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That's silly. None of them were white.

One big factor that hasn't been mentioned is when USPA required its group member DZs to separate high-performance landings from standard landings by either space (separate landing areas) or time (separate passes). In the late 2000s and early 2010s, collisions in the pattern could account for 25% of a year's fatalities (and they often occurred two at a time). Those have virtually disappeared.

Reality is that you cannot see genes. Reality is that people tend to try to identify male and female visually. Reality is that leads to all kinds of problems.

Hey, the largest empire the world has ever seen was built on piracy, privateering and ingenuity by a tiny nation. This is just the 21st Century version.

It sure was fun and a bit scary to be around students in the static line days! I'm surprised more DZO's didn't have heart attacks. As a young jumper at the time, watching static line students was great entertainment and sure made skydiving seem cool & dangerous. (Doing radio or dispatching them did get a little more stressful of course.) Most students of course did fine, but there were always a few problem students. All sorts of tales and horror stories to be told, as they scattered themselves across the landscape when having trouble hearing or processing the radio instructions (or even turned the radio off because they didn't like the instructor's "attitude"), moved their hands in accordance with the steering instructions....but didn't actually grab the toggles first, lied on their forms and jumped with undisclosed medical conditions ("Don't worry about that eye," said the student to the paramedic checking his pupils for proper neurological functioning after a crash landing, "I can't see out of that eye anyway."), spiralled down into the ground with one toggle still stowed (and getting lucky and surviving with minor injuries), occasionally just went unconscious, chopped for minimal reason ('the parachute was the wrong colour', 'the slider didn't go back up again', whatever), got edgy and chopped because another student had chopped on the previous load, delayed chopping for way too long, started to chop then decided not to and left the cutaway handle partially pulled and dangling, thumped down under round reserves, lost gear in fields of crop after taking gear off before walking out of the field, backlooped into their risers on exit to cause malfunctions and near main-reserve entanglements, suddenly decided to put in a full toggle turn too close to the ground, didn't flare, flared too early but then let it up, and so on. Not that tandems are perfect, but having someone experienced along for the ride really helped make things safer for the STOOOPID ones out there.

His holdings increased in value by $4B. Right. And that's how it works. A rich person's stock goes up in value. He now has (say) $4 bilion more. He does not pay any tax on that. He THEORETICALLY owes taxes at some point if he sells them - and the amount of tax he pays is the difference between the basis (what he bought the stocks at) and the price the stocks are now. If rich person needs money they get a loan, generally at rates at or below inflation. The bank that holds his stock is happy to do this since they have all his money. It's part of the "service" they provide for wealthy investors. Then they die. At that point his accounts fall to his heir. His stock is re-basised upon inheritance; now no one owes taxes on the money he made. His heir then sells stocks (tax-free) to pay off his loans. Voila, no one ever pays taxes on the money that guy made. (Of course this only works if you are rich enough to pull that off, and have such resources.)

I have no problem with paying my taxes to support the nation. What I object to is that the ultra-wealthy have bought their way out of doing so.

Who is going to inherit the Earth? America? On the list of the world's 50 largest defense contractors US corporations occupy 19 spots including the 5 top ones. You spend money like a drunken sailor, or more like a power mad politician. Yet you consistently come home with your tail between your legs. You start wars that you can not end pissing away resources that your hard working people keep shoveling into the furnace of corrupt greed. All the time sitting on enough WMD to attract the other side's attention with each of you parking missile submarines in hiding places so that both of you can be certain of each other's destruction. The meek will indeed inherit what is left of the Earth after your foolish pride ruins your part of it, and most likely my part as well.