GQ_jumper

And we can only derail them at the ballot box. And they are not (I think) looking forward to 2012. And this is the very reason the media, the left, the right ruling class and billvon hate the tea party *** The Republicans and the Dems both need to pull their heads out of their respective fourth points of contact and stop holding our countries future hostage over ideological BS. And the tea party needs to go back to what it was during its infancy, and stop listening to people like Palin who hijacked it and switched it to "full retard". Both sides deserve to be severely punished at the elections next year. The Republicans need to stop protecting people from taxes, the system is broke, revamp it and make all of us pay our fair share, from the rich down to the working class. And the Dems need to stop protecting the people who expect more than they deserve(Unions....), and realize that everyone should have to work for a living, and a free handout should not be a way of life. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

+1 to that statement. Unions are responsible for bankrupting how many companies? No you don't deserve 75,000 a year for doing a job that a high school drop out can do just because you have worked for a company for 20 years, but haven't earned any sort of positional promotion. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

I'm going to assume that was meant to be satirical. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

certainly not the rich - who have taken their lovely tax cuts (several trillion worth), are the richest they have ever been in human history, and are laughing all the way to the bank... We all enjoy the benefits of being citizens, therefore we all shoulder the burden. The tax already shoulder the largest burden in the country with regards to taxes, and if we all take a tax hike across the board they are going to have the largest increase still. So blanket statements like tax the rich do nothing to solve our problem. We need to get rid of ALL the tax cuts and stop trying to nickel and dime our way out of this. All the deductions for having kids, and writing off housing expenses, and finding ways to turn everything into a work expense, etc etc. Pay the tax rate and quit trying to find loopholes to get your money back. We can't just say this is the problem of the rich when the poor don't pay a thing, everyone needs to step up and pitch in, from the rich down. I agree in part. Yes the rich have gotten some lovely tax cuts, but the burden should be shouldered by all of us. They pay quite a bit of the taxes in this country, but if they take a tax hike, those of us on the lower end should have to give more as well. Its all of our country, and all of our problem, not just for the rich to fix. they've got most of the money - so it's mostly their problem... History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

certainly not the rich - who have taken their lovely tax cuts (several trillion worth), are the richest they have ever been in human history, and are laughing all the way to the bank... I agree in part. Yes the rich have gotten some lovely tax cuts, but the burden should be shouldered by all of us. They pay quite a bit of the taxes in this country, but if they take a tax hike, those of us on the lower end should have to give more as well. Its all of our country, and all of our problem, not just for the rich to fix. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Some old guy that knows sky jumpin!! History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

There are a lot of things that are going to determine your fall rate(body position, jumpsuit, etc.), but just looking at your height and weight, you shouldn't have any issue staying with most groups. Yes you are heavy, but you have a LOT of surface area with a 6'7'' frame to balance it out. When I taught at the Military Free Fall school I had a fairly broad range with regards to my fall rate, so I was able to jump with nearly any student there. We grouped our students by size, and I was surprised occasionally by seeing the lightest student in the class fall faster than some of the heaviest students in the class. I remember one day I jumped with an Air Force kid that barely weighed 140 and watched him burn a hole in the sky, then immediately followed that with a jump with a 240 pounder that floated like none other. Don't worry about the fall rate too much at this point, you'll learn as you get more experience to make huge adjustments to ur fall rate. In the long run that tall lanky frame may actually help you move efficiently when u start turning points. Look at guys like Craig Girard, he's a tall lanky guy and can move with the best of 'em. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

"If the US Government was a family, they would be making $58,000 a year, they spend $75,000 a year, & are $327,000 in credit card debt. They are currently proposing BIG spending cuts to reduce their spending to $72,000 a year. These are the actual proportions of the federal budget & debt, reduced to a level that we can understand." - Dave Ramsey I like that take on the whole scenario. Maybe this will be the wakeup that people need to realize that we all need to make sacrifices across the board to get out of this mess. Its not just the government overspending, its also fueled by us voters supporting anyone who finds a creative way to give us more money, whether it be tax breaks, or spending programs. I've given 12 years and counting to the military and I'm facing a severe cut in my retirement, where is everyone else stepping up to make a sacrifice? History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Where did I indicate it was concealed? Quite the opposite; it's bright yellow/blue and doesn't fit under pants. Fail. And there ya go; two solid reasons why you're typically bypassed for what many others experience on a regular basis. "Random" doesn't consistently, constantly include you to the point that it's become harassment. Even you not-so-subtley point out what you perceive a terrorist to not be. [note to self-"clean cut white guys are less of a risk. Like McVeigh, Stack, Kaczynski--those guys. As Paul mentioned, it's theatre. That's all it was, is, and will continue to be. That's the best response you've got? What kind of dolt could possibly suggest that Ben Gurion (as only one example) is an equal or lesser secure airport to any airport in the USA? I fly through there regularly and the difference is permeable. Exceptionally professional. Exceptionally well-trained. Exceptionally clean. Managed by security PROFESSIONALS and not goat-f**k stupid highschool dropouts, many of whom can barely form a complete sentence. It's the same at all of the airports I previously mentioned. Have you flown through them? One does not need to be a security professional to perceive a professional process. Paranoia is your business; I get it. When you spend more time in your responses trying to pick the fight directly with me and not finding ways to justify your original opinion there is no more point in me trying to discuss anything with you. It also doesn't make it possible to argue with somebody that can't grasp what you say. When I pointed out that I show my military ID and don't fit the profile for what many people consider a threat I was pointing out that I STILL get searched as much as anybody else. So the whole profiling thing everyone complains about doesn't have any merit. Traveling with my buddy recently, who is of asian heritage, but strangely looks the part of someone of middle eastern decent, we have both received just as many extra screening as the other. Please try to understand what I am pointing out, I wasn't trying to trivialize anybody's experience, rather I wanted to show that people of every type get th same treatment. And don't forget that you as a moderator are responsible for enforcing the standards here, please refrain from referring to anyone with a dissenting opinion as a dolt. Its incredibly unprofessional and displays a lack of character when its done. I haven't intended to insult or make a negative statement towards anyone, merely used people's examples to help prove my point. Same goes for the paranoia statement. Some of us spend most of our lives in countries that are controlled by terrorist organizations who have million-plus dollar bounties on our heads. Security assessments are a matter of survival, not paranoia. Either way, you seem to be more content picking a fight with me than trying to prove your point, so I'm going to move on to other things. You have just demonstrated why I no longer enjoy these forums, and rarely spend time in here. You would rather take the first person to respond to your post and pick a fight directly with them than try and find some common ground and lead a healthy debate. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

I fear change, I say bring back hammer-hammer along wiht all the great swing moves you and I both love

So you wear a solid bulky object on your body and decide to conceal it? I've had to travel in knee braces too and I make sure I wear clothes I don't have to completely remove for it to be inspected. Maybe you missed the part where I said "not caused by you." I could personally think of a few ways to hide a sharp object or ignition device in a knee brace, and I can think of a group of hijiackers that used ceramic blades hidden in shoes. This is a necessary evil. That one holds no water, everyone I know that complains about airport security says they are profiled, from my 5'3" asian female best friend, to people I know with names that are obviously inspired by their Jewish heritage. They all have the same story. Wanna venture to guess how many times I've shown my military ID as they check it against the name on my ticket at the entrance to the screening checkpoint and still been singled out for extra screenings? I'm a clean cut white guy, and I travel in clothes that typically leave little room to conceal anything, I also treat the agents with respect and deal with them politely yet I still get searched quite a bit. So the profiling complaint means absolutely jack. I'll give you that one, sorry for your loss, but that still leaves you merely 1 for 3 in the realm of legitimate complaints. What is the basis for your assumption that they are more secure? Are you an expert in doing security assessments? Do you maybe have red cell experience? Strangely enough assessing threats is a large part of my job, and its become such a big part of my life that anytime I travel I am doing assessments in my head of how I could breach security just to keep myself thinking about it 24/7 so I don't get complacent when I travel in dangerous areas and it allows me to keep an eye on danger areas. When people talk about how much better security is at foreign airports they usually base it on the simple matter of convenience. Using simply a metal detector and a wand is awfully easy on the traveler, but last time I checked they are the exact measures that were passed through the last time airliners were hijacked. So obviously not a reasonable way to secure a facility. I'm genuinely sorry to hear about some of the experiences you've had, that sucks for anybody. Honestly though the majority of the time when people complain about cumbersome security practices the complaints are based on nothing more than people being whiners. Everyone has seemed to have built these liberties, rights, and freedoms which they have granted themselves in their heads and use them as a reason to create issues when they perceive their self-manifested freedoms to have been breached. Apart from your loss of property everything else is nothing more than business as it should be conducted. Hopefully those responsible for you loss of property got what they had coming, other than that we all just need to suck it up, there is far more at stake than your convenience. take care History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Photos/scans of private citizens found all over the internet, near-fatal beatings of some who have teased others over their small 'members', belongings stolen by government agents, loss of dignity for any number of persons by having their diapers (young and old) examined and sexual parts groped is hardly "nothing." Quote You take a very small number of isolated incidents caused by a few bad apples to paint the entire system in a negative light. I have travelled on commercial flights hundreds of times since 9-11 and have never once had an issue apart from having to spend a few extra minutes at the security screening explaining something to an agent or getting an extra pat-down. These include times when the chemical swabs have tested positive for all kinds of goodies that go boom due to the fact that nearly every piece of baggage I own, and all my hiking boots have been in contact with explosives for work. Have you yourself had a major incident that was not either A) blown grossly out of proportion or B) largely your own fault? I say again that people need to climb down off their high horse and contribute to something that while mildly inconvenient, and far from perfect is in its most basic form intended to help us. Its not the perfect solution but its better than nothing. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. Benjamin Franklin Quote I would honestly like to try and understand the "liberties" that people feel they are giving up by flying. The only thing I can see infringed upon is your freedom of speech by not being able to jokingly say you have a bomb in your carry on, in which case I agree with having that right temporarily dialed back a bit. Flying on a commercial airplane isn't a right. Nowhere is anyone guaranteed the right to air transportation. When you book a flight you implicitly agree to comply with the federal regulations regarding air travel, much the same way that your entry onto a government installation implies consent to search. If you don't like having your liberties infringed upon, as you claim you are then you don't have to travel by commercial plane, its a simple concept. I will agree though that most TSA agents are incompetent. Most of them are uneducated, and have no other job skills to offer the world. You give an idiot a badge, minimal training, and tell them they are important and they are going to act stupid. Half of the people I encounter in airports seem barely employable. Either way, if the law requires me to take my flip flops off and let someone run the back of their hand through my crotch then so be it. Not all of us are so full of ourselves that we feel the need to make a huge issue out of nothing. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Its called a Remington 870 and a hacksaw!!! History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

SSSOOOOOOOOOO, I've been out of the loop on RW for some time now, but coming back in and seeing these new changes I have to say that I don't like the new blocks one bit. Especially the new block 1, does anybody know what the reason was behind the change? Why would we want to fix something that wasn't broken? History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Actually, from personal experience, you can't beat a Remington. Although I typically rate shotguns based on a different set of metrics than most people, I have used Remingtons in ways that should have blown out the barrell on many occasions and they have always come through strong. Benellis I have seen fail a number of times. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

how about we make ALL americans pay at least a little and nobody gets money from the gov. *** Second that one. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

There is some level of truth to this but honestly from my experience over the last 11 years one of the biggest problems is that our military is no longer trained the way they should be. As people have been mentioning for years our military has become soft. Drill Sergeants are no longer allowed to intentionally induce stress in basic trainees, everybody has to feel special(black beret, CAB, etc.), nobody is toughened up anymore. I joined in '99 and even then I personally felt let down by the challenges that were presented to me in my initial training, I felt it should have been far more difficult. It is even worse now, and I see the results of our softer training every day when I walk around the post and see the way soldiers carry themselves. We need to quit trying to change the way we approach our young soldiers, quit coddling the younger generation and force them to either toughen up or move on. I have heard some of the senior leaders in the Army's Training and Doctrine Command(which oversees basic training) mention that recruits nowadays will quit if they are yelled at or stressed, so the training has been softened accordingly to accommodate their needs. I say toughen up or get the fuck out of my military. Every time I watch a unit rotate into theatre there is a rash of suicides in the first month. Soldiers so afraid of the big bad world that they pull the trigger on themselves within days of leaving home, and the only people to blame for it is the leaders in the military. There is so much desperation to keep recruiting numbers up that we have stopped looking for the most qualified, and lowered the standards. We as a society have become weak and the military is a direct reflection of that. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

know you like to run down anyone who is not a door kicker hence my comments about send everyone else home since you dont need em.. ( In your rather myopic ability to see the big picture),,,, but Congress takes a dim view of losing one of those college boys that a WHOLE lot more money is spent on who fly airplanes than your run of the mill door kicker. Even the door kickers are given training last time I checked on how to Return with Honor. Guess who gets more training... and that takes people who can actually TEACH others how to do that... no matter how much YOU wish to denigrate their service. *** Never once said get rid of anyone who isn't a shooter, just said lets trim the fat and look at things realistically. The military's job is to support the infantry, that includes my job, in my career field, I support their big picture movement. Never once said everyone bows down to me. As for who trains us in SERE. Fellow door kickers who are taking a three year break from the fight to spend family time at home then getting back into it. Not career teachers. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

I never said any of the above.... That was all you. She was firing that one at me buddy, don't know why she dragged you into the fight. Typically someone gets that riled up when something hits a bit close to home, yet the truth hurts sometimes. She thinks my statement about pregnant women is sexist, despite me having no issues with women in the military. However, when my girlfriend working at the aid station here in Iraq tells me that 1 in 5 women in a given regiment admitted to intentionally getting pregnant to go home early, its hard not to hate a bit. Those soldiers aren't replaced, they leave their work for somebody else to pick up. Gen. McChrystal had it right, punish them AND the male soldier who rendered them combat ineffective. And of course nobody likes to hear that the job they used to have is useless, but like I've said before, the military was built to fight wars, get in the fight or GTFO. Again though, what would I know, 11+ years of experience(still going strong), and five trips to combat zones obviously gives me zero insight into the military, silly me. Take care Dan History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

well, bear in mind you started your very informative (if in dire need of some paragraph breaks for readability) post talking about the logistical requirements to support deployed forces. And having the most efficient, potent soldiers means lot of trainers. And other personnel. So it starts adding up. As I talked about earlier, we have to ask ourselves do we need, and can we still afford to have the ability to deploy troops anywhere in the world at the drop of a hat. In the short term, that exercise of power helps the US. But the costs are killing it in the long term, and that long term is getting shorter. Quote Agreed on the comment about my lack of editing! I gave up trying to put well-written posts up a long time ago as a form of protest to the lack of intelligent replies that infect this place It was more of a rant than anything! I agree that there is a heavy logisitcs requirement to sustain today's forces, but trust me, its over inflated, and we are killing ourselves indulging in creating all these jobs. We seriously need to trim the fat, lean down the military, and take a good hard look at what it really takes to support the troops in the fight. Which people seem to forget is what the military is all about. Everything the military does is geared towards supporting the combat arms, but unfortunately nobody sees it that way anymore. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

If you have access to the tax code and are able to read the parts that apply directly to you then whose fault would it be if there were mistakes? There is no catch-22, the code is publicly available, and if you so choose to do the forms on your own then you are responsible for knowing what should be there. The cheat sheet is in your hands and if you fail to take advantage of it then you are at fault. Option B) Join the military, we get our taxes done for free History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Yes I understand both sides were being petty, but one man made the no-pay call.*** Reading comprehension is a critical skill, try again. And yes I agree the GOP was playing stupid games, but I didn't see ANYONE up in Washington screaming to keep our paychecks flowing. For the record, despite the fact that I am registered as a republican, I do not typically associate myself with them. I have not been happy with EITHER party lately, and think the GOP is squandering away a once in a lifetime opportunity at success over petty garbage. Regardless of political affiliations though, there is no excuse for keeping us working and fighting without pay, while everyone in the big offices keep making $100+K a year. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

And how do you plan on getting support to those SF teams when they need it. Clean water is sometimes hard to come across... shelters, sometimes food (if they can't beg, borrow, steal), fuel, long term medical care. Not to mention, you could lose an entire ODA in a matter of minutes, and then take hours or days to get to what was left. An ODB is a C2 element for the ODA's, without air assets, logistics (food, water, shelter, fuel) support, power, or even a semi safe place for them to set up shop, you would be sending that 12-14 man ODA into hostile territory with no support, probably a lack of communications packages that can talk that distance. You wouldn't even be able to know they're being over run or turned on by the indigs. As far as assistance, planes. As far as communication, satellites. Although as usual I'm going to guess that my experience is discounted as usual, being overshadowed by the keyboard warriors serving in every conflict simultaneously through the DZ.com forums, I'll throw it out anyways. theonlyski had it right Butters. I'm an ODB team sergeant, and trying to make a broad stroke as simple as planes and satellites is a ridiculous statement. Supporting our teams requires us to have logistical hubs here in the region. The biggest ones are in Germany and then every step of the way they get smaller and have a chain going all the way down to the teams. The amount of extra work it would take to get support to our operators if everything had to come all the way from the US would make us incapable of doing our mission continuously and largely ineffective. All of the overseas stations serve as support centers for all of our forces who are forward deployed. And the delay that would be caused by shutting them down and having to re-establish them would make us ineffective as a military. Yes we have rapid deployment units that can go anywhere in the world at the drop of a hat, but as soon as they start to spin up so does the logistics monster to follow them and emplace a sustainable footrpint once they take the initial ground. Our military is set a certain way for a reason. i do agree however, that we have a lot of fat that can be trimmed. How bout we start at the ground level, tighten standards, and any soldier that cannot meet them gets their walking papers. Out of shape soldiers, those with "emotional problems" who have never even seen combat, soldiers who conveniently find themselves pregnant or injured every time a deployment comes up, get the fuck out, we don't need you. Then take a good hard look at a lot of the fat in terms of units who don't contribute to the fight. How much do we spend funding the demo teams for each service? If a soldier wants to join the military to go straight to the Knights and avoid combat they should be a fucking civilian. Trim down our demo teams and fill them with wounded warriors, those guys and gals still deserve a paycheck and would do tons for the public image. How about Air force SERE instructors, a job that you can sign up for to guarantee you'll never contribute to the fight, if they don't go to combat, get them out. Then put some serious checks and balances on the services for efficiency. I've lost count of the number of times I've watched the Air Farce intentionally botch things so they could get out of flying shitty missions, or spend an extra day or two in a nice locale, collecting per diem. I've seen more fake aircraft breakdowns than I can count. Get rid of these endless amount of support units that don't deploy and don't serve a purpose, if you're in the military your job is too deploy and serve in combat, not sit on your hands back in the states. Nix all of these officers that aren't getting commands and just end up going to a job that was created to house officers who didn't make the cut to move up, I run across so many that fill billets just for the sake of staying in the army even though they've been passed up for command. You missed the boat, you failed, go try something else. And heres the big kicker, get rid of KBR!!! Or put them under a serious microscope, they have so many people over here who don't do crap. I walk into a support office and there is one soldier doing nothing and seven KBR workers making three times as much who jump through every hoop to not do what their contract brings them here to. If that soldiers is so worthless they get stuck in a support office over here, doing something like managing who gets what billeting assignments, then make them work themselves to death until, they either get out or learn to earn their keep. And all the ridiculous spending on weapons programs, and searching for technology we will never see or use, get rid of it. The Army has been looking for a replacement to my M4 since I joined and I still have an M4. After all the squabbling they have decided to field the Scar, the absolute last choice on the list of every soldier who tested all the options, there's 15 years of studies for you. We don't always need something new and shiny, we need something that works, and more of what we already have. We have 8 support soldiers for every combat arms soldier in the military, is it just me or does that seem a little off? History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

How about a first hand account. In the days leading up to the deal being reached I had to pull all my guys in and make sure that every one of them got on the phone with their wives back home to inform them that we would only be receiving half of a paycheck. I confirmed it when I received my mid-month pay statements from DFAS(Defense Finance and Accounting Service), and the mid-month amount was half of what I usually make. We also received a letter from our command telling us the same thing, and making sure leaders have their soldiers make budget plans with their wives. If I were not on a public computer here I would scan in a copy of my Pay statement to show you what I would have received compared to normal before the last minute deal was struck. So yes, regardless of who is to blame, Dems. or GOP, the fact is that none of us in the military would have received pay, yet we were obviously not going to stop conducting operations here in theatre. Even though we would have eventually received all of our pay once the debacle was over the damage would have been done and there would likely be countless soldiers with knocks on their credit because of it. So a little bit of finger pointing here, lets not forget that the president refused a week extension that would have prevented that to force a deal. He held our pay ransom to get his way. Yes I understand both sides were being petty, but one man made the no-pay call. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower