and my thinking!

I just can’t imagine or understand what’s happened to me so quickly!

Funny . . . it’s all taken place over just the last 7 or 8 years!

And if all this wasn’t enough to deal with.

I’m now afraid to go into either restroom!

 

Random….

Posted on by December 11, 2018

Stuff…

Go read the folks on the sidebar, I’ll be over here watching the whale go by…

But I DO have a question…

And a comment…

🙂

Different perspectives…

Posted on by December 10, 2018

This is from an online chat among some Navy aircrew friends…

We were a make up crew out on a way dark night to chase the Phil Sea Phantom….if you don’t know ask. It was dark…no moon…and we’re double cycle plus. No sub of course…the Phantom was sleeping elsewhere. so we motor back to the boat which was darken ship…and emcon….finally got the drop lites. It’s not bumpy but we had big..big pacific rollers…so the ship was doing a good bit of up and down…..and it’s about 0300 or so. We were single pilot…driver and a NFO in the right front. We’re in at 7500 pounds…..missed the first trap. Came around and did it again…missed again a bit more violently….did this 4 more times and I could tell the driver was pretty flustered, this is when I came to be a believer in dual pilot S-3. We now had both low fuel lights lite, the deck was locked so we had no chance for a tanker launch and were too short of gas to make the beach (Cubi darn it), so we briefed the what ifs..we had gas for one more pass then we were going to fly offset from the track and punch out….nobody wanted to ditch an S-3. Normal preps…tighten straps check gear etc….in we come and he traped a 4 wire….and the deck butt heads parked us right on the bow…..I hate being up there in the day time…night with a pitching deck was worse.

We were into that window that if you hadn’t dipped the tanks you just didn’t know how much gas was left…it wasn’t much though. Since I like the driver I thanked him a lot for not making me go swimming…and got put on the schedule with him the next day as we passed through the ready room.

Oh yeah, on this one we were so low on gas that you could feel the plane float as you went over the deck. But you know…nobody was all that worried…we’d get this pass in and then punch out controlled and close to the boat…the plane guard DD had a helo up so it was a no brainer….you just can’t keep making approaches until you flame out as you see the drop lites……bad juju…and that’s where we were on fuel…but he got it aboard on the 7th pass.

Anybody catch the irony above? Continued below the fold…

Continue reading →

Teh Stoopid…

Posted on by December 9, 2018

It should burn…

Occasional Cortex is at it again, even before she gets sworn in, HERE.

And what about all those wymen on the left who have those homophobic tweets, etc? They like bringing up stuff that men/boys have done, and scream and yell, but where is the pushback? One pusher is Nick Cannon, who calls them out, HERE. 

 And this one is really interesting… Huawai CFO is arrested, the company says nothing, but the Chinese GOVERNMENT is protesting mightily, HERE. If anybody believes large Chinese companies are ‘really’ private companies, you need to read a little more. Huawai is an arm of the Chinese Government, and probably ‘well’ connected to their intel collection services. It IS a good bet they violated the Iran sanctions by playing a shell game with company assets/products, but it’s the long game China always has played. Personally, I think they are more afraid of what ELSE she may be asked about, and that’s why the push to keep her out of US hands.

Paris was burning again, and the yellow vest rebellion is apparently growing rather than subsiding, with others now piling on to the protests, HERE. 

And the Ebola outbreak in Africa, which is getting almost no coverage here, is about to blow up, it’s now in a city of 1,000,000 people, and less than 500,000 doses available anywhere. It’s complicated by the ongoing local wars endemic to Central Africa, HERE.  

And lastly, the Dems fascination/dreams of getting Trump out of the White House by any means possible. There is no longer any pretense of civility, bi-partisanship, or much of anything else. Don’t they realize even if they accomplish this, Hillary STILL won’t be president? And I really wonder if they have any clue about the response this will generate in the general population/flyover country? Article, HERE, one of many. The other thing I really don’t understand about the whole Mueller investigation is how they have continuously turned a blind eye to what the Dems did, not just Hillary, but the Obama administration… Sigh…

Media vs. Reality…

Posted on by December 8, 2018

We’ve seen this before at NRA Annual Meetings with the ‘shading’ of videos and pictures of Everytown and Bloomie’s syncopats.

Here are some other examples from around the world!

The kid in this infamous photo was participating in a pro-immigration demonstration. He wasn’t a detained illegal immigrant. 
Slight difference, isn’t there…
And there is this one… Kinda reminds me of Everytown’s BS…
And from Paris…

It’s enough to make one wonder about what IS the real truth out there… And who is presenting what version of their particular truth…

YMMV…

Dammit…

Posted on by December 8, 2018

It appears the loss of the Marine KC-130 comes down to bad maintenance on a prop blade…

Sloppy maintenance work at an Air Force depot was at the root of a tragic crash of a Marine Corps Reserve KC-130T that resulted in the deaths of 16 service members in July 2017.

Full Article, HERE. Of course they say it will never happen again, but dammit, it SHOULDN’T have happened the first time!

16 people lost their lives over this ‘mistake’. And once again, this points out how differences in requirements, e.g. operational/situational like over water, corrosion, etc. between services doesn’t make for good combined maintenance facilities. 

KC130 crash

My personal opinion, we should never have gone away from Navy NADEP maintaining Navy/Marine acft, because those folks know the requirements and strictly adhere to them, especially the corrosion issues.

I know, I know, cost savings, yada, yada, but those people ‘saving’ that money don’t have to put their butts in the seats of those airplanes like our Sailors and Marines do every day! As of today, there have been now 21 non-combat losses of acft this year in the Navy and Marine Corps. That is WAY too many, and I can’t help but wonder how many of those are maintenance related because the birds are old, need rework, and parts are getting hard to come by, but the OPTEMPO isn’t slowing down and giving the troops a break so that they can actually FIX the crap that’s broke.

And that extends across not only the air side, but ships and submarines. Deferred maintenance isn’t the answer, stopping the operations and FIXING problems should be the priority!

I got nuttin…

Posted on by December 5, 2018

Trying to play with formatting for the book… I can’t brain now, so you get humor…

Tax cut explained- This is indeed a very exciting prospect.  I’ll explain it by using a Q & A format:

Q. What is a ‘Tax Cut’ ?

A. It is extra money that the federal government will return to taxpayers when they file their “1040 Tax Returns”.

Q.Where will the government get this money that they are going to return?

A. From taxpayers.

Q. So the government is giving me back my own money?

A. Only a smidgen of it, a couple of thousand dollars.

Q. What is the purpose of this tax cut?

A The plan is for you to use the money to purchase an ultra high-definition TV set, thus stimulating the economy.

Q. But isn’t that stimulating the economy of China?

A. Shut up.

Below is some helpful advice on how to best help the U.S. Economy by spending your “tax cut returns” wisely:

* If you spend the “tax cut returns” money at Wal-Mart, the money will  ; go to China or Sri Lanka .

* If you spend it on gasoline, your money will go to the Arabs.

* If you purchase a computer, it will go to India (software), China (hardware) …

* If you purchase fruit and vegetables, it will go to Mexico, Honduras or Guatemala …

* If you buy an efficient car, it will go to Japan or Korea.

* If you purchase useless stuff, it will go to Taiwan.

* If you pay your credit cards off, or buy stock, it will go to banking management bonuses and they will hide it offshore.

Instead, keep the money in America by: 1) Spending it at yard sales, or 2) Going to ball games, or 3) Spending it on prostitutes, or 4) Beer or 5) Tattoos.

(These are the only American businesses still operating in the U.S. )

Conclusion: Go to a ball game with a tattooed prostitute that you met at a yard sale and drink beer all day! No need to thank me, I’m just glad I could be of help.

There there are cartoons…

Snerk…

TBT…

Posted on by December 5, 2018

Sigh…

I really DO miss doing this. Many thousands of hours on that bird, and this is actually one of my old squadrons, long after I left.

‘We’ never had media onboard, nor did we want them there… LOL

Of course this is an ‘unclassified’ flight, so basically a ‘lot’ of stuff is being left out of the brief, equipment is being left off, etc… It’s only about six minutes long, out of NAS JAX.

Also, we didn’t usually have the ‘luxury’ of catching a boat on the surface… Usually we were hauling ass to keep from being seen if we thought one was coming up!

Posted in TBT