The right stuff

Heather "Lucky" Penney now commands the D.C. Air National Guard. Ten years ago, as a newly minted F-16 pilot, she flew a number of sorties on 911; first to intercept Flight 93 and then to clear the skies of planes that might be part of the 911 terrorist attack.

In an interview with Steven Scully on C-SPAN, Penney, who 10 years ago had just completed her basic training on F-16s, talked quietly about the way her day unfolded. This was about as compelling an interview as I've seen in years.

Her sober delivery was laced with disarming levity: "We are very deliberate about who has the authority to authorize whether or not we hit the pickle button and the missile comes off the plane." and "We all kind of laughed, like 'what kind of bozo porked his instrument approach going into New York'?". The language clearly signaled membership of the small elite group of fighter pilots, yet it didn't come across as affected, no did her humor indicate a lack of appreciation for the seriousness of her job.

Her account of the day was both straightforward and fascinating.

Scully: "How did you prepare for something like this? How did you personally prepare prior to 911?

Penney: "Er, yeah, I didn't. [laughs] Because that was not one of our doctrinal taskings, there was no alert training for me as a wing-man. My job was to learn how to go to war, My job wasn't learn how to sit alert, and there were no rules of engagement. We hadn't even thought about what that kind of mission might be like on American soil".

But it was her description of how she planned to bring down a hijacked plane without any weapons on her F-16 that was (forgive the hyperbole) so completely mind-blowing.

In the short time it took for her to gather her flight gear, she had thought through some different scenarios and their implications for collateral damage and concluded that to minimize the debris field meant breaking off the plane's tail section. Without any hint of bravado, she calmly explained that taking off the tail meant ramming her plane into the airliner.

Scully: "Potentially you have to bring down a plane. In the light of everything that was happening, did you give any thought as to how you would have done that - if it was over the city?"

Penney: "For the lager aircraft, it would simply be taking off the tail which would be... I would essentially be a Kamikaze and ram my aircraft in to the tail of the aircraft. I gave some thought to: would I have time to eject? but I would need to ensure... [laughs] ...I mean, you only get one chance. You don't want to eject and then have missed, right? You've got to be able to stick with it the whole way".

Scully: "So you were prepared to take your own life, if necessary, to bring down that plane."

Penney: "Of course".

This last line was delivered quietly, almost dispassionately, yet it was clear that it wasn't because of a lack of emotion. Nor was it empty rhetoric, but came, I think, from deep sense of duty, combined with iron self-discipline and self-control. Penney is exactly the kind of person I'd want defending this country. Intelligent and thoughtful (not to mention articulate), she is indeed "the right stuff".

Watch the video. Believe, me, it will be an hour well spent.

Supply and demand - 2

The Economist noted last week that "co-operation was in short supply" in American politics. When something is in short supply, its price rises. And the Tea Party's asking price for co-operation is far to high for many Democrats. 

Supply and demand - 1

Tracy, CA, is now charging for 911 calls. Just as many people choose not to buy medical insurance, many will likely choose not to pay the $48 annual 911 fee. Then, if they need emergency services, they face a $300 per-call fee. If more people choose both to opt out, and, because of the call-out fee, decide not to call 911, not only will Tracy be a less safe place to live, but the cost of 911 services will continue to rise as fixed costs have to be spread over ever smaller numbers of annual contributions and one time fees.

There are some - the more extreme second amendment crowd - who think that we should all be carrying guns and looking out for ourselves anyway. With this additional (regressive) tax for public safety services, there may come a point when people who had been happy to rely on the police to keep order may find the case for arming themselves in self defense too economically compelling to ignore. Even at today's rates, one call-out costs almost exactly the same as a Remington 12 gauge shotgun - which you can use as many time as you need.  

At that point, we'd be back in the Wild West of 150 years ago. Some see that kind of "rugged individualism" and self reliance as a romantic idyl. To me, it's my worst nightmare.

A new narrative

I hadn't heard this one before which may mean I'm deaf; or it could be that it's taken three years and the associated fading memories to concoct.

The cause of the debt crisis 

Greedy home owners and Democrat ideologues were jointly to blame for the financial meltdown. Here's why:

The former took out mortgages, of their own volition and with no encouragement from anyone else, that they knew (being the financial sages and visionaries they are) they couldn't afford.

They were aided and abetted in this by Democrats who "forced" the banks to write unsound mortgages which they would never have done otherwise¹. The banks were therefore obligated, simply out of a fiduciary duty to shareholders, to defray the risk they were being blackmailed into taking on. They did this by packaging these risky loans and selling them on to counter-parties who should have known what they were buying - caveat emptor². So it wasn't the fault of the companies selling arsenic-laced CDOs and CDSs.

Conclusion: the banks are actually innocent victims in a socialist plot cooked up by the people in the lowest income segments of society and their Democratic "enablers", and to add insult to injury, Wall street is now suffering unjustified and vindictive reprisals from the AGs and other regulatory agencies.

My goodness - isn't that a great story? A+ for creativity. All the more reason to worry about 1) who writes the history and 2) who controls choice of history books kids are told to buy. This one is right up there with creationism. 

^{1 - The Democrats controlled both houses and the executive branch for only 2 years in the quarter century preceding the crisis while in the 4 years immediately leading up to the financial meltdown, Republicans held the executive and both chambers.
2 - Since the counter-parties to these transactions were themselves banks, if the seller is not responsible for the ensuing mess, then the buyer must be. Either way banks as buyers or sellers are implicated and regulation is clearly need to prevent these systemically damaging transactions from being made.}