It's kinda funny how these discussions end up coming aroud to the same old thing. I guess I always end up going back to the most basic motivation, because, ultimately, that's why we do anything at all. I don't want to believe you're racist. That's a very harsh term for what exists in nature. For the most part, we are hard wired that way. Let's just say the force(your DNA) is very strong in you.
And as modern society fails to live up to my expectations, it gets stonger- I think because I'm forced to rely more and more on family, Church, and Tribe in that order....the less independant I am, the more fiercely I protect what's left of what I can be dependant on.
Anyway, the penny pinching has resulted in the continued use of antiquated ATC equipment. The controllers have been fighting this since the 70's, culminated with the strike in the 80s. And now the replacements raising the same questions. So in order to keep using that equipment, they lay the problem on us with insane restrictions on the use of our vast amount of mostly empty airspace. I would rather pay higher user fees for better ATC equipment than have to buy another new gizmo that's just adding weight to the airplane. I don't want to "secretly" fly all over the country. I just don't want to be burdened with a bunch of declarations and paperwork that could be handled by up to date ATC equipment. I just want want to go up and enjoy the view and find my $100 hamburger
Funny, I just decided that if I ever pay that much for a meal, I want a room and a soak in a pool as well....I used to take my wife to a fancy french restaurant on her birthday. This year instead I took her to McMinnamen's Grand Lodge in Forest Grove- and for the same cost as dinner for two at the French Restaurant, we got dinner & breakfast & a room & a soak in their hot tub.
Uh, you lost me on that. You are aware that it was an Amreican who rented the truck...oops, wait, you were talking about the first bombing of WTC weren't you?
Yep. I consider Oklahoma City the work of a Patriot against a broken system known as the ATF.
Well then, Ryder was used...twice. Hmmm...could it be that Ryder is our main conspirator here? Who owns them? Maybe we should check up on this. I mean who else would rent a truck to a blind man?:-)
Or a man with a criminal background in this day of Total Information Awareness.
Oh, lordy! But you just did with that other statement. You sure have a way keeping me off balance. Your tribe and possibly your family suffered under horrible discrimination, and you want to perpetrate the same upon others?
There's a big difference- those others have a homeland to go back to- be that Mexifornia (let's admit to ourselves that we've lost the Southwest- the Mayday protests proved it's time to give LA back to Mexico) or Saudi Arabia. If they don't want to be discriminated against, they can just go home.
Under visual flight rules, a flight plan is optional. If I'm flying over remote territory, a flight plan is strongly recommended, and I would file one. I don't want to see that be made mandatory. That's just more gov't interference. We suffer enough of that. Most of rules resulting from accidents have nothing to do with preventing similar events. Under instrument flight rules, flight plans are required for obvious reasons to any pilot. They gotta have a pretty good idea where you are when you're in the clouds. Anyway, basic safety should be left up to aviators, not penny pinching bureaucrats.
You've got a very different definition of freedom than I do- but we knew that didn't we? I don't see this as penny pinching- I see it as giving the ATC guys, as cops on the beat so to speak, the information they need to do their jobs. It's in situations where information is denied (whether somebody wants their "freedom" or the military wants their "secret training" or whatever) that problems exist. Secrecy and privacy are abuses of freedom to me.
You don't have then at every intersection, and not all the airspace needs to be controlled. That's where the gov't gets really weird. After an accident happens within controlled airspace at about 3,000 feet, the gov't decides to extend absolute control over all airspace from a previous floor of 18,000 feet, down to 12,500. This obviously does nothing to eleviate the problem near an airport close to the ground. But that's generally how they operate. More false security, just like TSA and the patriot act. That's because they wnat more control, not more safety.
More control, more information, leads to better decisions and more safety for everyone. Less information leads to less safety for everyone, and thus, in the long run, less freedom for anyone.
That's really sad to hear you say that. Everybody deserves the same freedoms. No matter where they are from. I consider anything less to be racist.
We've had that discussion before- and you know that I consider racism to be, at this point, the rational decision, and tolerance the irrational emotion-based decision, just due to how human beings evolved. Thus I have no problem with you calling me a racist- because I think the real oppression is in being forced to tolerate others at the expense of safety and security.
That may be possible now. The last time I turned a wrench was in the 80s, so I wouldn't know how far things have advanced. At the time, every radio had a distinct function. Your communications equipment was seperate from the navigation equipment, In fact, navigation was further divvied up into seperate radios for direction finding, distance measuring, etc. The transponder was its own little box just for responding to radar. At the time the price was between 1,500 and 3,000 dollars.
Someone else said similar- I'm amazed at the cost in a day and age where major department stores use a similar system for inventory control and shoplifing prevention (RFID). But then again, I also remember some of the Ham radio guys I hang out with complaining about the FCC not allowing software tuned radios yet- so this may be a part of that (where the cost is increased because the law hasn't caught up with the tech).
What holes are you talking about?
I'm strongly into automation of systems- not allowing human "freedom" or other mistakes to lessen the efficency of the system. One other guy pointed out that in 1987, a German teenager flew a light aircraft with no transponder to Moscow- and the Russians couldn't stop him and had a hell of a time even tracking him. That's a huge security hole in the system- especially post 9-11. The same poster basically claimed that an easy way for terrorists to work around the TSA would be to use an aircraft like yours- no electronics- and simply fly it into a jet that was taking off. The ATC would never see it, claimed that poster, because the tech is just that bad.
Your cynicism does not impress me. If the majority of Americans had savings accounts which included 6 months of rent+utility payments, and they owned their cars, the economy would not crumble. As long as these buffers are maintained, people can still spend 100% of their extra income.
I had about 3 times that- took me about 8 years to save it. It's all gone now of course, because 6 months isn't enough when your job search lasts 26. Luckily my wife had an inheritance that allowed us to keep the house, and we heated with wood when the gas, electricity, and phone were shut off. It's amazing how uncynical one can be until one goes through that experience. I'm now to the point where I have about 3 months of mortgage+utility payments saved up- I'm about to go through a weekly to monthly paycheck conversion and it won't bother me. But if you're a citzen, you can no longer count on 6 months savings being enough. I personally suggest 4 years worth. It will take ALL of your extra income for the better part of a decade to do it- but it's well worth the effort. Of course, if the majority of Americans actually did THAT- well, certain industries would would quickly go bankrupt.
A retalitory strike against a family. We had several bin Ladens in this country on 9-11; the Bushes rounded them up and sent them home to Saudi Arabia. Wouldn't it have been much more interesting to cut off their heads on TV one at a time until Ossama himself surrendered?
A retaliatory strike against a religion? Twenty-four hours and we'd have subdued Islam, the fastest growing faith in the world?
This religion also happens to be a political system, which is why it's so dangerous and why it is so fast growing. The prophecy that makes it both, the promise that makes it both, is a promise of justice and one world government from one single city. Take out that city- make it so that there is NO hope of establishing the "Nation of Islam" anytime within the next 1000 years- and you will remove that promise. Two cobalt warheads, fired from the US on ICBMs, would do it. For humanitarian reasons, you's want to hold off a bit- give the people time to evacuate first, after all, you're trying to kill the theology not the people. But in the end, the result is the same- the ancient trade centers of Mecca and Medina, and a huge amount of the desert around them, glowing in the dark for the next 1000 years as a testament to all followers of all religions as to what happens when you take money to do terrorism.
It's called "Making an example", and it worked for the Romans when the Jews rebelled as well- the next most significant thing they had to face didn't happen for another 400 years, and even then, it was a threat from outside the empire instead of another rebellion.
I never thought I'd say this to anybody in the world, but I'm happy Bush is in office and not you.
Well, the difference between my tactics and Bush's isn't much. The only difference is that the guilty have gone free and the innocent have suffered under Bush. Oh yeah, and what are we up to now? An additional 2500 Americans dead? Where my method would have required no troops at all.....
The "culture" that attacked us could have just as easily been a group of American whackos
In which case a slightly different method would have been called for- but basically the same idea. When faced with terrorism, the correct response is a larger act of terrorism.
Despite what they insist on the TV, we STILL don't know who paid for the mission.
Doesn't matter. If the result of Islamic-involved terrorism was the complete loss of Mecca for the next 1000 years, you can bet you'd very quickly reverse the major theological argument that creates terrorists-for-hire in political Islam. It's a matter of understanding the theology of terrorism.
And how do you backup your statements when they discredit you, as you know they would, if you cease to exist to anyone outside of Gitmo?
And discrediting works how? They tried to discredit Wilson- and didn't succeed.
Remember, we're talking about someone refusing to scramble jets regardless of whether there is an actual life threatening incident to scramble them for.
OK, you're talking about a different case than I was. I was talking about the specific case of having multiple radar targets without transponders in civilian air lanes without anybody informing the ATC in charge of that section of the airspace. In other words, the military "exercise" excuse for not scrambling jets. The life threatening incident in that case would be on direct orders from somebody- and the way to release it is to let everybody know we've got a rogue military commander in charge of that airspace. The loss of ticket sales to commercial airlines that use that airspace WILL cause an investigation that can't be avoided by merely silencing the original whistleblower- because to fail to do the investigation will result in a lack of consumer confidence in air travel (much like another thread of this discussion is causing in me- ATC really can't track private experimental planes?)
Of course. The business model will simply change. Maybe I won't provide software, maybe I'll provide replacement organs generously donated from leftists (minus the brain, obviously, those are defective by definition). I'll take the eternal gratitude of all the people with sense as payment.
Ah, but that business model ALSO requires the government to provide you with transportation access to get the replacement organs from the dead leftest to the donor (by air, water, road, or rail). Without the government, you can't get the property rights to ship the body and/or body parts to the people who need them. To meet my challenge, you need to come up with a business model that is free from society itself- uses NO government resources at all. You claim it can be done, but I think you will fail to meet my challenge, thus proving my "socialist" theory correct.
I hope you're not recommending that we ban general aviation(privately owned aircraft), because if you are, then I will expect you to buy my ticket everytime I want to go flying to Des Moines for a hamburger.
Not at all. I just expect you to file a flight plan on the correct website and stick to that flight plan, and I expect that if you deviate from it CAP will be looking for your lost ass. In other words- BASIC SAFETY.
This is usually the response we get any time a schedueled airliner has a mishap. Somehow it's always the little plane's fault, even if none was involved. We find ourselves with more controlled airspace where we don't need it. You're falling into the "post 9/11 world" syndrome. Everything is a threat. We must eliminate this "freedom" thing.
Well, at least for non-citizens. But the benefits of a controlled airspace should be obvious to anyone- and has almost NOTHING to do with terrorism or mishaps of large planes. It's mere traffic control- no different than the reason we put stoplights at intersections.
The Concorde crashes once after over 30 years without an accident. Statistically, it became one of the most dangerous aircraft in the air, though in reality it is the safest machine that ever flew. So, somebody crashes an airliner into a building, and we should ban small aircraft? I don't think so. Well, a commercial truck was used in OKC. Let's ban pickup trucks. Or at least put U-Haul out of business because a Ryder truck was used. That's the kind of logic we get out of these screaming ninnies.
Or at the very least, we should keep young arab men from renting U-Hauls and Ryders. This isn't exactly rocket science, nor do we need to go to ridiculous extremes.
On the transponder thing. First, an aircraft transponder is quite a different animal than an ELT(Emergency Locator Transmitter). An ELT simply transmits a signal on the emergency frequencies to be located using standard triagulation techniques. Maybe GPS is used now. A transponder transmits an ID selected by the pilot when "hit" by a radar signal, and is quite expensive. I believe an ELT is required on all certified(not experimental) aircraft. A transponder is required if you want to fly into controlled airspace. Don't start laying problems on people who had nothing to do with the incident.
Why is the transponder so much more expensive? Seems to me it could be simulated in software on any radio that can recieve and transmit microwave signals....It's not like any of this is new tech costing millions of dollars to produce. Isn't that also basically what RFID does short range? Return a alphanumeric string when painted by the proper radio frequency? And that's cheap enough to throw away on tags at WalMart.
I'm not saying your not correct- just that there are some supicious holes in your story. For all I know- those holes are in reality, in which case they are REALLY stupid holes to have from a basic safety standpoint let alone from a secure area standpoint.
Which was an error considering the culture that had attacked us. Their "restraint" has given us 5 years of war for what should have been a 24 hour retaliatory strike against a religion. But the Bushies can't actually attack their terrorist friends in Saudi Arabia- so we hit Afghanistan and Iraq instead.
Failure to intercept the jets was not an indictment of the administration. I'm certain that Clinton's military would have done no better at all.
I agree with that- but to me, that's just more damning. There is no reason, even before 9-11, that these men should have been allowed to cross the border into the United States at all, Failing that, there is no reason why a jet leaving it's flight plan and turning off it's transponder should not be intercepted at the very least- shooting down should be a last resort tactic, but there are OTHER tactics intercepting jets can take without actually firing anything at all.
To me, the proof of incompetance started the day a small piper cub crashed into the East Wing of the White House- a decade earlier. That was the warning. The fact that neither Bush administration nor the Clintons did anything to change that, and in fact were so addicted to "free trade" as to actually make the situation worse, is a significant problem.
Ever heard of a gag order or how long it takes the military to get one? They'd claim it involved national security and so you'd be out of a job and in jail(or Gitmo) if you opened your mouth. And generals don't often lose their jobs for that kind of stuff, or have you not noticed that yet?
Which would be an even worse mistake in my case- as I'd have auto-emailers set on dead man's switches e-mailing every media outlet if I didn't type in my code on my computer once a day. I've been set up for this for YEARS- ever since sombody mistook my e-mail address as sounding Armenian. Once out on the internet, no gag order can stop the information flow.
Shooting down a civilian airliner without asking questions is erring on the side of caution?
It is when: 1. the transponder is off. 2. The pilot does not respond to radio calls. 3. The pilot does not respond to visual signals to turn back. 4. The pilot does not respond to a military jet in formation off his left wing, a military jet in formation off his right wing, and a military jet descending on the cockpit fron the front to force the plane down.
ALL of that should have happened *before* the planes got anyplace close to a heavily populated area- and didn't because orders to even scramble fighters had to come from Washington due to an ill timed training mission that tied up all military jets on the east coast except for two that morning. (Which was a mistake to begin with- you NEVER send more than 1/3rd of your troops out on training. NEVER.)
Basically, 9-11 proved that this administration is incompetant.
Well I think it's probably because, up until 9/11, every time a plane had not responded to the tower, it had turned out to be some form of equipment malfunction, pilot error ("oops -- you wanted us on what frequency?"), or an honest emergency.
All three of which can be determined with a skilled intercept.
There are enough stories about small planes wandering off course and into no-fly zones; pre-9/11, just shooting down an airliner full of people because the pilot flew it too close to a military installation would have been really bad PR. I suspect that whatever standing orders allowed such a shootdown would only ever be used once -- after that, the political fallout would be so bad that they'd be immediately rescinded and replaced with a chain of command that included everyone from NORAD to the Junior Congressman from Hawaii's masseuse's dog. In other words, it would turn into a complete goatfuck, and quite possibly make the future situation worse by slowing responsiveness.
Well, I would have put the "obvious" point when a mentally challenged young man crashed a Piper Cub into the White House a few years back- wasn't that during the first Bush Administration? I was amazed that Flight 93 hit the Pentagon- I would have thought such an important area as Washington DC and such an important building would have been ringed with Patriot installations after that first small plane incursion.
There was a previous slap in the face that could of been, should have been, used as proof- if the Bush Administration hadn't have restricted such orders to a small inner circle of three people in July 2001.
My point was that wireless control systems in planes enables a new form of terrorist attack where the terrorist is separate from the plane. It's not just an assumption, it's the whole bloody argument for why basing this on bluetooth is a bad idea.
We've already proven that suicide terrorists can, and do, take over planes, but that's not nearly as scary as a non-suicide terrorist taking over a plane from a distance.
Um dude, when was the last time you saw a plane show up on weather radar?
I actually assumed they simply edited it out of the final video.
Airport radar isn't that great either; unless the plane is actively transponding, it's going to be difficult to track. Not impossible, but hard. Also, it's simply not what ATC guys are trained for.
Are you trying to tell me that ATC guys and their equipment are unable to detect a specific traffic hazard within the airspace that they are supposed to be watching? Using radar specifically designed for detecting large metal objects within that airspace? Seems like you've just identified a new vector for suicide bombers- just fly a small plane with no transponder into the takeoff stream from a major airport, since the ATC guys can't see it....
True for commercial craft, but there is a lot of variety on the non-commercial stuff. I've got an old Stitts - basically a J3 Cub with low wings - that does not have any electrical system. It prop starts, has a float and a stick for a gas gauge, and some basic instrumentation. It does it not have a transponder, radio, or GPS - just basic compass and elevation. And yes - it is possible to get lost if you are not careful. Not that something like that is a threat...but it is an excuse. (grin)
After 9-11, that kind of plane is indeed a threat. Pack it full of diesel and fertilizer, and you've got the suicide bomber equivalent of a guided missile.
In addition to that- all three of the items that it does not have, can be added in a single pocket instrument that runs on AA batteries. They're used by hikers all the time in the Cascade range, and they do save lives (hit the button, the transponder goes off, and the radio starts reporting your GPS location- when you're buried in an avalanche it can mean the difference between dying of hypothermia and being rescued). I'd think that carrying such a device would be a requirement for anybody flying such an antiquated plane- and the best part is if everything goes RIGHT, there's no real difference to the pilot- the plane still works the same.
If you're incorporated, you've already taken my tax money for your business.
I don't take your tax dollars; given how much you whine I'm surprised you make enough to pay any.
$15,000 last year. But actually you do- corporations are all about sucking off the public tax money and not giving anything in return.
your state, your road system. Interesting that socialists want everything for everyone, but are quick to cut anyone they don't disagree with off all by themselves.
Hey, at least I pay taxes- when your entire business is about avoiding them.
Ah, so next time you will do the natural birth thing and stay away from the hospital?
The hospital (St. Vincent's) is a part of my tribe, unlike you.
And oh, by the way, your state wants what I'm selling pretty badly right now... enough for me to make more money than I ever have before.
My guess is that it's only the Californicators buying it.
Indeed, please have the natural birth next time and spare us the all the trouble and annoyance.
Well, since you've admitted to selling crap products to people who don't need them, and apparently can't tell the difference between need and want anyway, why should I bother with you? Except maybe as a potential target in the revolution. IF you were worth the bullet.
The natural consequences were that some idiot put himself in a position (by choice) to be affected by artificial consequences. Sorry, no sympathy here for that.
Of course not- I'm not looking for something that doesn't exist! You have no sympathy for anybody other than yourself, obviously, so why would you have any sympathy for the needs of your neighbors, unless forced to feign it at gunpoint?
Which conveniently explains why you have none?
Well, no- I'm a pretty good liar too- there just are better liars than me out there, and they have the money to hire large Italian men to come to my door and insist that I sell my inventions for a pittance.
What a wonderfully elitist, self-serving and self-fulfilling rationalization. I'm sure it makes you feel much better about yourself to believe that fantasy to be true.
It isn't a fantasy, it's obvious- if your customers knew how to produce what you produce, they might still pay you- but only the cost of the time it saves them from producing it themselves. If your employees knew how much you were earning off of their work they'd demand a wage increase. Either one would wipe out your profit- thus wealth creation depends on lying to one side or the other; most likely both.
Let me alleviate your ignorance of the monetary system: the currency belongs to the government, the wealth that it represents does not. I guess if you're a demosocialist and envision a society where nobody actually has any wealth and depends completely on the government for everything, that distinction is rather small.
Well, I've yet to see any wealth created without depending completely on the government for a huge number of items. None of which you seem willing to actually bother to pay for.
True ignorance is the inability to distinguish what's important and what isn't; failure is what results from ignorance. For leftists the only thing that's important is their own unrealistic, elitist, and egocentric perspective of reality which is why they do so poorly in the real world (unless they're filling their pockets with other people's hard-earned wealth, of course). Oh, but that's right, nobody works hard to earn anything that they have (in the leftist's view of the world), so it's perfectly okay to take it from them if you're lazy or have some excuse why you can't earn any for yourself.
There is ONLY hard work- everybody works equally hard. Hard work means nothing.
You're perspective is unrealistic, elitist and egocentric, not to mention incorrect. By the way, it's probably news to you but there are a lot of very successful businesses that are used to implement all of the functions in your (rather flawed) perspective.
None of them would have any business if it wasn't for government contracts- I've yet to see anybody build a freeway on their own.
I'm sure it makes you feel better to think that somehow other peoples' success is tied to those institutions which you socialists love so much, but the truth is that some people make it without (and sometimes in spite of) them.
Fine, then take up my challenge- disconnect your business from all of the above institutions. No commuting- you can't use the roads. No mail- you can't use the postal system, that's a socialist institution. No Internet- it uses ARPANET backbones. Oh yeah, and no money printed by the Government at all. Can you still do business?
I realize it's a "mistake" to be financially successful in the leftist world, but some of us prefer that to being "indentured servant" loser whiners.
The mistake is being financially successfull at the cost of the next generation. The punishment is dying alone in a nursing home instead of at home with your grandkids.
There are many reasons to NOT scramble an intercept in such a case but few looking to say it was a conspiracy will bother finding what they are. Some military exercises come to mind as an example and it takes a lot of phone calls to get a straight answer as to whether one is even happening. Care to take a guess how long you'd have your job if you scrambled jets and didn't check the chain of command?
Tactical situations involving national security should *always* err on the side of caution. The side of caution would dictate to *always* scramble- you can always recall later, and of course standard miltiary procedure would be to attempt to contact the off-course aircraft upon intercept, not just shoot it down. In addition to that- ANYBODY putting aircraft, on orders, without a flight plan or transponder and without notifying the people in charge of watching that aircraft, is dangerously negligent and should be court martialed. The fault is with the chain of command- and if they try to fight back against you, well, take your story to the public, we'll see how long that general lasts in his job having endangered civilians for a military exercise.
There is NO excuse, in this day and age of multiple civilian navigation and communication technologies, for having an aircraft off course and not responding to communications. Add to that a flight path into restricted airspace after intercept- and I want those soldiers shooting first, not asking questions of the chain of command. If the current code of military justice doesn't allow our soldiers enough freedom to protect our civilians in the heat of the moment, then it needs a serious reworking until it does. Until then, it's so seriously broken that we might as well not have a military at all.
Hmm, if I'm a flight controller with modern systems and I see something without a transponder on my screen, outside of the flight plans I'm supposed to be watching, I'd think SOP would be:
1. Get the rest of my traffic the hell away from it
2. Contact the miltiary and give them a position and a vector estimate from the position on my screen
And I'd damned well like to think we could scramble an intercept without contacting Canada or the White House!
Actually, I wasn't going to say their job was more important than yours- just different. If you see a plane without a transponder on your screeen, that's a red alert emergency to a flight controller- first you instruct all the planes near it to get the hell away from it, then you call the air national guard and ask for an intercept. What other people in this thread have informed me is that part 2 apparently isn't enough- apparently you need to contact Canada for permission first.....
Actually, I'm kind of wondering something- why don't we have standing orders covering this situation that avoids the chain of command and allows towers to call the local air national guard base directly when this sort of thing happens?
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It's kinda funny how these discussions end up coming aroud to the same old thing. I guess I always end up going back to the most basic motivation, because, ultimately, that's why we do anything at all. I don't want to believe you're racist. That's a very harsh term for what exists in nature. For the most part, we are hard wired that way. Let's just say the force(your DNA) is very strong in you.
And as modern society fails to live up to my expectations, it gets stonger- I think because I'm forced to rely more and more on family, Church, and Tribe in that order....the less independant I am, the more fiercely I protect what's left of what I can be dependant on.
Anyway, the penny pinching has resulted in the continued use of antiquated ATC equipment. The controllers have been fighting this since the 70's, culminated with the strike in the 80s. And now the replacements raising the same questions. So in order to keep using that equipment, they lay the problem on us with insane restrictions on the use of our vast amount of mostly empty airspace. I would rather pay higher user fees for better ATC equipment than have to buy another new gizmo that's just adding weight to the airplane. I don't want to "secretly" fly all over the country. I just don't want to be burdened with a bunch of declarations and paperwork that could be handled by up to date ATC equipment. I just want want to go up and enjoy the view and find my $100 hamburger
Funny, I just decided that if I ever pay that much for a meal, I want a room and a soak in a pool as well....I used to take my wife to a fancy french restaurant on her birthday. This year instead I took her to McMinnamen's Grand Lodge in Forest Grove- and for the same cost as dinner for two at the French Restaurant, we got dinner & breakfast & a room & a soak in their hot tub.
Uh, you lost me on that. You are aware that it was an Amreican who rented the truck...oops, wait, you were talking about the first bombing of WTC weren't you?
:-)
Yep. I consider Oklahoma City the work of a Patriot against a broken system known as the ATF.
Well then, Ryder was used...twice. Hmmm...could it be that Ryder is our main conspirator here? Who owns them? Maybe we should check up on this. I mean who else would rent a truck to a blind man?
Or a man with a criminal background in this day of Total Information Awareness.
Oh, lordy! But you just did with that other statement. You sure have a way keeping me off balance. Your tribe and possibly your family suffered under horrible discrimination, and you want to perpetrate the same upon others?
There's a big difference- those others have a homeland to go back to- be that Mexifornia (let's admit to ourselves that we've lost the Southwest- the Mayday protests proved it's time to give LA back to Mexico) or Saudi Arabia. If they don't want to be discriminated against, they can just go home.
Under visual flight rules, a flight plan is optional. If I'm flying over remote territory, a flight plan is strongly recommended, and I would file one. I don't want to see that be made mandatory. That's just more gov't interference. We suffer enough of that. Most of rules resulting from accidents have nothing to do with preventing similar events. Under instrument flight rules, flight plans are required for obvious reasons to any pilot. They gotta have a pretty good idea where you are when you're in the clouds. Anyway, basic safety should be left up to aviators, not penny pinching bureaucrats.
You've got a very different definition of freedom than I do- but we knew that didn't we? I don't see this as penny pinching- I see it as giving the ATC guys, as cops on the beat so to speak, the information they need to do their jobs. It's in situations where information is denied (whether somebody wants their "freedom" or the military wants their "secret training" or whatever) that problems exist. Secrecy and privacy are abuses of freedom to me.
You don't have then at every intersection, and not all the airspace needs to be controlled. That's where the gov't gets really weird. After an accident happens within controlled airspace at about 3,000 feet, the gov't decides to extend absolute control over all airspace from a previous floor of 18,000 feet, down to 12,500. This obviously does nothing to eleviate the problem near an airport close to the ground. But that's generally how they operate. More false security, just like TSA and the patriot act. That's because they wnat more control, not more safety.
More control, more information, leads to better decisions and more safety for everyone. Less information leads to less safety for everyone, and thus, in the long run, less freedom for anyone.
That's really sad to hear you say that. Everybody deserves the same freedoms. No matter where they are from. I consider anything less to be racist.
We've had that discussion before- and you know that I consider racism to be, at this point, the rational decision, and tolerance the irrational emotion-based decision, just due to how human beings evolved. Thus I have no problem with you calling me a racist- because I think the real oppression is in being forced to tolerate others at the expense of safety and security.
That may be possible now. The last time I turned a wrench was in the 80s, so I wouldn't know how far things have advanced. At the time, every radio had a distinct function. Your communications equipment was seperate from the navigation equipment, In fact, navigation was further divvied up into seperate radios for direction finding, distance measuring, etc. The transponder was its own little box just for responding to radar. At the time the price was between 1,500 and 3,000 dollars.
Someone else said similar- I'm amazed at the cost in a day and age where major department stores use a similar system for inventory control and shoplifing prevention (RFID). But then again, I also remember some of the Ham radio guys I hang out with complaining about the FCC not allowing software tuned radios yet- so this may be a part of that (where the cost is increased because the law hasn't caught up with the tech).
What holes are you talking about?
I'm strongly into automation of systems- not allowing human "freedom" or other mistakes to lessen the efficency of the system. One other guy pointed out that in 1987, a German teenager flew a light aircraft with no transponder to Moscow- and the Russians couldn't stop him and had a hell of a time even tracking him. That's a huge security hole in the system- especially post 9-11. The same poster basically claimed that an easy way for terrorists to work around the TSA would be to use an aircraft like yours- no electronics- and simply fly it into a jet that was taking off. The ATC would never see it, claimed that poster, because the tech is just that bad.
I'm not sure if that's still
Your cynicism does not impress me. If the majority of Americans had savings accounts which included 6 months of rent+utility payments, and they owned their cars, the economy would not crumble. As long as these buffers are maintained, people can still spend 100% of their extra income.
I had about 3 times that- took me about 8 years to save it. It's all gone now of course, because 6 months isn't enough when your job search lasts 26. Luckily my wife had an inheritance that allowed us to keep the house, and we heated with wood when the gas, electricity, and phone were shut off. It's amazing how uncynical one can be until one goes through that experience. I'm now to the point where I have about 3 months of mortgage+utility payments saved up- I'm about to go through a weekly to monthly paycheck conversion and it won't bother me. But if you're a citzen, you can no longer count on 6 months savings being enough. I personally suggest 4 years worth. It will take ALL of your extra income for the better part of a decade to do it- but it's well worth the effort. Of course, if the majority of Americans actually did THAT- well, certain industries would would quickly go bankrupt.
A retalitory strike against a family. We had several bin Ladens in this country on 9-11; the Bushes rounded them up and sent them home to Saudi Arabia. Wouldn't it have been much more interesting to cut off their heads on TV one at a time until Ossama himself surrendered?
A retaliatory strike against a religion? Twenty-four hours and we'd have subdued Islam, the fastest growing faith in the world?
This religion also happens to be a political system, which is why it's so dangerous and why it is so fast growing. The prophecy that makes it both, the promise that makes it both, is a promise of justice and one world government from one single city. Take out that city- make it so that there is NO hope of establishing the "Nation of Islam" anytime within the next 1000 years- and you will remove that promise. Two cobalt warheads, fired from the US on ICBMs, would do it. For humanitarian reasons, you's want to hold off a bit- give the people time to evacuate first, after all, you're trying to kill the theology not the people. But in the end, the result is the same- the ancient trade centers of Mecca and Medina, and a huge amount of the desert around them, glowing in the dark for the next 1000 years as a testament to all followers of all religions as to what happens when you take money to do terrorism.
It's called "Making an example", and it worked for the Romans when the Jews rebelled as well- the next most significant thing they had to face didn't happen for another 400 years, and even then, it was a threat from outside the empire instead of another rebellion.
I never thought I'd say this to anybody in the world, but I'm happy Bush is in office and not you.
Well, the difference between my tactics and Bush's isn't much. The only difference is that the guilty have gone free and the innocent have suffered under Bush. Oh yeah, and what are we up to now? An additional 2500 Americans dead? Where my method would have required no troops at all.....
The "culture" that attacked us could have just as easily been a group of American whackos
In which case a slightly different method would have been called for- but basically the same idea. When faced with terrorism, the correct response is a larger act of terrorism.
Despite what they insist on the TV, we STILL don't know who paid for the mission.
Doesn't matter. If the result of Islamic-involved terrorism was the complete loss of Mecca for the next 1000 years, you can bet you'd very quickly reverse the major theological argument that creates terrorists-for-hire in political Islam. It's a matter of understanding the theology of terrorism.
And how do you backup your statements when they discredit you, as you know they would, if you cease to exist to anyone outside of Gitmo?
And discrediting works how? They tried to discredit Wilson- and didn't succeed.
Remember, we're talking about someone refusing to scramble jets regardless of whether there is an actual life threatening incident to scramble them for.
OK, you're talking about a different case than I was. I was talking about the specific case of having multiple radar targets without transponders in civilian air lanes without anybody informing the ATC in charge of that section of the airspace. In other words, the military "exercise" excuse for not scrambling jets. The life threatening incident in that case would be on direct orders from somebody- and the way to release it is to let everybody know we've got a rogue military commander in charge of that airspace. The loss of ticket sales to commercial airlines that use that airspace WILL cause an investigation that can't be avoided by merely silencing the original whistleblower- because to fail to do the investigation will result in a lack of consumer confidence in air travel (much like another thread of this discussion is causing in me- ATC really can't track private experimental planes?)
Of course. The business model will simply change. Maybe I won't provide software, maybe I'll provide replacement organs generously donated from leftists (minus the brain, obviously, those are defective by definition). I'll take the eternal gratitude of all the people with sense as payment.
Ah, but that business model ALSO requires the government to provide you with transportation access to get the replacement organs from the dead leftest to the donor (by air, water, road, or rail). Without the government, you can't get the property rights to ship the body and/or body parts to the people who need them. To meet my challenge, you need to come up with a business model that is free from society itself- uses NO government resources at all. You claim it can be done, but I think you will fail to meet my challenge, thus proving my "socialist" theory correct.
You must really hate H&R Block and accounting firms.
I consider them to be an utter scam- and their use should be a sign for the IRS that this person needs to be audited.
People who are launch and run successful businesses wage a revolution one man at a time
Yep, and there's a name for that: Despot.
I hope you're not recommending that we ban general aviation(privately owned aircraft), because if you are, then I will expect you to buy my ticket everytime I want to go flying to Des Moines for a hamburger.
Not at all. I just expect you to file a flight plan on the correct website and stick to that flight plan, and I expect that if you deviate from it CAP will be looking for your lost ass. In other words- BASIC SAFETY.
This is usually the response we get any time a schedueled airliner has a mishap. Somehow it's always the little plane's fault, even if none was involved. We find ourselves with more controlled airspace where we don't need it. You're falling into the "post 9/11 world" syndrome. Everything is a threat. We must eliminate this "freedom" thing.
Well, at least for non-citizens. But the benefits of a controlled airspace should be obvious to anyone- and has almost NOTHING to do with terrorism or mishaps of large planes. It's mere traffic control- no different than the reason we put stoplights at intersections.
The Concorde crashes once after over 30 years without an accident. Statistically, it became one of the most dangerous aircraft in the air, though in reality it is the safest machine that ever flew. So, somebody crashes an airliner into a building, and we should ban small aircraft? I don't think so. Well, a commercial truck was used in OKC. Let's ban pickup trucks. Or at least put U-Haul out of business because a Ryder truck was used. That's the kind of logic we get out of these screaming ninnies.
Or at the very least, we should keep young arab men from renting U-Hauls and Ryders. This isn't exactly rocket science, nor do we need to go to ridiculous extremes.
On the transponder thing. First, an aircraft transponder is quite a different animal than an ELT(Emergency Locator Transmitter). An ELT simply transmits a signal on the emergency frequencies to be located using standard triagulation techniques. Maybe GPS is used now. A transponder transmits an ID selected by the pilot when "hit" by a radar signal, and is quite expensive. I believe an ELT is required on all certified(not experimental) aircraft. A transponder is required if you want to fly into controlled airspace. Don't start laying problems on people who had nothing to do with the incident.
Why is the transponder so much more expensive? Seems to me it could be simulated in software on any radio that can recieve and transmit microwave signals....It's not like any of this is new tech costing millions of dollars to produce. Isn't that also basically what RFID does short range? Return a alphanumeric string when painted by the proper radio frequency? And that's cheap enough to throw away on tags at WalMart.
I'm not saying your not correct- just that there are some supicious holes in your story. For all I know- those holes are in reality, in which case they are REALLY stupid holes to have from a basic safety standpoint let alone from a secure area standpoint.
They reacted with surprising restraint.
Which was an error considering the culture that had attacked us. Their "restraint" has given us 5 years of war for what should have been a 24 hour retaliatory strike against a religion. But the Bushies can't actually attack their terrorist friends in Saudi Arabia- so we hit Afghanistan and Iraq instead.
Failure to intercept the jets was not an indictment of the administration. I'm certain that Clinton's military would have done no better at all.
I agree with that- but to me, that's just more damning. There is no reason, even before 9-11, that these men should have been allowed to cross the border into the United States at all, Failing that, there is no reason why a jet leaving it's flight plan and turning off it's transponder should not be intercepted at the very least- shooting down should be a last resort tactic, but there are OTHER tactics intercepting jets can take without actually firing anything at all.
To me, the proof of incompetance started the day a small piper cub crashed into the East Wing of the White House- a decade earlier. That was the warning. The fact that neither Bush administration nor the Clintons did anything to change that, and in fact were so addicted to "free trade" as to actually make the situation worse, is a significant problem.
Ever heard of a gag order or how long it takes the military to get one? They'd claim it involved national security and so you'd be out of a job and in jail(or Gitmo) if you opened your mouth. And generals don't often lose their jobs for that kind of stuff, or have you not noticed that yet?
Which would be an even worse mistake in my case- as I'd have auto-emailers set on dead man's switches e-mailing every media outlet if I didn't type in my code on my computer once a day. I've been set up for this for YEARS- ever since sombody mistook my e-mail address as sounding Armenian. Once out on the internet, no gag order can stop the information flow.
Shooting down a civilian airliner without asking questions is erring on the side of caution?
It is when:
1. the transponder is off.
2. The pilot does not respond to radio calls.
3. The pilot does not respond to visual signals to turn back.
4. The pilot does not respond to a military jet in formation off his left wing, a military jet in formation off his right wing, and a military jet descending on the cockpit fron the front to force the plane down.
ALL of that should have happened *before* the planes got anyplace close to a heavily populated area- and didn't because orders to even scramble fighters had to come from Washington due to an ill timed training mission that tied up all military jets on the east coast except for two that morning. (Which was a mistake to begin with- you NEVER send more than 1/3rd of your troops out on training. NEVER.)
Basically, 9-11 proved that this administration is incompetant.
One simple answer: because a small Piper cub crashed into the White House and proved we don't control our own airspace enough.
Why am I the only person who remembers that incident?
Well I think it's probably because, up until 9/11, every time a plane had not responded to the tower, it had turned out to be some form of equipment malfunction, pilot error ("oops -- you wanted us on what frequency?"), or an honest emergency.
All three of which can be determined with a skilled intercept.
There are enough stories about small planes wandering off course and into no-fly zones; pre-9/11, just shooting down an airliner full of people because the pilot flew it too close to a military installation would have been really bad PR. I suspect that whatever standing orders allowed such a shootdown would only ever be used once -- after that, the political fallout would be so bad that they'd be immediately rescinded and replaced with a chain of command that included everyone from NORAD to the Junior Congressman from Hawaii's masseuse's dog. In other words, it would turn into a complete goatfuck, and quite possibly make the future situation worse by slowing responsiveness.
Well, I would have put the "obvious" point when a mentally challenged young man crashed a Piper Cub into the White House a few years back- wasn't that during the first Bush Administration? I was amazed that Flight 93 hit the Pentagon- I would have thought such an important area as Washington DC and such an important building would have been ringed with Patriot installations after that first small plane incursion.
There was a previous slap in the face that could of been, should have been, used as proof- if the Bush Administration hadn't have restricted such orders to a small inner circle of three people in July 2001.
My point was that wireless control systems in planes enables a new form of terrorist attack where the terrorist is separate from the plane. It's not just an assumption, it's the whole bloody argument for why basing this on bluetooth is a bad idea.
We've already proven that suicide terrorists can, and do, take over planes, but that's not nearly as scary as a non-suicide terrorist taking over a plane from a distance.
Um dude, when was the last time you saw a plane show up on weather radar?
I actually assumed they simply edited it out of the final video.
Airport radar isn't that great either; unless the plane is actively transponding, it's going to be difficult to track. Not impossible, but hard. Also, it's simply not what ATC guys are trained for.
Are you trying to tell me that ATC guys and their equipment are unable to detect a specific traffic hazard within the airspace that they are supposed to be watching? Using radar specifically designed for detecting large metal objects within that airspace? Seems like you've just identified a new vector for suicide bombers- just fly a small plane with no transponder into the takeoff stream from a major airport, since the ATC guys can't see it....
True for commercial craft, but there is a lot of variety on the non-commercial stuff. I've got an old Stitts - basically a J3 Cub with low wings - that does not have any electrical system. It prop starts, has a float and a stick for a gas gauge, and some basic instrumentation. It does it not have a transponder, radio, or GPS - just basic compass and elevation. And yes - it is possible to get lost if you are not careful. Not that something like that is a threat...but it is an excuse. (grin)
After 9-11, that kind of plane is indeed a threat. Pack it full of diesel and fertilizer, and you've got the suicide bomber equivalent of a guided missile.
In addition to that- all three of the items that it does not have, can be added in a single pocket instrument that runs on AA batteries. They're used by hikers all the time in the Cascade range, and they do save lives (hit the button, the transponder goes off, and the radio starts reporting your GPS location- when you're buried in an avalanche it can mean the difference between dying of hypothermia and being rescued). I'd think that carrying such a device would be a requirement for anybody flying such an antiquated plane- and the best part is if everything goes RIGHT, there's no real difference to the pilot- the plane still works the same.
I don't do business with you;
... enough for me to make more money than I ever have before.
If you're incorporated, you've already taken my tax money for your business.
I don't take your tax dollars; given how much you whine I'm surprised you make enough to pay any.
$15,000 last year. But actually you do- corporations are all about sucking off the public tax money and not giving anything in return.
your state, your road system. Interesting that socialists want everything for everyone, but are quick to cut anyone they don't disagree with off all by themselves.
Hey, at least I pay taxes- when your entire business is about avoiding them.
Ah, so next time you will do the natural birth thing and stay away from the hospital?
The hospital (St. Vincent's) is a part of my tribe, unlike you.
And oh, by the way, your state wants what I'm selling pretty badly right now
My guess is that it's only the Californicators buying it.
Indeed, please have the natural birth next time and spare us the all the trouble and annoyance.
Well, since you've admitted to selling crap products to people who don't need them, and apparently can't tell the difference between need and want anyway, why should I bother with you? Except maybe as a potential target in the revolution. IF you were worth the bullet.
The natural consequences were that some idiot put himself in a position (by choice) to be affected by artificial consequences. Sorry, no sympathy here for that.
Of course not- I'm not looking for something that doesn't exist! You have no sympathy for anybody other than yourself, obviously, so why would you have any sympathy for the needs of your neighbors, unless forced to feign it at gunpoint?
Which conveniently explains why you have none?
Well, no- I'm a pretty good liar too- there just are better liars than me out there, and they have the money to hire large Italian men to come to my door and insist that I sell my inventions for a pittance.
What a wonderfully elitist, self-serving and self-fulfilling rationalization. I'm sure it makes you feel much better about yourself to believe that fantasy to be true.
It isn't a fantasy, it's obvious- if your customers knew how to produce what you produce, they might still pay you- but only the cost of the time it saves them from producing it themselves. If your employees knew how much you were earning off of their work they'd demand a wage increase. Either one would wipe out your profit- thus wealth creation depends on lying to one side or the other; most likely both.
Let me alleviate your ignorance of the monetary system: the currency belongs to the government, the wealth that it represents does not. I guess if you're a demosocialist and envision a society where nobody actually has any wealth and depends completely on the government for everything, that distinction is rather small.
Well, I've yet to see any wealth created without depending completely on the government for a huge number of items. None of which you seem willing to actually bother to pay for.
True ignorance is the inability to distinguish what's important and what isn't; failure is what results from ignorance. For leftists the only thing that's important is their own unrealistic, elitist, and egocentric perspective of reality which is why they do so poorly in the real world (unless they're filling their pockets with other people's hard-earned wealth, of course). Oh, but that's right, nobody works hard to earn anything that they have (in the leftist's view of the world), so it's perfectly okay to take it from them if you're lazy or have some excuse why you can't earn any for yourself.
There is ONLY hard work- everybody works equally hard. Hard work means nothing.
You're perspective is unrealistic, elitist and egocentric, not to mention incorrect. By the way, it's probably news to you but there are a lot of very successful businesses that are used to implement all of the functions in your (rather flawed) perspective.
None of them would have any business if it wasn't for government contracts- I've yet to see anybody build a freeway on their own.
I'm sure it makes you feel better to think that somehow other peoples' success is tied to those institutions which you socialists love so much, but the truth is that some people make it without (and sometimes in spite of) them.
Fine, then take up my challenge- disconnect your business from all of the above institutions. No commuting- you can't use the roads. No mail- you can't use the postal system, that's a socialist institution. No Internet- it uses ARPANET backbones. Oh yeah, and no money printed by the Government at all. Can you still do business?
I realize it's a "mistake" to be financially successful in the leftist world, but some of us prefer that to being "indentured servant" loser whiners.
The mistake is being financially successfull at the cost of the next generation. The punishment is dying alone in a nursing home instead of at home with your grandkids.
There are many reasons to NOT scramble an intercept in such a case but few looking to say it was a conspiracy will bother finding what they are. Some military exercises come to mind as an example and it takes a lot of phone calls to get a straight answer as to whether one is even happening. Care to take a guess how long you'd have your job if you scrambled jets and didn't check the chain of command?
Tactical situations involving national security should *always* err on the side of caution. The side of caution would dictate to *always* scramble- you can always recall later, and of course standard miltiary procedure would be to attempt to contact the off-course aircraft upon intercept, not just shoot it down. In addition to that- ANYBODY putting aircraft, on orders, without a flight plan or transponder and without notifying the people in charge of watching that aircraft, is dangerously negligent and should be court martialed. The fault is with the chain of command- and if they try to fight back against you, well, take your story to the public, we'll see how long that general lasts in his job having endangered civilians for a military exercise.
There is NO excuse, in this day and age of multiple civilian navigation and communication technologies, for having an aircraft off course and not responding to communications. Add to that a flight path into restricted airspace after intercept- and I want those soldiers shooting first, not asking questions of the chain of command. If the current code of military justice doesn't allow our soldiers enough freedom to protect our civilians in the heat of the moment, then it needs a serious reworking until it does. Until then, it's so seriously broken that we might as well not have a military at all.
Hmm, if I'm a flight controller with modern systems and I see something without a transponder on my screen, outside of the flight plans I'm supposed to be watching, I'd think SOP would be:
1. Get the rest of my traffic the hell away from it
2. Contact the miltiary and give them a position and a vector estimate from the position on my screen
And I'd damned well like to think we could scramble an intercept without contacting Canada or the White House!
Actually, I wasn't going to say their job was more important than yours- just different. If you see a plane without a transponder on your screeen, that's a red alert emergency to a flight controller- first you instruct all the planes near it to get the hell away from it, then you call the air national guard and ask for an intercept. What other people in this thread have informed me is that part 2 apparently isn't enough- apparently you need to contact Canada for permission first.....
Actually, I'm kind of wondering something- why don't we have standing orders covering this situation that avoids the chain of command and allows towers to call the local air national guard base directly when this sort of thing happens?